The Garlic Ballads (10 page)

“Is there a back door somewhere we can try?”

“Are you asking me to do something improper?”

“Lanlan’s only sixteen, that’s even worse.”

“Wenling’s census registration can be changed, but not Lanlan’s. We’re talking about a different township, and no matter how big my hand is, it cant cover the whole sky.

“Bring the girl out and let me talk to her,” Liu Jiaqing said loudly. His speech was a little slurred.

“Go get her,” Father said. His voice, too, was slurred.

Jinju quickly moved away from the window and lay down on the kang, pulling the covers up over her head. Footsteps drew nearer, and as she hid herself in the darkness, she began to quake.

The days passed quickly toward the end of the eighth lunar month. Jinju wasn’t being watched as closely as before: the gate was no longer locked at night, and she was permitted outside during the day. Elder Brother, who treated her better than ever, even bought her a pair of pigskin shoes, which she merely tossed to the foot of the kang without giving them a second look.

On the morning of the twenty-fifth, Elder Brother said to her, “Instead of spending all day moping around the house, why not come help me pick beans? Second Brother went to help Deputy Yang make briquettes, and I can’t manage by myself.”

It seemed like a reasonable request, so she picked up her scythe and followed him out the door.

The fields had changed dramatically in the two months since her last visit. Mature, sun-dried kernels of sorghum had turned dark red, the cornsilks had withered, and bean leaves had turned a pale yellow. Under the deep-blue sky the vista seemed endless; Little Mount Zhou looked like a broken green fan. Birds far from their nests whirred noisily in the sky, a cheerless sound that Jinju found particularly unsettling. She couldn’t bear to watch the unnatural movements of Elder Brother as he cut the beans, dragging his game leg behind him. That leg was inextricably linked to her fate, and over the two months of her confinement she had often dreamed it was crushing her; she would awake with a fright, gasping for breath, her eyes filled with tears.

Their bean field abutted Gao Ma’s cornfield, which had not yet been harvested. Where are you, Gao Ma? She thought back to the summer before, when a tall, husky Gao Ma strolled over, whistling confidently, to help her with the millet harvest. She could still hear the sound of his voice and see his figure. But the more she dwelled on the past, the more tightly her heart constricted, for she could also hear the thud of stools crashing down on Gao Ma’s head, a liquid sound swirling in her ears. She wouldn’t have believed her kind and decent Elder Brother capable of such ferocity had she not seen it with her own eyes.

“Sit over there if you’re afraid this will tire you out,” Elder Brother said with a grimace. “I can manage.”

Deep lines were etched in the corners of his clouded eyes, which seemed dull and lifeless. Something was hidden behind his expression, she felt, but she couldn’t put a name to it. Yet it reminded her of the leg he dragged along the ground. The deformed limb bore the scars of un-happiness and earned him people’s pity; but it was hideous, and that earned him their disgust. Her feelings for her brother matched her feelings for his game leg: pity on occasion, disgust the rest of the time. Pity and disgust, an emotional conflict that entangled her.

Gao Ma’s cornfield rustled as a breeze swept past, tousling her hair and slipping under her collar to cool her off.

Thoughts of Gao Ma made it both dangerous and necessary for her to look over at his cornfield as it protested uneasily in the breeze: withered tassels and stalks retaining barely a trace of moisture no longer enjoyed the resiliency of their youth, when they had been bent before the wind, their emerald leaves fluttering gracefully like ribbons of satin with each gust to form cool green waves; just thinking about it brought tears to her eyes, for now the wind made the stalks shudder as they stood tall and rigid, their once graceful movements just a memory.

Yellow, withered bean leaves rustled on the plants and flapped around on the ground. When a thorn pricked her finger, she looked down at her hands, which had grown soft in the months since she had last worked. She sighed, without knowing why. Sensing Elder Brother’s eyes on her increased both her disgust toward him and a longing for Gao Ma. As her scythe moved mechanically through the bean field, a sandy-colored hare was startled out of its hiding place. No bigger than a fist, with shiny black eyes, it curled into a furry little ball, flattening its ears over its back in fear and remaining motionless. Jinju threw down her scythe and bounded over to the slow-moving animal; squatting down and cupping her hand over it, she felt her heart flood with compassion as she gently pinched one of its ears, which was like a translucent petal. She picked it up carefully so as not to damage the ears; when the soft underbelly lay against her palm, and the tiny animal sniffed her hand in that awkward, timid way that rabbits have, she was deeply moved.

