Feather in the Storm: A Childhood Lost in Chaos (34 page)

With every twist in the path, he cursed me and cursed his fate.

As the sun settled beyond the mountain peaks, the lush greens and blues of the landscape faded to a monochromatic dull copper. The out-croppings of steep rocks shimmered above broad patches of russet undergrowth. The silhouettes of trees sprouting from bare rocks stood like a scattered column of attentive sentinels ascending into the clouds.

I climbed wearily into the thinning air, pausing often to gasp for breath. I felt no sense of wonder or exhilaration at the gorgeous scenery around me. I was thinking only that every step I took separated me further from the rest of the world, from my friends, from my family, from a happier future I’d imagined for myself in a city. Everything I loved faded in the valley far below. After a two-hour ascent, we passed through a low-hanging cloud, and as we emerged from it, I saw the village laid out on a flat brown terrace of land. “We’re here,” Team Leader Huang called to me. He waited for me to catch up with him and then led me into a small mud hut and dropped my suitcase on the dirt floor.

“Cuihua, I’ve got someone for you,” he shouted.

“Who is it?” came a sleepy reply.

“It’s Team Leader Huang,” he answered.

A young woman appeared. She was about my age and height. She was slim and had a long narrow nose and wide eyes. She was combing her hair. She looked at me curiously and said, “I’m Sun Cuihua. I’m an educated youth from Jing County. And who are you?”

I introduced myself, relieved to have a companion here.

“We did not know you were coming until yesterday,” Team Leader Huang said. “We have to go to the commune headquarters tomorrow and get you a bed. Tonight you sleep with Cuihua.” And with that he left.

I sat down on my bag. “Are you hungry?” Cuihua asked. “I can get you something to eat.”

“Not hungry.” I sighed. “I’m tired and I don’t feel well. I need to lie down.”

There was a single wooden board on four legs that served as the bed for both of us that night. And there was a thin blanket. I got in and squeezed close to the wall. Within seconds I was in a deep sleep.

Team Leader Huang awakened us the next morning. He was with another man from the village. “We are going to the commune headquarters,” he said. “The government has given us rations for each educated youth. You get a sickle, a hoe, a shovel and a shoulder pole along with your bed.”

“Must I go with you?” I asked. “I’m still tired and sore. My legs and back hurt. I can hardly walk, Team Leader.”

“You don’t have to go,” he said. “You’ll just slow us down anyway. You don’t have to work in the field today, either.”

I thanked him for his understanding.

Much to my surprise, the men returned about three hours later. They carried my supplies and the materials to make a bed for me.

“Look what we found on the road,” Team Leader Huang shouted from a distance and pointed back down the mountain. I strained to see the path below. A lone figure—a woman—trudged toward us. She looked up at us and waved. It was my mother. I rushed down the path to her.

“How did you find me?” I asked breathlessly.

“After I was pushed off the bus,” she said, “I tried to find a way to follow you here. But nobody was coming this way. The public bus would have cost me three yuan. I tried to find a free ride. Finally, a friend of a friend of a friend said she knew someone at the post office, and he let me ride on the mail truck. I came here just like a package. I asked for you at every stop and people kept telling me, ‘Farther up the mountain, farther up the mountain.’ ”

She was exhausted from the climb. But she was also very excited to see me. The two men hung a bamboo partition at one end of the hut to give me a room. Cuihua, Mama and I put my new bed together in my new room. We talked most of that day. Mama said life would be hard here. She cautioned me to be careful and to do what I was told. “The times will change,” she said. “Someday this will end. And when that happens, our new lives—our real lives—will begin. I know it is hard for you to believe this. But you must. Never give up hope. Never!”

Cuihua and I listened to her words, catching fragments of faith from them.

“Be sure you eat enough food,” Mama said. “And don’t work too hard.”

We cooked rice, and the three of us ate dinner together. Afterward Mama and I sat outside and watched the sun set. She asked me many questions about my journey. I didn’t want her to worry about me, so I said it had been uneventful. She watched my face as I spoke. I was not sure she knew I wasn’t telling her everything.

“Maomao,” she said, patting my hand, “there is something you need to know before I leave you here. Do you remember what happened when you were in the hospital in Hefei?”

