Tie Ning - The Bathing Women

In the quiet depths of the night, Wu often wept in the wide, empty bed, hugging to her the unfinished outfit of Quan’s she’d been working on that day. She would think that perhaps she shouldn’t have given birth to Quan. Why would she have given birth to her? Had she done it as a sort of memento of her relationship with Dr. Tang? Before Quan was born, Dr. Tang didn’t even know the child was his. Wu didn’t tell him, but she was sure the baby was his and she was willing to keep such a child in her life. The child would be a constant reminder of her secrets. She didn’t tell Dr. Tang, because she was afraid he would force her to go to the hospital to have an abortion. She knew intuitively that Dr. Tang didn’t really love her, and that her longing for him outweighed his need for her. The roots of that longing were mysterious to her. It seemed to be longing that drove her sexual desire, but then again laziness brought about her longing in the first place. Laziness allowed her to avoid many responsibilities but also prevented her from planning for the future in her relationship with others. Maybe even her so-called memento came from her laziness — she was too lazy to use birth control. As a married woman, she had such freedom in these matters, unlike an unmarried girl like Fei. While Fei was miserably gagged with gauze in the operating room late at night, Wu could walk into the ob-gyn in broad daylight to give birth to a child who was not her husband’s. How legitimate and righteous marriage was! How secretive and filthy marriage was! She sobbed and thought this might be what people called karma. It was the punishment that God sent her for conducting her life so badly and shirking her responsibilities. She’d decided on her own, and audaciously, to give birth to Quan. She brought Quan into this world recklessly, and did she really think it had been for the child’s benefit? Everything was like a dream, starting with the sick leave and ending with Quan’s disappearance, which should put an end to her relationship with Dr. Tang. Only now did she truly dare to take a close look at her family, to consider her loved ones. She had been afraid of looking at her family, of thinking about them. And always she had been more afraid of her daughter Tiao than of her husband. She was certain that nothing escaped Tiao’s eyes. The child could turn the world upside down when she thought it necessary.

But who could say that Yixun hadn’t picked up the scent of her infidelity? In the last two years, he rarely came home except on holidays and during the change of seasons in spring and autumn. If Tiao and Fan complained, he would just say the farm was busy and it was difficult to get leave. When Wu sent him a telegram informing him of Quan’s birth, he didn’t come back until a week later. Wu had spent a lot of time thinking about this telegram. Her original impulse was not to have Yixun around when she was in labour. It would be too difficult for Yixun and too disrespectful to him. Even though he probably did not know anything, she still didn’t want to take the risk. She would rather have no one close by and simply welcome the baby on her own. It would seem odd, though, to give birth all by herself, like an admission that there was ambiguity and deception involved in having the child, an admission that she lacked the courage to let the baby face the man whom she called husband. She wouldn’t let that happen. Muddling through, if at all possible, was the guiding principle of her life. So she had sent a telegram to the Reed River Farm. She sent the telegram, but he took his time in arriving. His delay was enough to make her wonder, but at the time she didn’t even have the courage to wonder. She just kept moving. When he arrived, she leaned back to the head of the bed and pulled up the quilt that covered her body, and then she picked up a glass from the nightstand and swallowed a few gulps of tea. Moving could relieve nervousness sometimes, so she kept moving. Finally, she reached under the covers for Quan and presented the baby to Yixun, who was standing beside the bed.

She never knew how Yixun reacted when he first saw Quan, because she’d kept her eyes cast down the whole time. She’d just lowered her eyes and, steadily, in her outstretched hands, held the baby for Yixun to see — she wanted him to accept her child. If only he had taken the child from her hands, then her heart would have been at peace. But he didn’t. On the contrary, he backed off a step. He withdrew his extended hands and slid them into his pockets — he was also fidgeting; he also needed to relieve his nerves by moving. Then he said without looking at her, “I’d better wash my hands. I was on the bus all day and dust got everywhere.”

He stayed at home only one night and returned to the farm.

So, who could say that Yixun didn’t know anything?

It was time to put an end to things.

This expression very much appealed to her now. One person’s death had made her understand that there were things in life that she needed to end. With this thought in mind, she went to People’s Hospital to see Dr. Tang. For once, arriving at those two first-floor rooms, she didn’t go directly to the inner room but took a seat in the waiting room, and Dr. Tang immediately knew why Wu had come.

They had never discussed Quan’s paternity. Dr. Tang hadn’t been to Wu’s home since Quan’s birth. But Quan didn’t stop growing and changing because Dr. Tang wasn’t around. Soon all those features that obviously belonged to the Tang family started to show in her. She had so quickly grown very different from Tiao and Fan. How little Quan looked like her surprised even Wu. The child’s appearance didn’t leave any room for doubt in the adults, the families, and the society in which she would have to live. So, when she was a year old, Wu brought her to People’s Hospital to meet Dr. Tang. It was a meeting that did not reveal anything new. Between Wu and Dr. Tang no curtain needed to be drawn back: Dr. Tang’s heart was as clear as glass when he looked at this baby with the curly brown hair who stared at him with little dark eyes. He seemed somewhat surprised and confused, taking Quan in his arms, slightly embarrassed and a little excited. He must have wanted to kiss her but clearly didn’t dare put his lips close to her face. With a lump in his throat, he asked, “What is her name?”

“Her name is Quan.”

“Which character for Quan?”

“The character for grass on top, and the one for completion below — Quan, meaning heavenly grass.”

He paused, and then asked, “The character for grass above and completion underneath?”

She said, “Yes. Doesn’t the character for Fei also have the character for grass?”

It was already too obvious, so they both stopped talking. Besides, she didn’t want to discuss anything; she’d just wanted to bring Quan here for him to see.

For this, Dr. Tang was grateful to Wu. He had always been grateful that she let him avoid responsibility towards her and now was even more grateful to be relieved of responsibility towards this child of theirs. Because she’d permitted him this escape, he didn’t have to feel nervous and could just relax, which had allowed him to enjoy sex with her. This was the real reason he needed her. In such repressive times, a woman like Wu could provide someone of his family and social background a warm bed in secret to soothe his anxiety and despair. By this stroke of sheer luck, she helped him maintain a relatively healthy balance between body and mind. They both knew the good days wouldn’t last, which didn’t mean they could have predicted Quan’s death. Unlike Wu, Dr. Tang was not shocked that Quan lived for only two years, and he didn’t mourn deep or long, either. He had been involved with a shorter life than Quan’s — in his niece Fei’s abortion. He didn’t consider his pessimism about the lives in the Tang family as cruel. In fact, he had predicted long ago that they would live to suffer, just as with his sister Jingjing’s miserable death, or his niece Fei’s plight, or the awkward life he was living himself. No one had ever understood what was in his heart, and this woman named Wu in particular didn’t understand.