‘Auntie, I haven’t introduced you yet,’ Chen Di says. ‘This is my girlfriend, Bingbing.’
‘Hello, Auntie,’ the girl says. She has a southern accent.
‘She’s so pretty,’ my mother says. ‘And even taller than Tian Yi.’
‘I came here straight from work. I couldn’t reach Wang Fei on his pager. I heard he’s gone back to Hainan Island. Look, I’ve brought a cake.’
‘I bumped into Yanyan in the Shangri-la Hotel last night. She was very offhand. She didn’t even bother to give me her card. She acted like some hotshot journalist, but she’s still only working for the Workers’ Daily, for God’s sake.’
‘Yanyan came here for a meal once,’ my mother says. ‘Come on, give me your jackets and sit down. You can watch the television. The food will be ready in a minute.’
They file into my room. Two, four, six — eight eyes stare down at me. If only I could open mine and look up at them.
‘He looks like Chairman Mao lying in the Mausoleum,’ says Yu Jin. ‘He has that same serene look on his face. “Remain unchanging in changing circumstances.” Do you remember saying that to me once, Dai Wei? I’ll never forget it.’
‘He led our student marshal team in the Square, Bingbing,’ Chen Di says. ‘He was great. So big and tough. He could even scare off our university’s boxing team.’
‘Really? But look how skinny he is now.’
There hasn’t been so much noise here since the police came and drove away the urine drinkers from our flat.
I remember waking Chen Di one afternoon when he was having a nap in the tent and saying, ‘It’s time for your broadcast, my friend.’ He’d stripped down to his Y-fronts. I could see his penis hanging out. He stared up at me blankly and said, ‘I’m so bloody knackered. As soon as this movement’s over, I’m going to cuddle up with a girl and sleep for a week.’ Although Bingbing probably is taller than Tian Yi, I doubt she’s pretty. I imagine she looks similar to the tall girl who drew us a map of Tiananmen Square.
‘He seems to have shrunk. He can’t be more than 1.7 metres now. He used to be 1.83. The tallest guy in the Science Department.’
‘I read that your urine sold for ten yuan a cup, Dai Wei. It’s incredible! A man was cured of chronic arthritis after drinking just one cup.’
‘Who drank urine?’ Bingbing asks.
‘Haven’t you heard the story? There was even an article about it in Le Monde. “Urine of Chinese Coma Patient Cures Cancer”. You can look it up on the internet.’
‘Only the urine of infant boys was drunk in the past,’ Chen Di says. ‘So if they’re drinking Dai Wei’s piss now, perhaps that means he’s returned to his infancy!’
It makes me happy to hear them joke and laugh like this. Chen Di has visited several times before, but this is the first time he’s stayed for a meal. His girlfriend is wearing expensive perfume. She probably works for a foreign company.
Someone switches off the radio. Someone else bumps their knee against the bed. I feel everyone’s gaze move up and down my body.
‘Dai Wei, your old classmates have come to celebrate your birthday,’ my mother says, coming in to collect my urine bottle. ‘You’re very lucky to have so many good friends.’
The room falls silent. All I hear is the sound of people breathing. Then Chen Di says, ‘Dai Wei, if you can hear me, you’ll know who I am. You’ve been lying here for six years — no, seven. It’s your thirtieth birthday today. Confucius said that a man of thirty must take his stand in life. We all hope you’ll be able to stand up again one day. I want to hear you explain all those strange theories you had about plant respiration. I want to see you awarded your PhD.’
‘Don’t make fun of him,’ Bingbing says, turning her back to him.
‘I’m not making fun of him. He was researching plant cell biology.’
‘I hope the government will have reversed its verdict on the student movement by the time you wake up,’ Yu Jin says. ‘We’ll appoint you commander-in-chief of the Square.’
‘Let’s not talk about the past,’ Mimi says, leaning against Yu Jin. ‘We should all just wish him a happy birthday.’
I find it hard to believe that Mimi is going out with Yu Jin. They hardly spoke to each other in the Square. I bet she’ll tell Yu Jin that she saw my penis. How humiliating. My mother has gone back to the kitchen to chop up bean sprouts. Her life has improved a lot since she met Master Yao. He visits her once a week now.
‘Can he hear us?’ Bingbing asks.
‘I’m sure he can,’ Chen Di says. ‘He’s particularly sensitive to women’s voices. When you spoke just now, his eyelids trembled.’ Chen Di is wearing a prosthetic foot. I can hear it squeak when he walks about.
‘He’s probably just excited to have us all here,’ Mimi says. ‘Dai Wei, Yu Jin has bought you a special qigong waist belt. It’s stuffed with more than thirty different medicinal herbs. Apparently it can cure many afflictions. We’ll put it on you in a minute.’
‘Since when did you start believing in Chinese medicine, Yu Jin?’ Chen Di asks.
‘The factory sent marketing agents round to our office. They wouldn’t leave until we bought some.’
‘I bet they were pretty girls,’ Chen Di says. ‘You probably sat them down and gave them cups of tea. How many belts did you buy?’
‘Stop teasing him! Yu Jin may be guilty of many things, but one thing I’m sure of is that he’s no philanderer.’
‘Supper’s ready!’ my mother shouts, laying the chopsticks on the table in the sitting room. ‘Come and sit down.’
‘Let’s give old Chairman Mao here a rest, and go and celebrate his birthday for him,’ Chen Di says.
There’s another knock on the door.
It’s Mao Da and Zhang Jie. They sit at the table without bothering to come in and see me. Wafts of alcohol blow into my room.
‘The Tiananmen Mothers group has made a big impact,’ Mao Da says to my mother. ‘I heard that your leader has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.’
‘The whole world knows about your group now, Auntie. You should be proud of yourselves.’ As soon as Zhang Jie finishes speaking, his pager rings. He gets up and makes a call on my mother’s telephone.
‘Poor Professor Ding has been persecuted relentlessly for her activities,’ my mother says. ‘She’s been sacked from her job, arrested, detained. She’s under constant surveillance now. There’s always a police car parked outside her home.’
‘When my colleagues find out I was involved in the Tiananmen Square movement, they treat me like a leper. No one wants to talk about those events.’
Zhang Jie says into the phone, ‘All right, we know the pros and cons… We’ll need a certificate from the Ministry of Information before we can apply for an internet service licence. We must find someone with high-level connections or we’ll never get anywhere.’ There’s a new tone of confidence in his voice.
‘None of his old professors have ever visited him.’
‘They’d lose their jobs if they did. That Granny Pang downstairs would report them to the police.’
‘Granny Pang’s taken up Falun Gong. It’s completely changed her. She wouldn’t dream of reporting anyone to the police now.’
My mother takes her cassette player out to the yard every day and practises Falun Gong exercises with a few other women in the compound. Granny Pang often comes up for a chat now. She told my mother that she realises it was wrong to pass information to the police, and that from now on she will cultivate truth, compassion and tolerance to ensure she doesn’t come back as an animal in the next life.
‘Get off the phone, Zhang Jie. It’s not often we all get a chance to sit down together like this.’
‘All right, all right. When I bought this pager three months ago, I was told it would give me daily share-price information, but the service still hasn’t been set up. When I ask the girl on the switchboard about it, she always promises to get it sorted, but she never does, of course…’