“Get some string and tie it up,” said Elder Brother, who had walked up to her. “Maybe you can keep it for a pet.”

She felt around in her pocket, hoping to find something, but there was nothing. As she searched the ground, he wordlessly removed a shoelace and tied it around the rabbit’s hind leg.

Jinju stared down at the now bare foot attached to Elder Brother’s game leg. It was covered with a layer of mud, and shiny as lacquer. He carried the rabbit to the edge of the field and tied it to one of Gao Ma’s cornstalks, then cut down a widowed stalk, stripped it, and chewed it for the sweet sap.

Each time Jinju glanced at the rabbit, which was often, she saw it struggling to free itself, straining so hard against the shoestring it looked as if it were trying to separate itself from the ensnared limb in order to escape on the other three. Finally she went over, cut the shoelace, untied the end around the rabbit’s leg, and released it. As she watched it hobble off and disappear amid the cornfield’s once beautiful, but now distressed, stalks, a vague sense of hope rose inside her. A dark, boundless secret was hidden amid all that corn.

“You have the heart of a Bodhisattva, Sister,” Elder Brother said as he walked up. “Your goodness will be rewarded someday.”

His garlicky breath sickened her.

She was treated warmly at lunch, probably because everyone had heard of her compassion that morning. During the fall harvest season, when everyone wished he had another pair of hands, they couldn’t possibly watch her all the time. So after lunch she went to the well to fetch water. Father and Mother followed her with their eyes, but neither said a word. She returned with two full buckets, dumped them into the water barrel, then went back for more. Instinct told her she had won their trust.

Disappointed that she had not seen Gao Ma, she was, however, greeted by neighbor women at the well, and the peculiar expressions she thought she saw in their eyes vanished when she looked more closely. Maybe I’m imagining things, she thought. On her third trip to the well she ran into the wife of Yu Qiushui, Gao Ma’s neighbor, a big woman in her thirties with lofty breasts whose nipples seemed always to be quivering beneath her jacket. As the two women faced each other across the well, Yu Qiushui’s wife said, “Gao Ma wants to know if you’ve had a change of heart.”

Her heart nearly stopped. “Has he?” she asked softly.

“No.”

“Then neither have I.”

“Good for you,” Yu Qiushui’s wife replied, looking around before tossing a wad of paper to the ground. Jinju quickly bent over as if to draw some water, swept up the note, and stuffed it into her pocket.

That afternoon, when it was time to return to the fields, Jinju begged off, complaining of a sour stomach. Father eyed her suspiciously, but Elder Brother said generously, “Stay home and get some rest.”

So she went to her room, bolted the door behind her, and took out the wad of paper (during lunch her preoccupation with the note had made it nearly impossible to keep up a conversation with her parents), which she carefully unfolded with a trembling hand. She could hear herself breathing. When some cold air seeped in through the cracks in the door, she anxiously wadded the paper up again and jerked the door open. The outer room was empty. Then, hearing a rhythmic pounding out in the yard, she tiptoed over to the window, where she saw Mother standing under the radiant autumn sun, pounding ears of grain husks with a glossy purplish mallet. Her net jacket stuck to her sweaty back, and a layer of yellow husks stuck to the jacket.

Finally, it was safe for Jinju to smooth the paper out. She avidly read the handful of printed characters:

Tomorrow afternoon. The cornfield. We’ll run away together!

The words, written in ballpoint, were sweat-smudged.

More than once she made it as far as the edge of the cornfield, but each time she turned and walked back. Cool autumn winds had removed most of the moisture from the crops, so that Gao Ma’s corn rustled noisily and the bean pods in her field had begun to crack and pop. Elder Brother and Father were up ahead, Elder Brother complaining about Eighth Uncle Yang commandeering Second Brother to help make briquettes at the peak of the harvest season. “What are you grumbling about? That’s what family is all about—helping one another.” Chastised, Elder Brother held his tongue, turning to look at Jinju as if to seek her support.

