Wild Ginger

  I found myself suddenly annoyed by her smile. I remained silent and began to put on my shoes.

  "What did you do after he left?"

  "Me?" I kicked off my shoes and then put them back on again. "What do you mean? Would you ... like to have a cup of water?"

  "No thanks. I suppose you didn't take off with him, did you?"

  "No, of course not. You told me that you didn't want him to know that I was there, didn't you?"

  "No."

  "Is it cold outside?" I tried to hide my nervousness.

  "What did you do, then?" She raised her chin and looked into my eyes.

  "I..."

  She began to laugh. "It's all right to tell the truth."

  "Truth? What truth?"

  "I mean, it's all right to say that you fell asleep too and that you did nothing else."

  "I did fall asleep. Of course."

  What had happened seemed unreal to me. It had been a week and the three of us had lost contact. It was as if we were waiting for something. I wasn't clear about my feelings. I couldn't stop replaying what had taken place in the closet. I began to feel that I could never be the same way with Wild Ginger. I wouldn't admit that I had betrayed her. Yet I couldn't say that I didn't betray her. I had enjoyed Evergreen shamelessly. I felt lucky for what had happened. Evergreen and I had offered each other something we craved—human affection. I was too desperate and too selfish to reject him. I had always envied Evergreen and Wild Ginger. I had always wanted to be in Wild Ginger's place. It was long before Evergreen came to me. I encouraged him by not reporting to Wild Ginger the moment he and I discovered each other. My excuse was that she never wanted Evergreen physically. If they had been lovers, I would never have allowed myself to interfere.

  On the tenth day, I received a letter from Evergreen. He asked if I could meet him that evening in his friend's apartment on Big Dipper Road. My excitement was beyond belief. I went at the appointed time, eight-thirty, to the apartment building, which faced the street. The place was on the second floor over a basket shop. The staircase was filthy and dusty. It was crowded with baskets. The wooden stairs squeaked under my feet. I stood in front of a narrow door. I knocked. A skinny middle-aged man opened the door. He let me in without a word and he left as I entered. I heard him locking the door.

  "Hello." Evergreen's voice greeted me in the dark.

  "I need to see."

  "I'm lighting a candle."

  "Is it safe?"

  "Mr. Xing is the bellman of the neighborhood. Nobody bothers him." The candle was dim like a ghost's eye.

  "How did you bribe him?"

  "He needs food coupons. His family is dying of hunger in the countryside."

  I took a deep breath as he began to kiss me.

  "No guilt?" he asked. "I was afraid that you might regret what happened."

  I told him that I wasn't thinking. I couldn't. I was out and beyond myself.

  "Same here," he said, blowing out the candle.

  The room was now completely dark.

  Downstairs came the noise of basket makers. They were talking in a strange dialect, yelling and laughing at the same time.

  Evergreen came to me in silence. It felt as if we had been lovers for years—our bodies knew exactly how to please each other.

  "Let's be the reactionaries, let's burn down the house of Mao," he whispered.

  We repeated the pleasure again and again.

  Downstairs grew quiet. The midnight shift workers had gone. I was beginning to feel tired. But Evergreen wouldn't quit.

  He sat next to me by the candle and watched me eat the snack he'd brought.

  "Why don't you have more buns?" I asked.

  "Sure." He leaned over and said, "Take off your shirt."

  "No. Why?"

  "I hunger only for you."

  I began to laugh. "Go chew Mao quotations! Fill your stomach with them. Come on! Chairman Mao teaches us..."

  "'A thousand years is too long, seize the moment.'" He grabbed me. "Chairman Mao also teaches us, 'A revolution is an insurrection, an act of violence by which one class overthrows another.'"

  "Chairman Mao again teaches us"—I put down the buns and wrestled with him—"'The situation must change. It is the task of the people of the whole world to put an end to the aggression and oppression perpetrated by imperialism."'

  He went wild. '"If the U.S. monopoly capitalist groups persist in pushing their policies of aggression and war, the day is bound to come when they will be hanged by the people of the whole world.'"

