Bi Feiyu - Three Sisters

“Why are you still wearing that coat?” she asked.

But instead of answering, Yuxiu backed up slowly, a willful look in her eyes. When she reached the wall, she leaned against it for support and slid down to a sitting position as she closed her eyes; she opened her mouth wide, but no sound emerged. Then she reached under her coat, her hands a flurry of motion as she unknotted, tugged, and pulled at the sash. Her eyes were still shut and her mouth hung slack as she dragged the sash out little by little; the more she pulled, the more she held in her hand, like a magician. Finally she exhaled and made a guttural noise that, to Yumi’s ears, sounded like agony but could have been ecstasy. But that was all—Yuxiu did not make another sound.

Sensing that something might be terribly wrong, Yumi walked up to her sister, water dripping from her hair, and tugged tentatively at the overcoat; Yuxiu did not resist.

“Stand up, Yuxiu,” Yumi said sternly.

Her eyes still shut, Yuxiu merely twisted her neck from side to side, so Yumi pulled her up.

“Stand up, I said.”

Yuxiu struggled to her feet, but with the cord untied, her pants slipped to the ground the moment she got to her feet. Yumi lifted Yuxiu’s coat and undergarment, exposing a giant belly that presented a terrifying sight under the harsh glare of the sun. “Yuxiu!” Yumi cried out.

Cocking her head to look at Yumi out of the corner of her eye, Yuxiu continued her labored breathing and, holding on to her sister, slowly sank to her knees.

“It’s all over for me, sister,” she said softly.

Yumi grabbed a handful of Yuxiu’s hair.

“Whose is it?” she asked.

“It’s all over for me, sister,” Yuxiu said again.

This time Yumi pulled Yuxiu’s hair back to make her sister look up at her. “Whose is it?” she demanded furiously.

Wang Lianfang was standing behind Yumi.

“Stop asking, Yumi. He’ll be part of the next generation of revolutionaries.”

The following morning, Yuxiu gave birth to a baby boy at the county People’s Hospital. Yumi had begged the doctor to abort the child, but she’d refused, saying it was too late and too risky. True to her reputation, Yumi did not panic. With a letter from Guo Jiaxing to the head of the hospital, she took charge, and everything went smoothly. But she had her own issue to deal with: She needed to know the identity of the baby’s father.

On the way to the hospital, she had grilled Yuxiu while they were on the speedboat, even slapping her a dozen times. When her hands were sore from slapping her sister, Yumi had tugged at Yuxiu’s hair, ultimately pulling out a handful; Yuxiu had remained stoically quiet the whole time. The corners of her mouth had begun to bleed, and even Yumi had not been able to bring herself to slap her anymore, yet Yuxiu had refused to tell her what she wanted to know.

“I’ve never seen a slut like you!” Yumi had screamed at her sister. After seeing her into the delivery room, Yumi sat quietly on the bench in the hallway with the speedboat skipper, utterly exhausted. Reclaiming her daughter from the skipper, she sighed and shut her eyes weakly. But then they snapped open. She glanced over at the skipper, slowly stood up, turned, and kneeled before him. Stunned, he tried to pull her up, but she said, “Skipper Guo, please, for our sake, don’t tell anyone. Please, I beg you.”

The skipper got down on his knees. “Don’t worry, Mrs. Guo,” he said, flustered. “I give you my word as a Party member.”

Yumi sat down again, her mind now busily figuring out what to do with the doctor and the baby. How should she deal with the baby? And was it a boy or a girl?

Everything went smoothly, and Yuxiu had her baby half an hour later. When the doctor walked out and pulled down her mask, Yumi went up, grasped her hands, and asked, “Is it a boy or a girl?”

“A boy,” the doctor said. Yumi fell silent as an unspeakable bitterness and sadness surged inside her. You did well for yourself, you little slut, she thought.

The doctor stood there looking at her and waited. Yumi’s lips quivered before she sighed and said, “I think we’d better give him away.”

After taking care of the details, Yumi walked into the ward and stood before Yuxiu with a grim look. Yuxiu’s bloodless face looked paler than paper, but although she appeared to be drained of energy, she took her hands out from under the blanket and said softly, “Sister, let me see my baby.”

Yumi had not expected such a blatant request, and her face turned dark purple.

“Yuxiu,” she blurted out, “how can you be so shameless!”

Yuxiu, still breathing hard, swallowed and said stubbornly, “Sister, please.” Her weak fingers clutched Yumi’s arm, but Yumi flung her sister’s hand away.

“It’s dead, I tossed it down the toilet. What made you think you could give birth to anything worth keeping?”

The light went out in Yuxiu’s eyes when she heard her sister’s words. Reluctant to give in, she propped herself up on her elbows but lacked the strength to sit up. Her head drooped down from her weak neck, a tangle of hair hanging in front of her face.

“Sister, help me up,” she said, cocking her head. “I want to take a look, just one look, and I’ll die happy.”

Yumi pushed her away and sneered. “Die? I don’t mean to mock you, Yuxiu, but you could have done that long ago if you’d wanted to.”

Yuxiu managed to hold herself up on her elbows for another minute before finally flopping back down in complete surrender, her energy spent. She lay there motionless, fixing her lovely, unblinking eyes on the ceiling; the light in those eyes was strangely clear and unusually bright.

As she looked down at her sister, despair and an almost unbearable sadness rose up inside Yumi; she tried but failed to hold back her tears. Covering her face with her hands and clenching her teeth, she said, “You’ve brought me nothing but shame.”

NO ONE WANTED to run 3,000 meters. What did 3,000 meters mean anyway? It meant you had to forgo food and water like a jackass and stumble blindly around seven-and-a-half laps on the 400-meter track. Yuyang, who had no physical ability worthy of mentioning and was not gifted with the height, speed, or strength of her classmates, had a stocky, solid build and, at best, a bit of awkward stamina. Anyone with a sharp eye could tell she was a country girl with little physical training—her arms and legs lacked coordination and flexibility. Like most girls from the countryside, she was not endowed with any special talents; her grades were passable, but that was about it. Her looks were even less memorable. How could her homeroom teacher ever notice a girl like her? And yet, the young teacher was a sports fan, so athletic wins and losses meant a great deal.

He entered Yuyang in the 3,000-meter race, though he didn’t expect much of her—a case of hitting a date tree just for the sake of making contact with something. But if she came in sixth place, it would add another point to their total. She might not be able to brag about any particular talent, but for the collective honor of Section Three of the class of ’82, she had an obligation to work and sweat. Pang Fenghua, another girl in the race, curled her lip and said to Yuyang confidentially, “Now you see how much the teacher values us, always giving us the most glorious tasks. Let’s not disappoint him.”

Like Yuyang, Fenghua was a country girl who had passed an exam to attend school in town. The two girls had similar backgrounds, though Fenghua often appeared more worldly. Whenever the teacher criticized her, her tears flowed as easily as pee, gushing so much that the teacher had no choice but to take pity on her.