Yu Hua - Brothers

Baldy Li nodded like an obedient child, and when Lin Hong walked past him she heard him mumbling, "I will receive my retribution, as will you."

Lin Hong nodded and, wiping her tears from her eyes, said, "I will certainly receive my retribution."

That night the autumn wind blew and the moon shone brightly. Someone walking along the railroad tracks collecting stray pieces of coal discovered Song Gang's body, and he told two people living near the tracks. The body didn't have a single bloodstain on it. The train had ridden over Song Gang's waist, and while his body was sliced clean in half, his clothing hadn't even been torn. At eleven o'clock that night, the two people living near the tracks transported Song Gang in a pull-cart to the front door of his house. Former workmates of his from the docks, they recognized Song Gang under the face mask and saw his clothes and glasses lying on the stone. After discussing the situation, they found a pullcart and put Song Gang in it, then placed his glasses in his jacket pocket and draped the jacket over his body. Song Gang was very tall, so as his body lay in the cart his head stuck out and his feet dragged on the ground. Therefore, one of the workers walked in front pulling the cart while the other walked behind, holding up Song Gang s legs. In this way they walked through the deathly quiet streets of Liu Town. The autumn leaves rustled beneath the wheels, and occasionally a few passersby would stop and watch them curiously. Neither of the two workmates said anything as they walked, hunched over, returning Song Gang to his door.

After they put the cart down, they pulled Song Gang s body a little so that his head was no longer hanging over the side, and folded up his legs so that his feet rested on the ground. Then they gently knocked on the door, called out softly, and waited silently for more than half an hour before realizing that Lin Hong was not home. One of them sat on the pullcart's handlebars watching over Song Gang while the other walked along the empty streets, trying to find someone from Baldy Li's company. The dockworker knew that Baldy Li was Song Gangs brother and had heard the rumors about Lin Hong and Baldy Li.

The dead Song Gang had been brought home, but they couldn't get him through his own front door; instead, he was lying faceup in the flatbed of a pullcart in front of the house. The worker sitting on the handlebars watched blankly as the wind blew leaves onto Song Gang's body. Some of the leaves came from the tree overhead, and some were blown up from the ground. Around two o'clock in the morning, the worker finally saw his workmate coming back with Deputy Liu.

Deputy Liu stood in front of the pullcart looking at Song Gang. After shaking his head, he stepped aside to call Baldy Li, then walked back to the pullcart, and the three of them waited there in front of Song Gang's house. At around three, they saw Lin Hong appear in the empty street, and as she approached she passed in and out of the light from the streetlamps. She walked solemnly with her head bowed and hugging her shoulders, looking as if she were walking in and out of life itself.

Lin Hong walked up to the pullcart, avoiding the three men's gazes, then turned and walked away. As she was opening the front door she looked back at Song Gang's body lying in the pullcart, covered with leaves. She opened the door and found complete darkness inside. Lin Hong looked back at Song Gang and couldn't help going back and leaning over the pullcart to clean off the leaves that were covering his body. What she saw was not Song Gangs face but his face mask. She knelt down and began to cry, her entire body shuddering, as she pulled off the mask. Under the moonlight she was able to make out his peaceful expression. As she cried her trembling hands caressed his face. This face that once had so many happy smiles, that not so long before was full of yearning as Song Gang rode the train back to Liu, was now lifeless, as cold as the dark night.

LIN HONG experienced a silent dawn. After Song Gang was carried to his bed by his former workmates, she realized that his body had been virtually sliced in two. As the two men lifted the tenuously connected halves of Song Gang by his arms and legs and walked toward the bed, Song Gangs body looked as though it had been folded in half. His posterior dragged against the concrete floor, as leaves fell from his body. After they lay Song Gang down, his folded body was once again stretched flat, and a few remaining leaves fell onto the bed. After Deputy Liu and Song Gangs two former workmates left, predawn Liu Town was absolutely silent. Lin Hong sat on the bed hugging her knees to her chest, gazing at the peaceful Song Gang and the peaceful leaves as tears streamed down her face, her thoughts alternating between utter confusion and utter clarity.

In her periods of confusion, she felt as lonely as the depth of night. In her periods of clarity, it seemed as if Song Gang were speaking, smiling, walking, and tenderly caressing her. These were sweet secrets that the two of them shared and that no one could intrude upon. Now the twenty years they had shared had been brought to an end, and they would never again share any experience together. Lin Hong felt a chill run through her body, a chill of loneliness and solitude. She told herself over and over that it was she who killed Song Gang; as a result, she hated herself and wanted to scream. She didn't scream but instead silently grabbed a clump of her hair and pulled it with all her might. Her hair sliced open her fingers, leaving them red with blood. She gazed abjectly at Song Gang, lying there in eternal rest, and asked over and over again, "Why did you have to leave?"

Then she felt a wave of humiliation sweep over her as she remembered how lonely she had been after he left and all she had suffered at the hands of the chain-smoking Director Liu, and she couldn't help sobbing, "You left before I had a chance to tell you about all the humiliation I endured."

The next morning Lin Hong received the letter Song Gang had sent her before committing suicide. The letter was six pages long, and each line was deeply moving. Song Gang told her that he had been very happy all these years together and thanked her for always being at his side. He said that ever since his lungs went bad, he had considered separating from her, but she had told him that, no matter what happened, she would never leave him. He said that, knowing this, he could die without regrets. He asked that she forgive him for taking his own life and that she not feel bad because of him. He said that being with her those twenty years was better than spending twenty lifetimes with any other woman, and therefore he had no regrets. Song Gang also told her very apologetically that when he left without saying goodbye more than a year earlier, it was only in order to earn enough money so that she would be able to live without worries. He regretted, however, that he was not very talented at earning money and had been able to bring back only thirty thousand yuan, which he had stuffed under the pillow. He hoped that, after she rid herself of this burden, she could live comfortably, relying on her own abilities. Finally, he emphasized that he didn't hate Baldy Li and certainly didn't hate Lin Hong, nor did he hate himself. He had just taken a first step and would look for Lin Hong in the next world. He was confident that they would have an opportunity to be together again, and after that they would be together forever.

Lin Hong read Song Gang's letter over and over again, crying so much that the pages became soaked with tears. Then, still crying, she got up, removed Song Gang's clothes, and began washing his body. When she noticed the two red swellings on his chest, she gripped the towel in terror, wiped at the red swellings, and uncovered the festering wounds under his armpits. Her entire body began to tremble. She looked at Song Gang's wounds over and over again, and each time her tears started to blur her vision, she would wipe them away and continue looking carefully at the wounds, until her eyes would again blur over. She couldn't understand what these wounds were from, or what had happened to Song Gang while he was away traveling. She stood blankly for a long time, still holding the towel. She cried, she shook her head, she became confused, she couldn't understand.