Yu Hua: Boy in the Twilight: Stories of the Hidden China

“LAIFA, HOW DID YOUR MOM DIE?” they asked.

“She died in childbirth,” I said.

“Which child was that?” they asked.

“Me,” I said.

“How did she give birth to you?” they asked again.

“With one foot in the coffin,” I said.

Hearing this, they would laugh a good long time. “What about the other foot?”

I wasn’t sure about the other foot. Mr. Chen didn’t tell me — all he said was, when a woman gives birth she has one foot in the coffin. He didn’t say where she puts the other one.

“HEY, WHO’S YOUR DADDY?” they shouted.

“My daddy died,” I said.

“Nonsense,” they said, “your daddy’s alive and well.”

I looked at them, eyes wide. They came over, close to me, and whispered in my ear. “I’m your daddy.”

I looked down and thought for a moment. “Mm,” I went.

“Am I your daddy?” they asked.

I nodded. “Mm.”

I heard them chortle. Mr. Chen came over. “Pay no attention to them,” he said. “You’ve only got one dad. Everybody’s only got one dad. If people had lots of different dads, how would their moms manage?”

· · ·

AFTER MY DAD DIED, the people in the town, no matter how old they were — the men, I mean — practically all of them told me they were my dad. With so many dads, I started having lots of names, and I didn’t have enough fingers in the evening to count all the new names they gave me during the day.

Only Mr. Chen still called me Laifa. Every time I saw Mr. Chen and heard him call my name, my heart would skip a beat. Mr. Chen would stand in the doorway of the pharmacy, watching me with his hands inside his sleeves, and I would stand there and look at him back. Sometimes it made me snicker. After a while Mr. Chen would wave me away, saying, “Off you go. Look, you’ve still got a load of coal on your back.”

One time, I didn’t go off. I just stood there. “Mr. Chen,” I went.

Mr. Chen’s hands came out of his sleeves and he stared at me. “What did you call me?”

My heart was thumping. Mr. Chen came over. “What did you say just now?”

“Mr. Chen,” I said.

He smiled. “You’re not so dumb, after all,” he said. “You know to call me Mr. Chen, Laifa.”

He called my name again and I smiled just as Mr. Chen had done. “Do you know that Laifa is your name?” he asked.

“Yes,” I said.

“Let me hear you say it.”

“Laifa,” I said quietly.

That made Mr. Chen laugh very hard, and I opened my mouth and joined in. After a little more laughing, Mr. Chen said, “Laifa, from now on, unless people call you Laifa, just don’t answer them, do you understand?”

I smiled. “I understand,” I said.

Mr. Chen nodded. Then, looking at me, he called, “Mr. Chen.”

“Mm,” I went.

“When I call my own name, why do you answer?”

I didn’t know Mr. Chen was calling his own name. I thought it was funny, so I smiled. He shook his head. “You’re still a simpleton, it seems.”

MR. CHEN DIED a long time ago, and Pug-nose Xu Asan died just a few days ago, and a lot of people died in between. People around the same age as Xu Asan have white hair and white beards, and these days I often hear them saying they’ll soon be dead, so I think I’ll be dead myself soon, too. They tell me I’m older than Pug-nose Xu Asan. “Hey, idiot,” they say, “who’s going to collect your body once you’re dead?”

I shake my head. I really don’t know who’s going to bury me once I’m dead. I ask them who will bury them when they’re dead, and they say, “We’ve got sons and grandsons, wives too. Our wives aren’t dead yet. What about you? Have you got sons? Have you got grandsons? You don’t even have a wife.”

I said nothing. I haven’t got any of those people, so I put my load on my back and went on my way. But Xu Asan had all those people. The day that Pug-nose Xu Asan was cremated, I saw his son and grandson and all the women weeping and wailing as they walked along the street. I followed them to the crematorium with my empty load on my back. It was a lively scene all the way, and I thought how nice it would be if I had a son and a grandson and other family. I walked along next to Xu Asan’s grandson. The kid was crying louder than anyone, but he asked me as he wept, “Hey, am I your daddy?”

PEOPLE ABOUT THE SAME AGE as me are tired of being my dad now. They used to give me all kinds of names, but sooner or later they put the question to me point-blank, they ask me what my name is. They say, “What is your name? When you die, we want to know who it is has died … Think about it: when Xu Asan died, all we needed to do was to say Xu Asan died, and everyone would understand, but what do we say when you die? You’ve got no name at all.”

I know what my name is. My name is Laifa. It used to be that Mr. Chen was the only person who remembered my name, and once he died, nobody knew my name. Now they all want to know what I’m called, but I won’t tell them. They roar with laughter and they say: An idiot is just an idiot pure and simple. He’s an idiot in life and an idiot when he’s lying dead in his coffin.

I know I’m an idiot. I know I’m getting old and will die soon. Sometimes I think: It’s true what they say. I don’t have a son or a grandson, and when I die nobody will weep and wail and see me off to my cremation. I still don’t have a name of my own, and once I’m dead they won’t know who has died.

These days I often think of that dog I used to have, that skinny little dog that later grew up to be big and strong. They used to call it Dummy, too. I knew they were cursing it when they called it Dummy. I didn’t call it that. I called it Hey.

In those days streets weren’t as wide as they are now, and houses weren’t as tall. Mr. Chen would stand in the doorway of the pharmacy. His hair was still black then. Even Pug-nose Xu Asan was young in those days. It was before he was married. “A man like me, in his twenties …,” he would say.

But my dad was dead. I had been delivering coal on my own for years by then. As I walked along the street, I’d often see that dog, so small and skinny, mouth open, tongue hanging out, licking this and that, wet all over. I’d seen it around a lot, so when Pug-nose Xu Asan lifted it up and showed it to me that time, I recognized it right away. Xu Asan had stopped me in the street. He and a few other people were standing outside his house, and Xu Asan said, “Hey, do you want to get married?”

I stood on the other side of the street and watched them snickering, and I snickered myself. “The dummy wants a woman,” they said. “He smiled.”

“Do you want to get married or not?” Xu Asan asked.

“What for?” I said.

“What for? To live with you … sleep with you, have meals with you … Would you like that or not?”

I nodded. That’s when they brought out the dog. Xu Asan picked it up by the scruff of its neck and thrust it toward me. Its four legs were scrabbling around and it was barking madly. “Hey, hurry up and take her. She’s yours,” he said.

They stood there, roaring with laughter. “Come on, dummy! Come and collect your mate.”

I shook my head. “That’s no woman.”

Xu Asan shouted at me, “If it’s not a woman, what is it?”

“It’s a dog, it’s a puppy,” I said.

They roared with laughter. “This dummy knows about dogs … He knows about puppies.”

“Rubbish.” Xu Asan glared at me. “This is a female, look here …”

Xu Asan lifted the dog’s rear legs and yanked them apart to show me. “Did you get a good look?” he asked.

I nodded. “Female, right?” he said.

I shook my head again. “It’s not a woman,” I said. “It’s a bitch.”