Cixin Liu - Death's End

This was a day like any other day in his life of twenty-eight years, eleven months, and six days.

Like Lao Li, Tianming didn’t inform his family of his decision. He did try to write a note that could be given to his father after his procedure, but he gave up because he couldn’t think of what to say.

At ten, he walked into the euthanasia room by himself, as calmly as if he were headed to his daily examination. He was the fourth person in the city to conduct the procedure, so there wasn’t much media interest. Only five people were in the room: two notaries, a director, a nurse, and an executive from the hospital. Dr. Zhang wasn’t there.

He could go in peace.

Pursuant to his request, the room was undecorated. All around him were the plain white walls of a normal hospital room. He felt comfortable.

He explained to the director that he was familiar with the procedure and did not need him. The director nodded and went to the other side of the glass wall. The notaries finished their business with him, then left him alone with the nurse. The nurse no longer showed the anxiety and fear that she had had to overcome the first time. As she pierced his vein with the needle, her motion was steady and gentle. Tianming felt a strange bond with the nurse: after all, she was the last person who would be with him in this world. He wished he knew who had delivered him when he was born twenty-nine years ago. That delivery doctor and this nurse belonged to the small number of people who had genuinely tried to help him during his life. He wanted to thank them.

“Thank you.”

The nurse smiled at him and left, her footsteps as silent as a cat’s.

Do you wish to terminate your life? For yes, select 5. For no, select 0.

He had been born to an intellectual family, but his parents lacked political savvy and social cunning, and they had not been successful in their lives. Though they did not live the life of elites, they had insisted on giving Tianming an education they thought befit an elite. He was only permitted to read classic books and listen to classical music; the friends he tried to make had to be the kind that his parents deemed to be from cultured, refined families. They told Tianming that the people around them were vulgar, their concerns common. In contrast, their own tastes were far superior.

In primary school, Tianming had managed to make a few friends, but he never invited them home to play. He knew that his parents would not allow him to be friends with such “vulgar” children. By the time he was in middle school, his parents’ intensified push for his elite education made him into a complete loner. That was also when his parents divorced, after his father met a young woman who sold insurance. His mother then married a wealthy general contractor.

Thus, both of his parents ended up with the kind of “vulgar” people they had told Tianming to stay away from, and finally realized that they had no moral authority to impose the kind of education they wanted on him. But what had already been done to Tianming was enough. He could not escape his upbringing, which was like a set of spring-loaded handcuffs: The more he struggled to free himself, the tighter they bound him. Throughout his high school years, he became more and more alone, more and more sensitive, grew further apart from others.

All his memories of his childhood and youth were gray.

He pressed 5.

Do you wish to terminate your life? For yes, select 2. For no, select 0.

He had imagined that college would be a frightening place: a new, strange environment; a new, strange crowd; more things for him to struggle to adjust to. And when he first entered college, everything pretty much matched his expectations.

Until he met Cheng Xin.

Tianming had been attracted to girls before, but not like this. He felt everything around him, which had been cold and strange, become suffused with warm sunlight. At first, he didn’t understand where the light had come from. It was like a sun seen through a heavy veil of clouds, only appearing to observers as a faint disk. It was only when it disappeared that people realized that it was the source of all light during the day. Tianming’s sun disappeared at the start of the weeklong holiday around National Day, when Cheng Xin left school to visit home. Tianming felt everything around him grow dim and gray.

It was almost certain that more than one boy felt this way about Cheng Xin. But he didn’t suffer the way other boys did, because he had no hope for his yearning. He knew that girls did not like his aloofness, his sensitivity. All he could do was to look at her from afar, bathing in the warm light she gave off, quietly appreciating the beauty of spring.

Initially, Cheng Xin gave Tianming the impression of being taciturn. Beautiful women were rarely reticent, but she wasn’t an ice queen. She said little, but she listened, really listened. When she conversed with someone, her focused, calm gaze told the speaker that they were important to her.

Cheng Xin was different from the pretty girls who Tianming had gone to high school with. She didn’t ignore his existence. Every time she saw him, she would smile and say hi. A few times, when classmates planned outings and parties, the organizers—intentionally or otherwise—forgot about Tianming. But Cheng Xin would find him and invite him. Later, she became the first among his classmates to call him just “Tianming,” without using his surname. In their interactions—limited though they were—the deepest impression Cheng Xin left in Tianming’s heart was the feeling that she was the only one who understood his vulnerabilities and seemed to care about the pain that he might suffer.

But Tianming never made more of it than what it was. It was just as Hu Wen said: Cheng Xin was nice to everyone.

One event in particular stood out in Tianming’s mind: He and some classmates were hiking up a small mountain. Cheng Xin suddenly stopped, bent down, and picked up something from the stone steps of the trail. Tianming saw that it was an ugly caterpillar, soft and moist, wriggling against her pale fingers. Another girl next to her cried out: That’s disgusting! Why are you touching it? But Cheng Xin carefully deposited the caterpillar in the grass next to the trail. It will get stepped on .

In truth, Tianming had had very few conversations with Cheng Xin. In four years of college, he could remember talking with her one on one just a couple of times.

It was a cool, early summer night. Tianming had climbed to the deck on top of the library, his favorite place. Few students came here, and he could be alone with his thoughts. The night sky was clear after a summer rainstorm. Even the Milky Way, which normally wasn’t visible, shone in the sky.

“It really looks like a road made of milk!” [2] Translator’s Note: Some Anglophone readers may get the impression here that the Chinese name for our galaxy is also “Milky Way.” It is not. The actual Chinese name for the galaxy is Yinhe, or “Silver River.” All Chinese students, however, study English for years.

Tianming looked over at the speaker. A breeze stirred Cheng Xin’s hair, reminding him of his dream. Then he and Cheng Xin gazed up at the galaxy together.

“So many stars. It looks like a fog,” Tianming said.

Cheng Xin turned to him and pointed at the campus and city below them. “It’s really beautiful down there, too. Remember, we live here, not in the faraway galaxy.”

“But aren’t we studying to be aerospace engineers? Our goal is to leave the Earth.”

“That’s so that we may make life here better, not abandon the planet.”

Tianming understood that Cheng Xin had meant to gently point out his own aloofness and solitude. But he had no response. This was the closest he had ever been to her. Maybe it was his imagination, but he thought he could feel the warmth from her body. He wished the breeze would shift direction so a few strands of her hair would brush against his face.