  I could feel my body blooming. I was unable to continue the reciting.

  "Don't you stop, Maple! Show your faith in Chairman Mao! Demonstrate your loyalty! Page one hundred fifty-six. 'Speech at the Moscow Meeting of Communist and Workers' Parties.' Come on, now!"

  '"It is my opinion,'" I began, '"that the international situation has now reached a new turning point.'" I stopped, my thoughts suddenly scattered—the pleasure was too overwhelming.

  "Go on, Maple, go on. 'There are two winds in the world today'"—he caressed me, his hands cupping my breasts from behind—'"the East Wind and the West Wind. There is a Chinese saying, Either the East Wind prevails over the West Wind or the West Wind prevails over the East Wind."'

  We were breathless. He insisted we continue reciting. I tasted his sweat as I went on. '"It is characteristic of the situation today that the East Wind is prevailing over the West Wind. That is to say, the forces of socialism have become overwhelmingly superior to the forces of imperialism..."'

  Our bodies came together again.

  The mind's scene was splendid.

  "Say yes, Maple, say yes! Say you want me too, say it! I need to hear you say it!"

  My tears streamed.

  "Yes! Do that again, Maple, yes!"

  "Chairman Mao teaches us..."

  "No."

  "Come on, Evergreen!"

  "'People ... people of the world, unite and defeat the U.S. aggressors and all their running dogs! People of the world, be courageous, dare to fight, defy difficulties, and advance wave upon waves.'"

  '"Then the whole world will belong to the people. Monsters of all kinds shall be destroyed!'"

  '"Keep pushing the cart,' Maple!"

  '"Keep pushing the cart until ... until we reach the Communist heaven!'"

  "Oh Maple, the blind man is picking peaches."

  "And the blind woman has caught a fat fish—this is a miracle."

  "Do the quotations!"

  "You armchair revolutionary!"

  He groaned, "Oh! Chairman Mao!"

  The night didn't end until we collapsed in each other's arms. I meant to talk about what to do with Wild Ginger but didn't get a chance. To be honest, I was avoiding the discussion. The problem had grown too big to be fixed. In the meantime Evergreen and I were testing each other. Before I could do anything regarding Wild Ginger I needed to know my feelings as well as Evergreen's. Nevertheless I feared that I had no control of the situation. Wild Ginger could break in any moment. I had, in fact, been waiting for it to happen. She always had a foreboding before her fate took shape. I could smell the scorched words in her mouth.

  I continued to avoid Wild Ginger. Luckily all her time was being taken up with a big campaign to promote Mao's latest teachings. There was an accident—an "accident" in Wild Ginger's eyes, but not in mine. It chilled my enthusiasm completely for the Maoists. A high school student, a piano player, had criticized the Red Guards for destroying his piano. A fight broke out and the Red Guards placed the pianist's hand in a doorjamb and slammed the door shut.

  Wild Ginger rushed to the spot. "The man could have played Mao quotation songs! I know him. His name is Guo-Dong the Grand Beam. He is a good comrade. We had talked about having him play the solo for the Shanghai Mao Propaganda Band. He was my responsibility! And now you have ruined my plan!" She ordered the door slammer to be immediately arrested and sentenced to life in prison.

  To all of us the sentence was too harsh. Wild Ginger
had been acting strangely recently. Her voice was distant and her expression remote. Her eyes looked weary although still penetrating. Something seemed to be seriously bothering her and she was constantly angry.

  I ran toward home as if someone were chasing me. It was my own thoughts. Evergreen and I hadn't met for a month. Had he gone back to Wild Ginger? Or had she caught him and made him confess? I had a feeling that the confrontation between me and Wild Ginger was about to take place.

  The neighborhood was quiet that noon. The midsummer heat was stifling. Fat locusts infested the trees and made high-pitched noises. I slowed as I neared the lane. I noticed a shadow under the sun. It was Evergreen.

  "Wild Ginger and I are finished," he began.

  I felt bad and relieved at the same time.