“I remember. You told me never to talk about it.”

“Have you?”

“No.”

“After I arrived and saw your condition I baptized you. Do you know what that means?”

“No. I only remember it was wet.”

“Maomao,” she said and then lowered her voice to a whisper, “I am a Christian. And you are, too.”

“I don’t know what that is. How did you become one?”

“When I was fourteen, my brother and sister—your third uncle and second aunt—took me to a church with them. They had become Christians years earlier. They attended a Catholic university in Beijing and were converted there. At first I thought it was fun. I’d never seen or heard anything like it before. I was enthralled by the ritual, the chanting and the singing, and the incense and statues. I returned with them the following week. They explained what it meant. They taught me that there is a God and that there is a Son of God and a Mother of God. They showed me that there is another world. I know this is hard for you to understand, particularly now, in this world. But you need to know these things. They will help you stay strong.”

I listened intently and was moved by her solemnity.

“When I was fifteen,” she continued, “I was baptized by a priest in Tianjin. A priest normally baptizes. But when I saw you in Hefei, I thought I was going to lose you, so I baptized you myself.”

“And that is how I became a Christian, Mama?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because I want someone to watch over you when I am not with you. Because I don’t want to lose you ever to those who pulled us apart and tormented us. Because there is a God who watches over you.”

“Why is this a secret? Why can’t I tell anybody?”

“Because they hate us and fear us—the Communist Party. After their revolution, they began arresting Christians.”

“Did they arrest you?”

“Not me, because I was young. But they warned us to stop believing in our God. They said we were ‘prisoners of superstition.’ They told us, ‘Wash your minds and get rid of your religion.’ In 1951 policemen came to our house in Tianjin—the same house where you lived with
Grandma when you were a little girl. They ransacked the house. They took away your second aunt. They beat her and put her in prison. She is still there today. She refused to deny her God. She has been in prison for twenty-five years because she is a Christian.”

“What if they find out about me?” I asked. “I’m in enough trouble already.”

“They won’t. Nobody knows. But you must never confide in anyone else.”

“I won’t.”

“Remember,” she said, “if you ever feel you need help, Maomao, if you become sick, if you should think that you can’t go on living, remember what I am saying. There is a God. Close your eyes and ask Him to help you. He will.”

“Where is He?”

“He’s up here in the mountains with you. And he’s down in Wuhu with us, too. Until you learn more, just whisper, ‘God help me!’ ”

I really didn’t understand what she was saying. I gave her a perplexed look.

She read my face and said, “Someday this will make sense to you. But for now, in this chaos, even though it is hard to grasp, you need to have trust and faith.”

“I will,” I assured her.

In the morning I received permission from Team Leader Huang to walk Mama down the mountain. The bus came, and she climbed aboard. I waved goodbye until she was out of sight. Then I felt completely lonely and lost. “God help me,” I said. I waited for a voice or a sign. There was none.

I adjusted to the cycles of village life. Because we were in the mountains, the sun did not appear over the eastern peaks until nine in the morning, and it set about five in the afternoon. The days were short and the nights were long. Each morning Cuihua and I boiled a cauldron of water and filled a thermos. We cooked rice for breakfast. We had rice and hot water for lunch and dinner. This was our daily diet. The lack of
iodine in the mountain springs and the restricted diet—vegetables did not grow well at that altitude—meant that many of the villagers suffered from what they called big-neck disease, or goiters. Most had prominent or bulging eyes, another symptom of dietary deficiencies.

I worked with the villagers every day in the terraced fields from dawn until dark. We planted rice, picked tea leaves, and chopped down trees and bamboo. I learned to carry a long stick and swish it through the underbrush in front of me on the way to and from work in order to scare away the poisonous snakes that infested the region. One of the feared snakes was called a five-step serpent by the villagers, indicating that anyone who was bitten could take only five steps before dropping dead. Another feared snake was the bamboo-leaf green serpent. This one blended into the bamboo and might strike from either above or below. Its bite was just as deadly.

