They began to liven up and their conversation grew more animated. Looking up, they saw that the sun was at its zenith, and they realized that both their stomachs were growling. Mr. Cheng suggested lunch. Unfortunately, all the restaurants were full, with lines of customers waiting for seats. The sight of those crowded restaurants only fueled their hunger, and they could hardly tolerate the wait. In the end Wang Qiyao proposed that they go to her place for noodles. Mr. Cheng said that in that case they might as well go to his apartment, because a friend had brought some eggs and salted meat back for him from Hangzhou just the day before. They boarded the trolley, which was always empty at noon, and sat side by side, as the street scenes flashed before their eyes like images from a movie, each image bathed in a flash of sunlight. They had not a care in the world, content simply to let the trolley take them where it might.
Mr. Cheng’s apartment was still there, just as she remembered it, only older. The water stains on the outside walls were a bit more pronounced. The interior was darker, due in part to the layer of dust on the window panes, which looked as if they had not been wiped in the last twelve years. The elevator was in bad shape: its iron grating had rusted, and the clanking sound it made echoed up and down the shaft. Wang Qiyao followed Mr. Cheng out of the elevator and stood waiting as he rummaged for his key. A huge piece of a spider web hung from the domed ceiling; she wondered if it had taken twelve years to weave this. Mr. Cheng opened the door and she entered. After her eyes had adjusted to the darkness, she saw that the little world inside had barely changed; it was as if the entire room had been encased in a time capsule. The wax finish on the brown hardwood floor had a lustrous sheen, the lighting frame and the camera stood in their assigned places, the carpeted wooden platform was still there, and behind them the doors and windows of the cardboard backdrop looked at once ancient and naively fresh.
Mr. Cheng went straight to the kitchen and got busy. She could hear the sounds of chopping, followed shortly thereafter by the aroma of rice and salted pork. Rather than offering to help, Wang Qiyao wandered about the studio. She moved along to the back, where she found the dressing room unaltered and saw a pleasing reflection of herself in the mirror, which was too blurred to expose the traces of age on her face. From the dressing room she passed on into the dark room. After groping for the switch, she turned on a red bulb whose rays focused on a single spot, leaving all else in a darkness that hung pensive and yet seemed symbolic of permanence in the face of change. Wang Qiyao failed to understand that it is precisely this myriad of unchanging little worlds that serves as a counterfoil to the tumultuous changes taking place in the outside world. After standing there for a moment, she switched off the light, softly closed the door, and went into the kitchen. Chopsticks and two bowls had been laid out on the round table by the gas range. A pot of rice simmered on one burner while on the other a terrine of egg custard was simmering.
Mr. Cheng served the egg custard along with the salted pork he had cooked in the rice. Sitting across from each other, they picked up their bowls, but were so much past the point of hunger that they almost didn’t feel like eating. It was not until each had finished their first helping that they realized how famished they really were. They ate bowl after bowl, as though filling a bottomless pit. After they had consumed all the rice in the medium-sized pot and polished off the entire terrine of egg, they burst out laughing in the realization that, not having seen each for twelve years, they were so focused on eating that they had barely exchanged a single word — they had probably eaten more that afternoon than the sum of all the meals they had shared in the past.
Feeling somewhat embarrassed and sensing Mr. Cheng’s eyes on her, Wang Qiyao said, “Don’t look at me like that. You only have to eat for one person, but I have to feed two. Besides, I didn’t eat any more than you!”
They were both taken aback by the way she had so frankly broached the subject; they immediately lapsed back into silence.
After a long pause, Wang Qiyao said, with a forced smile, “I know you’ve been wanting to ask. . but even if you did, I really wouldn’t know what to say. At any rate, what you see before you is every bit of me. . there really isn’t anything else to ask about.”
Her words were at once defiant and worldly, but they hinted at feelings of resignation and bitterness. Mr. Cheng could sense that she had lived through an epoch of sorrow. Having got that out of the way, they relaxed and were able to talk about the present without any more references to the past. Mr. Cheng said he was now working in the accounting department of a government firm. His salary was more than enough for a single man, at least up until recently, when things had got a bit tight, but he was much better off than his colleagues who had families to support. Wang Qiyao explained that her income was tight to begin with, and that of late she had to rely increasingly on the consignment store to make ends meet.
Mr. Cheng was concerned. “Selling old clothes isn’t a long-term solution. What are you going to do once you’ve sold everything in your closet?”
“What is long term?” Wang Qiyao retorted with a laugh. “How long is long, anyway?”
Seeing that he had no response for this, she said more gently, “I just hope to get through my present situation…. That is my sole long-term goal.”
Mr. Cheng asked her how she managed. Wang Qiyao gave him a detailed description of how she counted every grain of rice. Mr. Cheng in turn regaled her with tales of his Dao of austerity, learning to get three lights out of a single match. Once they returned to the subject of food, they could talk of little else. Their excitement mounted until each insisted on inviting the other to dinner; it was as if they were engaged in a spirited competition to outdo one another. Wang Qiyao had to excuse herself: she had a patient coming for an injection and then a house call to make in the afternoon. Mr. Cheng saw her to the door, and watched the elevator door close before returning to his apartment.
The spring of 1960 was one in which people could talk of little else besides food. Even the scent of the oleanders aroused hunger. Mice scurried around all night beneath the floor in their hunt for stray morsels; flocks of sparrows took to the skies like migratory birds, searching for food. Saying that the city was in a state of famine would have been a bit extreme, but people were indeed doing whatever they could to satisfy their palates. Prominent figures lined up outside Western-style restaurants, waiting for a seat. Who knows what quantities of filet mignon, pork chops with onions, and fish disappeared into the bottomless pits of their stomachs. The aroma of butter cakes was almost enough to drive someone to murder or, at the very least, to send morality out the window. Street robberies occurred one after another, nothing major, just snacks snatched from children’s hands. At bakeries, drooling onlookers vastly outnumbered paying customers. There was a sharp rise in thefts as well.
In the still of the night the city’s inhabitants were kept awake not by anxious thoughts but by the rumblings of their stomachs. In the presence of hunger, even the profoundest sadness had to take second place; everything else simply disappeared. The mind, stripped of hypocrisy and pretensions, concentrated on substance. All the rouge and powder had been washed away, exposing the plain features underneath. Under the city’s bright lights, people’s faces were thinner and sallower, but infinitely more honest. Manners went out the window. Compared to the stark candor of true “famine,” a residual layer of extravagance remained; but the water had clearly receded and the rocks were now showing through. And even though the grave solemnity of “famine” was missing — hints of comedy lingered — there were ample occasions for irony. Hasn’t it been said that comedy is created by tearing down trivialities? Trivialities were certainly being ripped up in this city, although if truth be told, a good deal of flesh and bone were also involved. Still, the damage was not major, just a little wound.