  "Last night I made up my mind. I went to her house." Evergreen's voice was strained. "She ... actually knew. The moment I mentioned your name she came and slapped me in the face. She told me that she didn't want to know the details. She didn't cry or anything. She ... led me to her bed."

  My hair began to prickle at its roots.

  "She stripped herself and said that she would give me what I wanted. Even if it meant that she would have to lie to keep her position."

  I squatted down by the roots of a tree and waited for him to continue.

  "I could hardly think at that moment." He knelt down next to me and lowered his voice as much as he could. "I... tried to hold on to my clothes when she tried to strip me. She was ... I don't know how to describe it. I couldn't tell if she was herself. Anyway, she wouldn't let me go ... She insisted on us going to bed. I told her that I couldn't do it. I ... I didn't want to hurt her feelings, so I said that it was not worth it. She should have her first time with someone who would appreciate it. Then she cried."

  My tears welled up.

  "She said that she had put her shame in my hands and that I was ... obligated to pity her and show mercy if I had a conscience ... It was ... awful. She slapped her own face when I refused to touch her. She began to hit her head against the wall, said that she was sorry to Chairman Mao, said that she was going to whip the beast out of her body. The sound of her banging her head on the wall devastated me. I begged her to stop and ... I said I would try to take her.

  "It felt like making love to the dead. She was underneath me, her eyes were shut, her legs apart, her jaws locked tightly, as if she were going through torture ... But she wouldn't let me go. She cried, 'You must finish me!' In the meantime she wouldn't stop talking and reciting Mao quotations. She yelled at me, 'Prove that you are not a coward, admit that you are evil seduced. Show your shame, take out your sun instrument and look at it, spit on it...' Oh, these terrible words! I can't get them out of my ears! I thought I was mad to hear that. I am sorry, Maple, I shouldn't put you through this..."

  "Go on, please. I need to know."

  "She said it was her turn. She must toss herself in the pit of shame. She must see for herself how grotesque coupling was. She pulled over a mirror and demanded that I look at myself while taking her. The ugly members of our bodies. She said, 'Don't you think they are the most disgusting organs? One is like a worm and the other like a bee's nest! One should be cut and the other scorched!' She made me hate my body. I really did at that moment. I could have thrown up. She said it was the right feeling. The disgust. Keep looking. I can still see her shouting in front of my eyes. 'What are these? Animals! Animals!'

  "I was completely impotent ... I begged her to quit, but she said that we must fix the problem. It was only sex that blocked my eyes to see my own potential as a great Maoist. She said I could be fixed if I let her help. She said, 'You must get erect. I must go through this in order to get it out of your system. We must do this so there will be no myth between our bodies.' I tried to explain but she refused to listen. She pushed herself onto me, all over, and my body started to betray me and then ... suddenly"—Evergreen paused to catch his breath, his shoulders trembled, and his face turned paper white—"I saw blood."

  18

  I couldn't sleep. I felt that I owed Wild Ginger an explanation. I had become clear about my feelings toward Evergreen. After our talk Evergreen wrote me a letter. "To me, Maple, love is more important than Maoism."

  After contemplation, I wrote back. I accepted his proposal of engagement, however with one condition: I would not further my relationship with him before I made peace with Wild Ginger. Wild Ginger was too important to my life. And I was determined to keep her friendship.

  It was two o'clock in the morning. My mind had been racing. Finally I got up and sneaked out of the house. I wandered around the streets and then found myself at Wild Ginger's door. Her light was on. I stood, trying to figure out whether or not to knock. Suddenly the door opened. Wild Ginger in her uniform stood in front of me.

  "I don't intend to spit on you but I might not be able to help myself," she said. "Go away, Maple."

  "Wild Ginger," I uttered weakly. "I need a chance."

  "Go away before I pick up a gun and shoot you in the head."

  "Please, Wild Ginger, I'll do what you ask, anything."

  She laughed. "Anything? Who are you fooling? Don't say it if you don't mean it!"

  "I mean it."

  "What about giving up Evergreen? Now tell me that you mean it!"

  I lowered my head.

  "How blind I was to trust you ... How I hate myself!"

