Ma Jian - Beijing Coma

Bai Ling hurried over with Old Fu, and said, ‘We’ve just gone through the latest reports we’ve received from the intersections. The army are coming to clear the Square. They’re shooting their way through the city, crashing over the barricades in armoured personnel carriers.’

‘Whatever happens, this ceremony must go ahead!’ Mou Sen said, his eyes blazing with determination.

Yu Jin ran up to us. His clothes were splattered with blood. ‘Look, I picked up this bullet cartridge myself. The soldiers are shooting to kill. They lifted their guns and sprayed the streets with bullets, then tens of bodies dropped to the ground. My racing bike was crushed flat by the wheels of a tank.’

We stared at him in disbelief, and he stared back at me, his eyes wide open.

‘If you see any student marshals, tell them to go to the Monument,’ I said to him. I searched my pockets for my sunglasses, then remembered that Tian Yi had taken them.

Mou Sen walked up to Bai Ling and said, ‘Professor Yan Jia still hasn’t turned up yet. Would you stand in for him and cut our red sash?’ Then he said to Tian Yi, ‘Quickly, make a final announcement calling all those students in the trucks blocking Changan Avenue to come and attend the Democracy University’s opening ceremony.’

Tian Yi stepped onto the stage, gripping a microphone nervously in her hand and said, ‘Please will all the students come to the Democracy University to attend the trucks blocking Changan Avenue.’

‘Oh, that’s too much!’ hissed Mou Sen, annoyed at her slipup. He went over and whispered to her, ‘I said: attend the opening ceremony, not the trucks!’

Tian Yi put the microphone to her lips again and blurted out, ‘I mean, everyone must go to the trucks, not attend them!’

Mou Sen jumped onto the stage and took the microphone from her. I went over and helped Tian Yi down. Her legs were shaking. She looked as though she was about to faint. ‘Give me some water,’ she said, closing her eyes.

Mou Sen lifted the microphone, and in his loudest voice, cried, ‘We don’t want you to go to the trucks. We want everyone to come here and enrol in our University of Democracy. We will defend Tiananmen Square to the end, and continue our campaign of peaceful resistance. I now declare the Democracy University officially open. Can I ask Bai Ling to step up and cut the sash? Come on, Bai Ling!’

Bai Ling straightened her back and stepped up onto the stage, her small breasts shaking as she moved. She wrapped her hands around the scissors Mou Sen was holding, and together they cut through the decorative knot of the red silk sash. As they raised the severed sash into the air, the crowd burst into applause and a thousand camera flashes went off.

Tian Yi had calmed down a little. She squeezed my hand and said, ‘Promise you won’t leave me.’

‘Don’t worry. If the enemy advances, we’ll retreat. We don’t have to throw ourselves onto the machine guns like that patriotic Chinese soldier in the Korean War.’ There were at least 10,000 people crowded around the stage now. Nuwa was standing beside Mou Sen, translating into Chinese the speech a foreign guest was giving. The high-heeled red leather sandals she was wearing made her legs look elegant.

‘And now let our classes begin!’ Mou Sen said, smoothing back his long sweaty hair.

As the crowd roared their applause again, a stern announcement blasted from every government speaker in the Square. ‘We repeat again, the inauguration of the Democracy University has not been approved by the State Education Committee. The instigators must be prepared to take legal responsibility for their actions…’ The voice echoed menacingly through the Square, seemingly trying to prove that even the air above us belonged to the Party.

The distant gunfire sounded like a string of firecrackers exploding. I felt as though we were live crabs being tossed inside a scorching wok.

Mou Sen was still delivering his speech. ‘… Chairman Mao said that the People’s Liberation Army is a school, but did the State Education Committee approve its inauguration? The Party trains the army to suppress the people. We will train democrats to serve the nation! Tiananmen Square is our lecture hall. The rest of this vast nation is our campus. We don’t need the approval of any bloody education committee to establish our university!’ The crowd laughed approvingly.

‘All right, fellow students,’ Nuwa said. ‘Now I will ask Bai Ling to read out a message of congratulations from the Defend Tiananmen Square Headquarters. Let’s all give her another round of applause!’ She looked like a television presenter as she paced gracefully across the stage. The high heels of her red sandals were causing the skin at the back of her feet to wrinkle.

The longer Bai Ling spoke, the wider her eyes became. ‘Once this period of darkness is over, we will witness the emergence of a democratic republic, and all our efforts will come to fruition…’

As soon as Mou Sen stepped off the stage, Yan Jia, the Democracy University’s honorary president, turned up with his wife. Nuwa was so relieved she burst into tears. ‘We sent three people out to look for you. How wonderful that you made it! Once the representatives from the intellectual circles have read out their messages of congratulations, we’d like to invite you to give our first lecture!’

The light from the two spotlights powered by the diesel generator was dazzlingly bright one minute and a dim glow the next. The generator we’d used a couple of days before for the unveiling ceremony of the Goddess of Democracy had been much better.

Although people were frantically rushing across the rest of the Square, the audience in front of the stage listened quietly to Yan Jia’s lecture, breaking into respectful applause from time to time.

Whenever a flash went off, everyone tensed up, mistaking it for a gunshot. I stood at a distance from the crowd and kept an eye on the four corners of the Square, watching for any signs of trouble.

By the time Mou Sen announced that the opening ceremony was over, there were still more than two thousand people crowded around the stage.

I helped Xiao Li remove the spotlights and generator and roll up my banner. The city residents who were reluctant to leave converged in small groups to discuss what they’d heard. ‘So that’s what democracy is about,’ one man said. ‘I didn’t realise we’d have to overthrow the Communist Party to achieve it…’

‘They stand here and talk about democracy while the army tanks are rolling towards them. They think they can change this country. They’re so naïve. We told them to leave the Square weeks ago, but they wouldn’t listen…’

A few members of the Workers’ Federation’s Dare-to-Die Squad, all wearing red armbands, ran over to us and shouted, ‘The soldiers are killing people in West Changan Avenue. The citizens need our help. Come on, everyone, let’s go. We’ll fight those bastards to the death…’

You look down at your bed, as though observing the earth from space.

‘Wake up! Open your eyes!’ my mother cries, banging my iron bedstead. ‘I can’t go on like this! I’ve had enough. Enough! I can’t take it any more. If you don’t hurry up and die, I’ll kill myself. I’ll jump off the roof. I’ll gas myself, hang myself, swallow a bottle of pesticide. I’ll cut my wrists…’ She grabs my sheet and buries her head in it. I hear a muffled scream that sounds like straw crackling in a cotton bag.

Then she stands up and lets out wild, warbling howls. She inhales a breath of air, rasping, ‘Will you never die?’ then on her outbreath wails, ‘You useless lump of wood…’ Her words float through the dust that’s blowing in from the demolition site outside. ‘I’ll burn this flat down, I’ll…’