Susan Barker - The Incarnations

Teacher Zhao stares at Long March, stunned. Long March then tells Teacher Zhao of the evidence we have. One day last October Teacher Zhao had chalked ‘Use Maoist Thought to Criticize Maoist Thought’ on the blackboard instead of ‘Use Maoist Thought to Criticize Bourgeois Thought’. Teacher Zhao had laughed and corrected her mistake. But it was too late. A slip of the chalk had shown us evidence of her secret anti-Party agenda.

‘Well, Class Enemy Zhao?’ Long March spits fiercely. ‘Did you or did you not write “Use Maoist Thought to Criticize Maoist Thought” on the blackboard last October? Think carefully before you answer. There are twenty-eight witnesses here in this room who will testify that you did.’

For the next three hours Teacher Zhao defends herself against the charges. Though she looks scared stiff when the class breaks into chanting ‘Down with Teacher Zhao!’ she still won’t confess. Eventually, Long March screams, ‘I am sick of this rightist whore!’ and slaps Teacher Zhao so hard she knocks her glasses off and sends them shattering to the floor. The class descends into silence. For a student to hit a teacher is an unthinkable thing. But Teacher Zhao hangs her head and does not reprimand Long March.

‘I am sick of Teacher Zhao’s lies,’ Long March spits. ‘As the Great Helmsman said, “To stain our hands with our enemies’ blood is an honour!” Comrades! The Anti-black Gang Capitalist rally has begun outside. Let’s take her out!’

The Ox Freaks and Snake Monsters are paraded around the running track behind the school. Tall dunce hats are placed on their heads and placards hung around their necks: Down with Headteacher Yang! Down with Black Gangster Zhao! The teachers are handed pots and pans, which they are forced to bang in percussion as they straggle around the field.

A third-year girl called Shaoli shrieks the headteacher’s crimes through a loudspeaker: ‘Headteacher Yang Attempted to Overthrow the Communist Government and Take Over the Military! Headteacher Yang Attempted to Assassinate Chairman Mao!’

Headteacher Yang is stony-faced and unrepentant. Shaoli calls over Teacher Wu and tells him to slap the headteacher. When he refuses, a second-year girl beats him with a broom. They call over Teacher Zhao and, scared of being beaten too, she slaps Headteacher Yang to loud cheers. ‘ Harder! Harder! ’ shout their former pupils. Shaoli orders Headteacher Yang and Teacher Zhao to knock heads, and they headbutt each other like rams. ‘ Harder! ’ Shaoli shouts through the loudspeaker, like a ringmaster in a circus of humiliation and cruelty.

Keen to lead the Anti-black Gang Capitalist rally, you take the loudspeaker from Shaoli, punch your fist in the air and shout, ‘The iron fist of the proletariat will crush the enemies of Chairman Mao! Heads will roll! Blood will flow! But we will never let go of Mao Zedong Thought! Long Live the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution! ’

And hundreds of girls punch their fists up to the sky and shout, ‘ Long Live the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution! ’

You hurl your clenched fist up again: ‘ Long Live the Anti-capitalist School for Revolutionary Girls! ’

And I have no choice but to flail my fist to the heavens and shout with everyone else: ‘ Long Live the Anti-capitalist School for Revolutionary Girls! ’

That night I can’t sleep. I close my eyes and see Teacher Wu bleeding from his head as the second-year girl beats him with a broom. I see Teacher Lin on her hands and knees, her tongue lapping at Resist America’s boot leather. I see Teacher Zhao being slapped hard in the face by Long March, and her glasses shattering on the classroom floor.

I slip out of bed at daybreak and go to the Zhang residence in Ironmongers Lane. Though it’s not yet six o’clock, you are up and seated on the bench in the yard. Comrade Zhang Liya, leader of the newly established Red Guard of the Anticapitalist School for Revolutionary Girls, looking ready to fight the class enemies with your PLA uniform, red-star beret and militant gaze. Then you see me and break into a wide smile. We haven’t spoken in weeks. Not since the Cultural Revolution began.

‘Yi Moon,’ you smile. ‘How are you?’

I smile back thinly and say, ‘I am well, thank you. I have become very practised at writing Thought Reports and using the scalpel of Mao Zedong Thought to excise the malignant tumours of rightist thought from my mind. I can write Thought Reports in my sleep.’

‘Good,’ you say, ignoring my sarcasm. ‘Keep your political consciousness strong.’

‘How about you, Comrade Zhang?’ I ask. ‘Is the revolution progressing as you hoped?’

‘Progress has been satisfactory,’ you say, your eyes shining, ‘but there is more work to be done. For now we must spread the revolution beyond our schools, to the streets of Beijing. But we Red Guards will rise to the challenge. We Red Guards will fight to protect our Great Leader Chairman Mao from the capitalist roaders who attack him.’

‘I’d rather have adventures than learn from books,’ you told me in the ruins of the Old Summer Palace. Back then, your ambition had impressed me. Back then, I hadn’t known ‘have adventures’ meant persecuting and terrorizing innocent people.

‘Liya. .’ I say, ‘do you really think that Teacher Zhao was spying for the Nationalists and plotting to overthrow the Communist Party?’

‘The Cultural Revolution Committee of the Anti-capitalist School for Revolutionary Girls has these allegations under investigation,’ you respond.

‘But what evidence is there?’

‘The allegations are under investigation.’

Frustrated by your stilted, official speech, I cry out, ‘Every time I close my eyes, I see Teacher Lin licking Resist America’s boots, or Headteacher Yang being slapped in the face. Can’t you see how awful it is? We have stopped being humans. We are worse than beasts!’

Under your red-star cap, your eyes are stern. ‘You sympathize with the rightists because your father is a rightist,’ you say. ‘Restore your red status, and you would throw yourself into the Cultural Revolution tomorrow.’

‘My father is not a rightist!’ I correct. ‘My father’s department had to expel a quota of rightists. That’s why he was arrested and sent away. He did nothing wrong.’

You shake your head, as though at my naivety, and say, ‘Do you really think they’d send your father to a labour camp if he hadn’t committed a crime?’

A servant enters the courtyard with a teakwood tray of rice porridge, steamed buns and soy milk. The servant girl, who is our age, lowers the tray beside you on the bench then retreats, walking backwards like a eunuch before the Emperor. You don’t thank her, or even nod to acknowledge her, your chin propped up high by your sense of entitlement. How can you pretend to be one of the masses? I think scornfully. How can you pretend to be one of the proletariat, when you live like this ?

I turn to leave. I don’t bother to say goodbye. ‘ Wait! ’ you cry. You come after me, catching me by my shoulder at the gate. I turn around, expecting an apology for what you said about my father. Tenderness returns to your eyes as you stroke my head. ‘Sorry they cut your hair,’ you say. ‘You used to have such beautiful hair. But that bitch Miao butchered it.’

Who gives a damn about my hair? I want to scream. I step back, disgusted, and your eyes turn sad.

‘Yi Moon, I want you to know,’ you say, ‘I am protecting you and your mother. I am keeping you safe.’

‘My mother and I don’t need you to protect us,’ I mutter as I turn and walk out the gate.

Your laughter pursues me down Ironmongers Lane: ‘If only you knew. .’