  "Please, Wild Ginger, I am..." It was as if my mouth were not mine. I tried to drag more words out of it but my thoughts scattered. I watched Wild Ginger talk but I couldn't hear her. I saw her mouthing "I hate myself." Suddenly my mind was stirred by the image of years ago in which she stabbed her hand with a sharpened pencil.

  I began to feel that I could never truly love Evergreen, that the relationship between Evergreen and me would never work because it would always be haunted. It was doomed right from the beginning—I loved Wild Ginger so much that her suffering over Evergreen was my curse.

  She pushed me out and slammed the door.

  I stood there, unable to think.

  I can't remember how long I stood. Dawn broke. The locusts had begun their chorus. The noise was piercing and getting louder by the moment. The sound filled my head.

  For the next three months Wild Ginger and I didn't talk. The pain not only didn't go away but deepened. We were almost eighteen. Bored with Mao study I retreated into my own world where missing-cover Western novels and hand-copied ancient manuscripts became my obsession. Evergreen resigned his post as the district Red Guard head. He was in a military training program preparing to go to Vietnam. We couldn't make ourselves stay away from each other.

  Wild Ginger turned into an unrecognizable character. She set laws for all the youth—anyone who was caught engaging in a sexual act would be considered a criminal. She personally took charge of several raids where the Red Guards broke into people's houses.

  I sensed that Wild Ginger was looking to catch us.

  It was as if I weren't walking on my own legs that morning. I ate no breakfast. After I came back from the market I headed for school. As I approached the classroom, I saw Hot Pepper chatting intimately with Wild Ginger. Hot Pepper was dressed in a blouse printed in a pattern of pine trees and falling snow. Wild Ginger was in a navy blue Mao jacket with a bright red collar. She was examining an application of some sort, which I was sure Hot Pepper had completed. As I got closer and saw the red letterhead I was able to tell that it was Hot Pepper's application for Communist party membership.

  Seeing me, Wild Ginger put her arm around Hot Pepper's shoulders and the two turned and walked away. Within two weeks Hot Pepper was pronounced a party member. She followed Wild Ginger like a dog. She carried a heavy paste bucket all day long to help Wild Ginger put up news columns. I saw her pour Wild Ginger water during her speeches. The two flattered each other at the Mao activists' conventions. Hot Pepper must have felt an inch taller when she ran into me in the neighborhood. She gave me a warning for being late for last Th
ursday's Mao quotation reciting.

  As a radical Maoist, Wild Ginger not only pushed herself, but also pushed the entire district to be the model of Mao studies. In the name of Mao she enslaved us. We worked on reciting the quotations like monks chanting Buddhist scriptures. There was no longer time even for me to go to the market. Every morning Wild Ginger's shrill whistle would come from the loudspeakers mounted on the electric poles throughout the neighborhood. I often rushed to the school without washing my face or brushing my teeth. Within minutes the entire school would gather in an open square.

  Wild Ginger would stand on a four-foot-high concrete stage. The microphone in her hand looked like a grenade. Her skin was sunburned. Her eyes blinked nervously and her hands made fists. She often started out with a controlled voice but then, in an instant, she would shout. The sound would blast and the microphone would buzz. After a brief Mao quotation reciting, she would order us to march and run. She would keep us going so long we sometimes wondered if she had forgotten about us. Anyone who dropped out would be publicly humiliated and punished.

  When we ran into each other she treated me like a wall. One time she laughed hysterically when our shoulders brushed. I saw her showing more affection toward Hot Pepper. If Hot Pepper had a tail she would have wagged it harder. I knew she had been coveting a chair at the Red Guard's headquarters.

  19

  When my mother asked me about Wild Ginger I lied. I figured that she had some idea about our breaking up. She seemed just as awkward around the subject as I was.

  At the end of summer, Evergreen returned from military training. At the train station where I went to pick him up we discussed our future. "I have changed my mind about wanting to go to Vietnam," he began. "I'd like to open a husband-and-wife elementary school for poor children in a remote village in the countryside." After a pause he asked, "Would you like to be the wife?"