Boy in the Twilight: Stories of the Hidden China

THEIR SON

At five o’clock on a Saturday afternoon, several hundred workers crowded around the main entrance to the machine factory, waiting for the bell that would mark the end of their shift. The metal gate, still tightly shut, clanged as the people in front banged against it, while a buzz of conversation rose up from the people behind, punctuated by shouts here and there. As they awaited release, the workers were like livestock trapped behind bars, idly clustered in the dimming light of dusk, crowded together in the howling wind. The large windows in the factory behind them were already shrouded in darkness, and the desolate scene was enlivened only by the clouds of dust that swirled around the workshops.

Shi Zhikang, a man of fifty-one, stood in the front row in his military overcoat, directly facing the crack between the two leaves of the steel gate. The icy wind blew in through the narrow gap and onto his face, making him feel as though his nose was shrinking.

Next to him stood the old gatekeeper, his bald head flushed by the cold. Over a thick padded jacket he wore a faded boiler suit; the end of a large key projected from his chest pocket. People were yelling at him to open the gate, but he might as well have been deaf. He looked from side to side, and every time someone directed an impatient comment his way he would turn his head and look in the other direction. Only when the bell rang did the old man finally take the key from his pocket, while the people in the front row took a step back to give him room. As he moved forward, he made a point of thrusting his elbows behind him and put the key in the hole only when his arms met no resistance.

Shi Zhikang was the first to make it out the gate. He set off rapidly along the road to his right, planning to walk to the stop before the factory and catch the trolleybus there, to avoid the scrum outside the gate. At least forty workers would try to push and shove their way onto the trolleybus, although it would already be full of passengers by the time it reached the factory.

As he walked, Shi Zhikang thought about those forty workmates, imagining how they would cluster around the bus stop just as they had crammed in front of the gate. There would be a dozen hefty young men and at least a dozen women, three of whom had started work the same year as him. All three had medical conditions now: one had a ropy heart and the other two had kidney problems.

As he was thinking about that, the bus stop came into view, and at the same time he saw a trolleybus coming his way, so he took his hands out of his pockets and ran, arriving at the stop just as the bus pulled in. People were already waiting there in three clusters and, as the bus slowed down, the clusters moved to position themselves in line with the bus’s three doors. When the bus stopped, the clusters became stationary. The doors opened and passengers squeezed out in a tight, solid stream like toothpaste from a tube, and then, in a dense mass of limbs, people piled on.

By the time the trolley approached the entrance to Shi Zhikang’s factory, he had already pushed his way into the middle of the bus, and his arms were wedged vertically into the gaps left by bodies pressed up against him. The bus didn’t stop outside the factory but drove right on past. Of the forty workers who had been waiting there, only five or six were left, along with seven or eight people he didn’t recognize, so one or two other buses must have come along. The three women had evidently been unable to cram aboard, for they still were waiting at the stop, the one with the bad heart in the middle, the two with kidney disease on either side. They stood in a tight clump in their dumpy padded coats, each with a black woolen scarf around her neck. The chill wind blew their hair every which way, and the deepening darkness blurred their features, as though their faces had been charred by fire. As his trolley passed them, Shi Zhikang noticed how their heads turned to follow it. They watched as the bus he was on sailed away from them.

After nine stops Shi Zhikang got off the trolleybus and walked back thirty yards to another stop, where he would board another bus. By this time the sky was completely dark; the streetlamps cast only a feeble glow and it was more the bright lights of the stores on either side of the street that illuminated the sidewalk and the area around the bus stop. Many people were already waiting, and those closest to the front were practically standing in the middle of the street. As Shi Zhikang made his way into the crowd, a minibus came along and, when the door opened, a young man with a canvas satchel hanging from his neck poked his head out and yelled: “Two yuan, two yuan …”

Two men and a woman boarded the minibus, as the conductor continued to shout, “Two yuan …”

At this point a bus turned a corner away in the distance and came into view. Seeing it, the conductor quickly ducked back inside and the minibus accelerated away from the waiting throng, as the bus rumbled toward them.

Shi Zhikang swiftly pushed his way to the front and spread his arms a little, pressing backward as the bus approached, pushing the people behind him back onto the sidewalk. As the front door of the bus slipped past, he monitored the bus’s speed and calculated that he should be perfectly in line for the middle door. But what happened was that the bus came to an abrupt stop, leaving him a yard or two away from his target door. He’d lost his position in the front row, and now he found himself on the outer edge of the crowd.

When the door opened, only three people got off. Shi Zhikang took a couple of steps into the crowd and thrust his arms into a tiny gap left by the people in front. As he pushed his way forward, he made good use of the upper-body strength acquired in his long years as a fitter. He steadily widened the gap, then squeezed into the space created, and began to work on opening a gap farther ahead.