Only when it rained or snowed heavily were we allowed to stay home. Weeks blended into one another, every one pretty much like the last. And I always asked God for rain and snow. One rainy day while I was washing my soiled clothing in a big wooden basin, I sensed someone standing behind me. I assumed it was Cuihua. I turned and noticed a pair of high-topped white sneakers. These were unusual, since most of us in the mountains went barefoot. I looked up and saw a nicely dressed and handsome young man smiling down at me. His face was bright red. He was blushing. I stood up. My hands were wet and soapy. I didn’t know what to do with them. Cuihua came into the room and saw the visitor and said, “Wu Yimao, this is Teacher Zhu. And Teacher Zhu, this is Wu Yimao, the new educated youth from your hometown, Wuhu.”

“Hello, Teacher Zhu,” I responded.

“Please, don’t be so formal,” he replied. “Call me Zhu Yiping.”

Hearing him speak in the Wuhu dialect sent a shudder of delight through me. Here was someone from home. I wrung my hands together nervously. “I heard there were some new educated youth here, so I dropped by to say hello,” he said. “Are you getting accustomed to
the altitude and the mountain life? Everything here is up and down.” He laughed. I was uncomfortable talking with a young man my own age who stood so close to me and spoke so informally. I’d never had a conversation like this before. I had difficulty hiding my uneasiness.

“How long have you been here?” I finally managed.

“Four years,” he answered. “Four
long
years.”

“And you’re a teacher and not a peasant?”

“Yes,” he said, “that’s an interesting story. I’m from a black family. I was sent here to be a peasant. Some time ago, while I was working in the field, a small tractor driven by a peasant backed over my foot. He came close to killing me, but he only broke several bones. I stayed in bed for two months. It took me several weeks after that to walk without pain again.”

“Why didn’t they send you home as a handicapped person?” I asked. “I thought that was the policy.”

He laughed. “Oh, you are new here! Believe me, if injury were a way of getting out of here, every educated youth in the mountains would be standing behind a tractor! A broken foot or a broken leg is a small price to pay for going home. But no way. Sorry. They know that. They just wait till we get better and then give us another assignment. Yimao, they’re never sending us home. They waited until I could walk and saw I’d be no use working in the fields, so they assigned me to the school.”

He shuffled back and forth across the room and showed me that he still favored his left leg. “See,” he said, “it never healed right. But up here, nobody cares.”

His words unsettled me. I once more sensed the dread that I would never leave this place except by death.

Zhu Yiping remained and talked with us the rest of the afternoon. He started back to his village before darkness set in; waving his snake stick in front of him, he still had a slight limp. “How do you get around on these mountain trails?” I called after him. He turned and smiled and shouted, “Badly!”

We kept a large water jar inside the hut, and we had to fetch water for it every few days. When I first arrived, Cuihua fetched it for both of us from a nearby well. Soon I was taking my turn getting our water. I carried two wooden buckets to the well, which was about twenty feet deep. I could not see the bottom. I was afraid I might fall in. I knelt at the edge and braced myself on the rock wall surrounding it. After I threw down the bucket I pulled it from side to side with a long rope, but I failed to fill it with water. I pulled it back up, uncertain what to do. Just as I was about to give up and go home, Zhu Yiping came along. “Cuihua told me you were here,” he said. “Let me help you.” He picked up the bucket. “Keep it upside down when you drop it. If you don’t, it will float.” He filled each of my buckets for me. He handed me his snake stick and he carried them on a shoulder pole back to our hut, and I followed him.

Cuihua was waiting for us. She watched from the door. “You’re almost a family now,” she said. “You two look like a husband and wife.”

I was embarrassed. I could think of nothing to say. Yiping also reddened and put down the buckets and said, “The water is for both of you, Cuihua. And I really don’t fancy having two wives.” It was perfect, and all three of us burst out laughing.

Yiping visited us regularly after that. Sometimes he brought rice with him, and we cooked dinner together and talked late into the night. I learned he had only a middle school education but studied classical Chinese literature and poetry on his own. We shared a love of poetry. I told him I’d brought several books of poetry with me, and he said he had done the same. He carried them with him after that, and I got out my large book of Tang Dynasty poetry and we sat together long into the night reading and reciting to each other. Some evenings, as he intoned the ancient poems of love and loneliness, I listened and followed his recitations with my finger on the page. I warmed at certain passages and my heart quickened. I wondered if he was trying to speak directly to me through the poems, or if he merely loved the words on the page.