Dreams of Joy (42 page)

The brigade leader is not at all interested in my baby’s future, not when there’s something more titillating to pursue. “This is a serious accusation,” he says. “What proof do you have of your wife’s bad behavior?”

“She kissed me in the Charity Pavilion before we married,” Tao answers truthfully. Again, the people in the canteen grumble and whisper among themselves. The brigade leader asks for quiet and Tao continues. “She touched me with her naked feet in the stream.” This elicits shocked
oh
s. “Once we were married, she wanted to do the husband-wife thing right next to my brothers and sisters.” He turns and addresses me directly. “Now you won’t do it at all.”

I jump to my feet. All eyes turn to me, but what can I say? Everything he said is true. I can’t get mad, but I can’t let this go either.

“When Tao and I first met, I was a virgin,” I say. “Now he insults me by saying I was a broken-down shoe—”

“A baby—even a girl—should not be with a mother such as this.” Tao speaks right over me. “Ah Fu belongs to my family and our village, not to an outsider. My wife puts on a red face, but I’ve seen her bourgeois ways. I’ve encouraged her to open her heart to the Party. I’ve told her she needs to be a cog in the revolutionary machine, but she refuses to perform ritual self-examination and self-criticism.”

Everything my mother said about Tao is true. He is
hsin yan
—heart eye, tricky. He’s using the safety of his background to denounce me as a way of diverting attention from his having sex with girls on the work teams.

“She is
not
red,” he emphasizes. “She is black and she has tried to spread her blackness to all of us by painting a black mural! There are rules for paintings. They must be
hong, guang, liang
—red, bright, and shining—but what did she choose for her subject on one of the walls? An owl. The whole world knows that the owl is a symbol of bad omens, darkness, and evil.”

“You are suffering from
hong yen bing
—red eye disease—envy,” I shoot back. But I’m frightened by his comments, because in my mural I
was
trying to send the message that the Great Leap Forward is a disaster.

Then Tao says something even worse, proving to everyone I’m not only a bad wife but also a traitor to Green Dragon Village and the commune.

“She’s always encouraging me to leave the village. She says I can have a better life if I go elsewhere.”

“That’s a lie!” I exclaim. “You’re the one who’s always asking me to write to my father to see if he can get you a travel permit or an internal passport. You’ve made it very clear that I’m a weight around your neck, preventing you from leaving the village. You’re the one who’s seeking praise and recognition. You’ve tried to claim the mural as your own.”

But who are the people in the canteen going to believe—someone they’ve known their entire lives or me? I’ve always thought of Party Secretary Feng Jin as an honest and straightforward man. I turn to him now, my hands outstretched in supplication.

“You must try to work this out,” he says. “A divorced woman is like a dried-up silkworm—ugly and totally useless to anyone.”

“But Tao has been sharing his time—”

“Enough!” Brigade Leader Lai orders. “Sit down, and let us hear from your comrades.”

Like that, my divorce turns into a struggle session as one after another person gets up to denounce me as a rightist element. They speak in low voices, as though they haven’t had a decent meal in a long time, and they haven’t. Then a young woman I recognize from one of the work teams walks to the area before the tribunal. The way she looks at Tao tells me she’s one of his girls. Seeing her causes my body to tense. Samantha wakes and begins to squirm.

“You wanted to be the star in the play the propaganda team mounted when you first came here,” the girl accuses. “You were always singling yourself out for special treatment. Ever since then, you’ve chosen to work in an individualistic way.”

“I came here to help the People’s Republic of China,” I say staunchly. “I wanted to serve the people, and I have.”

“You use the word
I
too often,” someone calls out. “
I, I, I
—that sounds like self-exaggeration, self-expression, and self-glorification of the individual.”

“You speak too frankly,” another states.

“And you brag—”

“Like a foreigner.”

“And your arm movements are too extravagant and expressive.” (This is true. I am more American than Chinese in this regard.)

The brigade leader gestures to the audience to quiet down, and then he addresses me directly. “Your comrades are telling you that your individualism has not yet been washed clean. You’ve also refused to open your heart to the Party. Understand, our criticism is meant to help you.”

Two pairs of arms reach under my armpits and lift me onto a table where people can see me better. More insults and accusations are hurled my way. It’s time for Samantha to eat, and she begins to cry. She’s a tiny little thing, but the sound that comes from her is both angry and desperate. My breasts respond, filling with milk. If I don’t feed her soon, my nipples will begin to leak. My situation should bring some sympathy, but it doesn’t.

“You’re concealing more serious defects by hiding behind trivial flaws,” Brigade Leader Lai says after another half hour of criticisms. “Let us hear more from the people who know you.”

Tao’s mother rises. Our relationship has been uneven at best and Tao is her son, but what she says isn’t as bad as it could be.

“You wanted a wedding ceremony and celebration, but these things aren’t necessary in the New China. You were crowing even then!”

One of Tao’s brothers steps forward. “Sometimes my sister-in-law gets a letter. She says it’s from her mother or aunt, but we can see it’s written in code.” He’s talking about the alphabet. “We have to rely on what she says is written there. She comes from our most ultrarightist imperialist enemy. How do we know she isn’t a spy?”

“What is there to spy on?” I ask, indignant. This boy has benefited from me in so many ways—from the packages of treats my mother and aunt have sent to the food that’s literally been taken from my bowl and put into his. Still, I have to be careful. Asking for a divorce is one thing, being labeled a spy is quite another.