Shi Zhikang plowed his way through the line and launched himself into the space by the door, exploiting the impetus of the people pressing from behind. Just as he planted one foot on the step of the bus, someone grabbed the collar of his overcoat and dragged him backward. He landed heavily on the ground and his head hit a leg. The leg retaliated with a kick, and he looked up to find a young woman glaring at him.

By the time Shi Zhikang was back on his feet, the doors had closed and the bus was beginning to move off. A woman’s handbag was trapped in the door, leaving a corner of the bag and part of the strap sticking outside, so that it swayed back and forth with the motion of the bus. He turned around, determined to find out who had pulled him back. Two youths about the same age as his son were watching him with a cold glint in their eyes. He looked at them and at others who had failed to squeeze onto the bus. Some returned his gaze, some did not. He was tempted to let off a swearword or two, but thought better of it.

Later, two buses arrived at the same time, and Shi Zhikang boarded the second. Today he did not get off at the stop closest to his home, but two stops earlier, where a man with a flatbed cart sold bean curd that tasted better than what you could buy in the shops. Shi Zhikang’s wife, who worked in a textile mill, had asked him to pick up a couple of pounds on his way home from work, because today was Saturday and their son, a junior in college, was coming home for the weekend.

After buying the bean curd, Shi Zhikang did not try to catch another bus and simply walked the rest of the way home. It was almost seven o’clock, but there was no sign of his wife. This upset him. His wife should have got off work at four thirty, and she did not have such a long commute. Normally his wife would have dinner practically ready by this time, but today he had to set to on an empty stomach, washing vegetables and slicing meat.

His wife, Li Xiulan, came in the door with a bag of fish. “Have you washed your hands?” was the first thing she said.

Shi Zhikang was not in a good mood, so he answered curtly. “Can’t you see my hands are wet?”

“Did you use soap?” she asked. “There’s flu going around, and pneumonia too. You need to wash your hands with soap as soon as you get home.”

Shi Zhikang snorted dismissively. “Then shouldn’t you come home sooner?”

Li Xiulan dumped the two fish in the sink. She told Shi Zhikang they cost her only three yuan. “They were the last two. He wanted five yuan, but I wouldn’t go higher than three.”

“Does it take so long to buy a couple of dead fish?”

“They haven’t been dead long.” She showed him the gills: “See, the cheeks are still red.”

“It’s you I’m talking about.” He raised his voice as he pointed at his watch. “It’s after seven already!”

Her tone also went up a register. “So what? What’s the big deal about me coming home late? Every day you get back later than I do — do I complain?”

“Do I finish work before you do? Is my factory closer to home than yours?”

“I fell down,” said Li Xiulan.

She flung the fish back in the sink and stamped into the living room. “I fell off the bus,” she said, “and it was ages before I could stand up again. I had to sit there on the side of the road for thirty or forty minutes. I practically froze to death.”

Shi Zhikang set down the cleaver he’d been using to slice the meat and walked over to her: “You fell? So did I — someone tugged my collar.”

He didn’t finish the story, for now she had rolled up her trouser leg and he could see there was a bruise as big as an egg on her knee. He bent down to touch it. “How did it happen?”

“When I was getting off the bus, there were too many people behind me. They pushed so hard I lost my balance.”

Just then their son arrived home, dressed in a red down jacket. Seeing his mother had suffered a fall, he bent down like his father had done. “Did you trip?” he asked with concern. Then he took off his jacket. “You should be taking a calcium supplement,” he went on. “It’s not only babies who need calcium, older people need it too. Every day your bones lose calcium, and that makes you prone to injury … If I got pushed off a bus, there’s no way I would end up with such a large bruise.”

Their son turned on the television and plumped himself down on the sofa. He put on the earphones of his Walkman and began to listen to some music.

“Are you watching TV?” Shi Zhikang asked. “Or listening to the radio?”

His son looked at him, but almost immediately turned away again, not having understood the question. “Have you washed your hands?” his mother asked.

He swiveled his head and removed an earphone from one of his ears. “What did you say?”

“Go and wash your hands,” Li Xiulan said. “There’s flu going around now and it’s easy to pick up germs on the bus. Go wash your hands, and be sure to use soap.”

“I don’t need to wash my hands.” Their son replaced the earphone. “I took a cab.”

SHI ZHIKANG COULDN’T GET TO SLEEP that night. For five months now, his wife had been bringing home only a little over a hundred yuan. He was in a better position — four hundred yuan — but still their combined monthly income was less than six hundred. The cost of rice had now risen to one yuan thirty a pound, and pork was twelve yuan a pound — even chili peppers were three yuan a pound. They still gave their son three hundred yuan a month for living expenses all the same, leaving a bit over two hundred for themselves. But this hadn’t stopped their son from taking a taxi when he came home on Saturday.

