Yu Hua: Cries in the Drizzle

Wang Liqiang bought a couple of dough fritters that morning — just for me, he said, and he laid them on the table. It was then, just as I had an appealing breakfast in front of me, that I chose to launch my hunger strike. I refused to eat a bite, no matter how they tried to persuade me. Instead I burst into tears and told them, “Take me back to Sun Kwangtsai!”

This was more a threat than an entreaty. Wang Liqiang knew he was at fault, and his efforts to appease me simply strengthened my resolve to remain at odds with him. As I went out, satchel on my back, he followed quickly on my heels and tried to put his hand on my shoulder, but I jerked away out of reach. When he dug in his pocket for ten cents’ snack money, I refused the bribe with equal determination, shaking my head and saying obstinately, “I don't want it.”

I insisted on savoring hunger to the fullest. Wang Liqiang's consternation at my fast had inspired me with the confidence to continue, and by inflicting hardship on myself I would get my revenge on him. At this stage I was proud of the stand I was taking. I vowed never again to let any food of his pass my lips, and at the same time I knew I would perish as a result; my eyes welled up with tears at the thought of my splendid martyrdom. My death by starvation would be the greatest retaliation against Wang Liqiang that there ever could be.

But when it came down to it I was simply too young to carry this through: my will was indomitable only so long as I had a full stomach and a warm set of clothes. When I was later to reach the point of practically fainting from hunger, I would find I just could not resist the temptation to eat. In fact, I was not then — and am not now — the kind of person willing to die for a conviction, so much do I value the sound of life flowing through my veins. Apart from life itself I cannot conceive of any other reason for living.

That morning my classmates noticed my bruised and swollen face, but they did not realize how much more painful was the hunger I was now experiencing. I had left home that morning on an empty stomach, and by the third period I was paying the price. First I was overcome with a vacant sensation: my insides felt as lonely as an alleyway late at night, windblown and desolate. Then the emptiness spread to all extremities, leaving my limbs powerless and my head groggy. Finally I came down with a stomachache, a pain more unbearable than the contusions on my face. Somehow I managed to make it to the end of the period, and then I dashed to the line of water faucets, put one to my mouth, and swallowed a whole bellyful of water. This gave me a shortlived respite from hunger. I leaned weakly against the water pipe and practically melted in the sunshine. The chilly winter water was so quickly absorbed into my system that I had to keep gulping it down right until the bell rang for the start of the next period.

After I left the water faucets, I found myself facing an even worse ordeal, for when hunger returned I had no resources to combat it. I collapsed on my chair like a sack of rice. Soon I was hallucinating that the blackboard was a cave and the teacher was pacing back and forth at the entrance to the cave, his voice booming as it echoed off the cave wall.

While my stomach was enduring one kind of pain, my expanding bladder inflicted a different sort of discomfort. It began to retaliate for my excessive fluid consumption. I had no choice but to raise my hand and ask Zhang Qinghai's permission to go out for a pee. We were only a few minutes into the period and he scolded me in very bad humor. “Why didn't you go during the break?”

I made my way gingerly to the toilet, not daring to run, because as soon as I tried that I could feel the water in my bladder sloshing back and forth. After finishing in the toilet, I grabbed the opportunity to drink another bellyful of cold water.

The fourth period that morning was perhaps the most trying hour of my whole life. Not long after I had been to the toilet, my bladder again became bloated and my face began to turn purple. When I really could not hold it another minute, I raised my hand a second time.

Zhang Qinghai eyed me suspiciously and asked, “You need to pee again?”

I nodded in embarrassment. Zhang Qinghai called Guoqing over and told him to go with me to the toilet to check whether I really had to pee. This time I didn't dare drink any more water afterward. On Guoqing's return, he loudly reported, “He passed more water than a cow!”

I sat down red faced amid my classmates’ titters. Despite my self-restraint during the last toilet break, it was not long before my bladder again became distended. Hunger had now become a matter of secondary importance; it was the bulging bladder that was my concern. I wanted to avoid raising my hand if at all possible and tried to endure the agonizing pressure, hoping that the bell would ring soon. I didn't dare adjust my position even slightly, feeling that the dam could burst at the least provocation. But later I just could not wait: time was passing so slowly and the bell would not ring. Timidly I raised my hand for the third time.

Zhang Qinghai was exasperated. “Are you trying to drown us?” he said.

The class erupted in laughter. Zhang Qinghai didn't let me go to the toilet again, but told me to go around by the window and pee on the outside wall of the classroom, because he wanted to see for himself whether I really had a call of nature to answer. When I splashed the wall with a powerful jet of urine, he was forced to accept the evidence. He walked a few steps away from the window and continued to conduct the class. It must have taken me a long time to empty my bladder, because Zhang Qinghai suddenly broke off from instruction and turned to me in surprise. “What, still not finished?”

Blushing hotly, I gave him a bashful smile.

I did not go home at the end of the morning session like the rest of my classmates, but continued my hunger strike. That whole lunchtime I lay underneath the water faucets, and when hunger pains gnawed I would raise myself up and consume a bellyful of water, then go back to lying there and feeling sorry for myself. By that time my pride was just for show; I was actually looking forward to Wang Liqiang finding me. I lay in the sunshine as the grass happily grew around me.

When Wang Liqiang did find me, it was afternoon, and classmates were arriving for classes. He discovered me sprawled next to the water faucets. I learned later from Li Xiuying that he had been anxiously waiting for me to come home ever since finishing his lunch. He helped me up, and when his hand grazed the bruises on my face I burst into tears.

He set me on his back, holding my thighs firmly with both hands, and set off for the school gate. My body swayed from side to side, and my feelings of pride, so dominant earlier that morning, gave way to dependency. Now I did not hate Wang Liqiang in the least, and when I rested my face on his shoulders I was thrilled to have a protector.

We entered a restaurant, and he set me down on the counter. Pointing at a blackboard that listed all kinds of noodle dishes, he asked me which I wanted. I scanned the menu but said nothing, for the remnants of pride were still circulating through my system. Wang Liqiang ordered a large bowl of noodles with three toppings — the most expensive option — and we sat down.

I will never forget the look in his eyes. Even now, so many years after his death, I feel a pang whenever I recall this moment. He gazed at me with such shame and affection that I say to myself: yes, I did have a father like that. But that was not how I responded at the time: it was only after he died, when I was back in South-gate, that I gradually became aware that Wang Liqiang was much more of a father to me than Sun Kwangtsai. Now, when it is all so far away, I realize that Wang Liqiang's death for me has been a lasting sorrow.