“We sleep together in the main room,” Tao’s brother continues. “She doesn’t do enough to keep the baby from making noise. Just listen to her now.” Samantha helps his case with her cries. “None of us can sleep. My poor brother is so tired he no longer has the strength to paint.”

I want to say Tao’s tired because he’s hungry, working too hard in the fields, and playing around with too many young women, but I don’t because
I’m grateful the accusations have turned back to something far less threatening than my being a spy.

He sits down and elbows Jie Jie, urging her to get up and say a few words against me. But she shakes her head no. I wish she had the courage to say something in my favor, but she doesn’t do that either. Still, I take her silence as a small victory.

A few more people criticize me. I didn’t work hard enough during the harvest. I wanted to win the corn-picking contest not for the glory of the team and the country but so I could boast about how important I was. I let my mother hug me in front of everyone.

I stand there, feeling bitter and angry. This is a great way to take people’s minds off their hunger and fatigue—work all day with no food, then come to a struggle session at night. Then someone kicks the leg of the table. It tips, and the baby and I fall. I turn my body so I can land on my back, protecting Samantha. I look up and see Kumei. I reach a hand out to her, believing she’s come to help me as I helped Yong. Instead, Kumei points a finger at me accusingly.

“You took baths—naked—in the villa’s kitchen,” she says. It breaks my heart that Kumei feels she must speak against me. But I understand. She has to protect herself, her son, and Yong. Still, this is stunning—shocking—information. The mood shifts yet again, turning ugly. I think of Yong’s struggle session. Fortunately no one has brought up how I helped her that day. Not yet anyway. But everyone’s hungry, everyone’s tired, and this could get violent.

I get up off the floor. Samantha is what my aunt May would call screaming bloody murder. I look directly at Sung-ling.
Please help me
. Sung-ling stands and raises her hands for silence. The audience quiets, which makes Samantha’s cries all the more pathetic. The village cadre’s voice is strident and harsh as she addresses me, but her eyes are not. Another show of kindness.

“We all agree you are too soft,” she says. “You complain too much. But Chairman Mao says, do not fear hardship. Do not fear death.”

I don’t fear hardship, but I do fear death. Few choices are open to those who are struggled against: hold to your morals and risk further punishment; admit guilt and accept punishment; admit guilt, offer thanks for everyone’s comradely help, and hope for leniency. My father Sam comes clearly to me now. I feel as though he is standing next to me,
his hand on my shoulder, reminding me not only what a parent should do but also how he might have done it differently. I turn and face my accusers.

“I’m grateful for your criticisms, for I know you’d not have said them if they weren’t true,” I say. “I’ll take them to heart and I’ll improve. I thank my comrades.”

“Good!” Sung-ling says. “The tribunal will take a few minutes to discuss the case. Everyone remain in your seats. We will return shortly.”

Brigade Leader Lai, Party Secretary Feng, and Sung-ling walk down the center aisle and out the door. I sit on my bench and face forward, aware of the restlessness of those behind me. I unbutton my blouse, and Samantha’s mouth grabs my nipple. My shoulders relax. Everyone around me calms at the sudden quiet. Tao comes and sits next to me. He doesn’t look at me or check on Samantha. Why is he being so difficult? Why doesn’t he just let me go? He doesn’t love me. He doesn’t even like me. Have I harmed him in some way? Does he want something from me? The only thing I can think of is just what Z.G. said. Tao wants me to help him leave this place. How many times has he asked me to write to Z.G. for a travel permit? Too many to count. And yet this was one of Tao’s biggest complaints about me.

The tribunal returns.

“You have quarreled over minor differences,” Brigade Leader Lai says. “Comrade Joy, you will not be made to wear a white ribbon of denunciation, but you must abstain from capitalist thoughts and make sure your husband receives his prerogatives. Comrade Tao, remember that children—whether sons or daughters—do not belong to you. Your daughter belongs to Chairman Mao.” He pauses to create the greatest effect, and then announces, “This divorce is not granted.”

The entertainment is over and people get up to leave. I catch Kumei’s eye, and she turns away in embarrassment. My mother-in-law, Jie Jie, and the other children group together, waiting. Tao flicks his finger, motioning me to follow him. I have nowhere to go and no other options at this time, but as soon as I get home I pull out paper and a pen. I write a letter to Z.G. begging for travel permits. Tao watches me the entire time.

The next day I come home from work, feed the baby, and leave her with Jie Jie. Then I take my letter to the pond and wait for the mailman. It’s the beginning of January in the Western calendar. I’ve missed Christmas and New Year’s again. It’s cold and dreary. When the mailman
doesn’t come, I walk up the hill that leads out of the village. From here, I can look far across the desolate fields. In the distance, I see a man bicycling toward me. It’s not the regular mailman, which tells me he must be dead. Will this new one be reliable? All I can do is trust and hope, but I know with sinking certainty that my letter will never go through. Brigade Leader Lai will read my request for travel permits, and that will be that. Word of what’s happening here cannot be allowed to leak out from the commune. The only way I’ll be free of Tao is to help him leave the village, and the only way I know to do that is going to fail.

After handing my letter to the mailman, I turn to walk back to Green Dragon Village. A new welcome sign has been posted by the side of the path:

“WHERE WERE YOU
born?” Superintendent Wu asks again.

“Yin Bo Village in Kwangtung province,” I answer.

“Do you have relatives still living there? Can you name them?”

“I’m related to everyone in the village, but I left when I was three. I don’t remember anyone.”

After twenty-nine months of meetings, I wouldn’t say that Superintendent Wu and I are friends, but we get along all right.