Li Xiulan had not fallen asleep either. She noticed her husband was tossing and turning. “You can’t sleep?”

“No.”

She turned to face him. “How much do you think our son paid to come home in a taxi?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never taken a taxi.” He paused. “I guess it would have cost at least thirty yuan.”

“Thirty yuan?” she moaned.

“We sweated blood for this money,” he sighed.

They said nothing more. Before long he fell asleep, and soon she was asleep too.

The next morning, their son again put on his earphones and watched TV as he listened to music. Shi Zhikang and Li Xiulan decided to have a good talk with him, so she sat down by his side, while her husband brought a chair over and sat in front of them. “Your mother and I would like to have a chat with you,” Shi Zhikang said.

“What about?” Because of the earphones, their son spoke loudly.

“Family matters.”

“Go on.” He was practically shouting.

Shi Zhikang leaned over and removed his right earphone. “These past few months, we’ve had a few problems. We didn’t want to tell you, for fear of distracting you from your studies …”

“What’s happened?” Their son removed the other earphone.

“Nothing much,” Shi Zhikang said. “Beginning this month, there’ll be no more night shift in our factory, and of the three hundred in the workforce, half will be laid off. As far as I’m concerned, it’s no big deal — I have skills, the factory still needs me … It’s more what’s happening with your mom. Currently she is just bringing home a bit over one hundred yuan a month. She’s due to retire in four years, and if she was to take early retirement, she could get three hundred yuan a month, and that would carry on for three years …”

“You get paid more if you take early retirement?”

They nodded. “In that case, why don’t you retire?” their son asked.

“Your mother and I are thinking that too,” Shi Zhikang said.

“Yeah, retire.” Saying this, their son prepared to put his earphones back on. Shi Zhikang threw his wife a glance. “Son,” she said, “our family finances aren’t what they used to be, and in the future they may be in even poorer shape …”

Their son already had one earphone in place. “What was that?” he asked.

“Your mom was saying that the family finances aren’t what they used to be,” Shi Zhikang said.

“Never mind about that.” Their son waved his hand. “State finances aren’t what they used to be either.”

His parents exchanged glances. “Tell me this,” said Shi Zhikang. “Why did you come home in a taxi yesterday?”

Their son looked at them, perplexed. “Why didn’t you take a bus?” Shi Zhikang persisted.

“The bus is too crowded.”

“Too crowded?”

Shi Zhikang pointed at Li Xiulan. “Your mom and I cram ourselves onto buses every day of the week. How can a young guy like you be afraid of crowded buses?”

“It’s not the pushing that’s the problem, it’s the smell.” Their son frowned. “I really hate smelling other people’s body odor. In buses, everybody’s jostling you, forcing you to smell their stink. It’s so packed and stuffy, even perfume smells bad. Plus, there are people letting off farts as well …

“I feel like throwing up every time I get on a bus,” he concluded.

“Throwing up?” Li Xiulan was shocked. “Son, are you ill?”

“No, of course not.”

She looked at Shi Zhikang. “Could it be stomach trouble?”

Her husband nodded. “Have you got a bellyache?” he asked.

“There’s nothing wrong with me.” Their son was getting impatient.

“What’s your appetite like these days?” Li Xiulan asked.

“I don’t have any stomach trouble!” their son yelled.

“Are you sleeping all right?” Shi Zhikang asked. He turned to Li Xiulan: “If you don’t get enough sleep, it’ll make you feel nauseous.”

Their son stretched out all ten fingers: “I sleep ten hours a day.”

Li Xiulan was still anxious. “Son, you’d better go to the hospital for a checkup.”

“I told you, there’s nothing wrong with me.” Their son jumped to his feet. “This is all about me having taken a taxi for once, isn’t it?” he cried. “Well, I won’t be taking any more taxis …”

“Son, we’re not bothered about the taxi fare,” said Shi Zhikang. “We’re thinking of you. You’ll be starting a job soon, and when you rely on your own salary you’ll understand that money doesn’t come easily and you have to budget accordingly …”

“That’s right.” Li Xiulan went on. “We never said you couldn’t take a taxi.”

“In the future there’s no way I’ll be taking taxis.” Their son sat back down on the sofa. “In the future I will drive my own car,” he explained. He put the earphones over his ears. “My classmates take taxis all the time.”

“His classmates take taxis all the time,” Li Xiulan repeated, looking at her husband. Seeing him nod, she went on. “If other people’s sons can take taxis, why shouldn’t ours?”

“I never said he couldn’t,” said Shi Zhikang.

Their son was maybe now listening to one of his favorite songs, for he was rocking his head back and forth and mouthing some lyrics. They looked at each other and smiled as they studied his contented air. Maybe the future would bring more and more difficulties, but this did not distress them unduly, for they could see their son was now his own man.