Dreams of Joy - Lisa See [148]
“The villa has lots of places to hide a body,” Kumei continues. “Yong’s too withered to stink. I hope I have the strength to keep moving her and still collect her food ration.”
Many families are doing this, hiding the corpse of mother, father, brother, sister, wife, husband, grandma, or grandpa in the house, so an extra ration can be picked up each day at the canteen.
I bite my lower lip, thinking of the old woman. She suffered so many indignities in the last ten years of her life. I swallow, and then say, “I’ll help move her, if you want.”
Starving is a grim business, but Kumei nods, grateful.
“Ta-ming is very weak,” she informs me. “He hasn’t gotten off his mat in two days.”
“Do you have anything to give him?”
She doesn’t respond. We both know the answer: no. And now that Brigade Leader Lai is gone, she can’t give his scraps to her son.
Kumei takes me to see Yong, who lies curled like a baby. Even in death she wears the white ribbon of denunciation. Kumei and I sit on the edge of the bed. I put a hand on Yong’s ankle, and then tell my two friends about having sex with Tao. Yong doesn’t respond, of course. Kumei tries to look sympathetic, but I know what she’s thinking: I need food.
We’re caught in the jaws of hunger, and our minds are tortured by this thought. And as hungry and weak as we are, we know that tomorrow and for the next six days, until next Sunday, we’ll have to work, pulling plows, digging wells, planting, and weeding from six a.m. until six p.m., followed by a political meeting or struggle session, with just a bowl of mirror soup—so thin you can see your reflection in it—to sustain us.
I catch a glimpse of myself in Yong’s mirror. My body is as thin as a ginseng root. My hands are as bony as dried twigs. My skin looks translucent. My hair hangs lifeless. My lips, which were soft and full, have shrunk to almost nothing. I’ll turn twenty-two on the twentieth of this month, but hunger has turned me into an old woman nearing death. I think of my friends Hazel and Leon back in Chinatown. Hazel’s probably gotten married, and Leon will have graduated from Yale by now. If I’d stayed home … What would be happening? Maybe I’d have a job, my own apartment, my first car…
Later, I take the long, slow walk back up the hill to my house. There’s still no activity on the terrace, but I can see my mother-in-law has put a pot of water on the outdoor stove: breakfast.
Inside, Tao, Fu-shee, Jie Jie, and some of the children are up and dressed. They sit on stools and boxes around the table. They don’t talk or make sounds. They don’t squirm or push each other. Their concentration is totally focused on something in the middle of the table. They’re waiting and watching. Their eyes somehow manage to gleam like those of animals and yet be dull as dirt.
I peer over their shoulders to see what they’re looking at. It’s something small and wrapped in a blanket.
“Samantha!” I scream.
Could she have died in the few minutes I was away? The bundle moves. As I reach forward to pick up my baby, I hear a strange barking sound. My hands draw back. It’s not Sam. I know her cry.
All the while, my husband has not moved. His eyes are like coal—dead and opaque. My body shakes as I reach over one of the children and pick up the bundle. I open the blanket. It’s Sung-ling’s baby, who looks hours, maybe minutes, from death.
“Where is Sam?” I ask.
They look at me, hungry, desperate, as though I’m holding their last meal. I step back in horror. I am holding their last meal! I’ve heard whispers about something the villagers have been doing in Black Bridge Village. They call it I Tzu, Erh Shih—Swap Child, Make Food—when mothers trade infants, let them die, and then feed them to their families.
“Where is Sam?” I shriek in terror, but no one responds.
I hold Sung-ling’s daughter close to my chest and run to her parents’ home. I push through the door and find a scene similar to the one I just left. Party Secretary Feng Jin and Sung-ling—who once were portly but now are wasted and waxy looking—stare at Sam. At least they have the