Father was crawling along on his hands and knees, Elder Brother was hobbling along on his game leg, and the pitiful sight of the two men weakened her resolve to leave. Gao Ma’s corn shuddered, it rustled, and she knew he was hiding in there somewhere, anxiously watching her every move. As her longing for him grew, she found it increasingly hard to recall what he looked like; so she concentrated instead on the aroma of indigo and the smell of his body. She decided to help Father and Elder Brother harvest the beans before she ran away.

Throwing herself into her work, she quickly outstripped them both, and by late afternoon had taken in more than the two of them combined. When they neared the final section of the bean field, they stood up and stretched, breathing a collective sigh of relief. Father looked contented. “You’ve worked hard today,” her brother complimented her. “When we get home I’ll ask Mother to cook you a couple of eggs.”

Sadness kept her from answering. She was already recalling Mother’s virtues and some hazy events from her own childhood. My gimpy elder brother carried me piggyback; now he and Father are crawling and hobbling through the field, cutting down beans. The setting sun has lit up the western sky. Their heads glisten. Even the wildwoods are gentle and inviting. There to the north is the village where I’ve lived for twenty years. Ribbons of chimney smoke mean Mother is cooking dinner. If I run away … the thought was unendurable. Off to the east an ox plodded down the road, pulling a cart piled high with beans. “The dog days of summer, sweltering in the sixth month,” the driver was singing. “Second Daughter rides her donkey out into the wilderness….”

Sparrows flew by like a dissolving cloud, heading for Gao Ma’s corn, which stirred briefly. A tall figure came into view, then just as quickly vanished. She moved toward it but stopped. She was being pulled in opposite directions by equally powerful forces.

Father’s voice broke the stalemate: “What are you standing around for? The earlier we finish, the sooner we can go home.”

There was no warmth in his voice now, and her resolve returned in a flash. Throwing down her scythe, she ran toward Gao Ma’s cornfield.

“Where do you think you’re going?” an unhappy Father yelled.

She kept running.

“You’re not going home before we finish, are you?” Elder Brother shouted.

She turned. “I have to pee. You can come along if you don’t trust me!” Without another glance at either of them, she darted into the cornfield.

“Jinju.” Gao Ma grabbed her around the waist and held her for a moment. “Crouch down,” he whispered. “Run like the wind!”

They ran hand in hand down a furrow, heading south as fast as their legs would carry them. Dry corn leaves slapped her in the face, so she closed her eyes and simply ran where the hand led her. Warm tears slid down her cheeks. I’ll never come back, she was thinking. The silken thread tying her to home had parted, and there was no turning back. The din set up by dry corn leaves nearly paralyzed her with fear, and she could hear the pounding of her heart.

The cornfield was bordered by a riverbank lined with indigo bushes, and even in her confused state she sensed their unique, intoxicating aroma.

Gao Ma dragged her up onto the riverbank. Instinctively she turned to look back and saw an enormous bronze orb sinking slowly toward the horizon: she saw multihued clouds; she saw an expanse of sunlit fields; and she saw Father and Elder Brother stumbling toward her, brandishing their scythes. Tears gushed from her eyes.

Gao Ma dragged her down the inside slope of the riverbank, but by then she was too weak to stand. The narrow river formed the boundary between two counties—Pale Horse to the south, Paradise to the north. It was called Following Stream. The flow of shallow murky water caused a barely perceptible swaying of reeds at the river’s edge as Gao Ma hoisted her onto his back and ran into the water without taking off his shoes or rolling up his pant cuffs. From her piggyback vantage point she heard dry reeds whisper and water splash. She knew the mud was thick and gooey by the way he was panting.

After climbing the opposite bank, they were in Pale Horse County, where a vast marshland spread out before them, planted exclusively with jute. As a late crop, it was still kingfisher green, and still full of life. They felt stranded in the middle of an ocean, and no shore in sight.

With Jinju still perched on his back, Gao Ma dashed into the jute fields. Now they were like two fish in that ocean.