sighs. She jabs her knife into the seam of a leather brogue, drags it around the base, pulls off the leather upper and tears out the insole which still bears the imprint of a man’s five toes.
‘Why didn’t you go with us to Sunlight Bathhouse the other day, then? It’s only two kilometres away.’
‘I didn’t want to walk that far – I was afraid police might catch me.’ Inside the bag by Meili’s feet are four pairs of shoes which she hopes will fit Kongzi and Nannan.
‘If you spray some cologne into a bowl of water and wash yourself with it, you’ll smell as though you’ve used soap. But I warn you, the nicer you smell, the more flies you’ll attract.’ Liu Di always laughs when she finishes speaking. The only time she didn’t was when she told Meili that her third baby was killed by family planning officers a few seconds after it was born.
At dusk, when the golden sky fills with fluttering crows and sparrows, the workers finish for the day and climb up the path for some fresh air. At the top of the hill, beyond the demolished village, stand the ruins of an ancient convent that was destroyed in the Cultural Revolution. The villagers built pig pens within the crumbling walls, using its tombstones and broken rafters. From up there, the landfill site resembles a dry lake nestled in a green forest. In a few years’ time, when the natural dip in the land has been filled, the local government is planning to cover the site with concrete and build a large sports centre to commemorate the forthcoming Beijing Olympics. On the other side of the ruined convent is a field of white chrysanthemums the site manager is growing for his own profit. As the workers return to their huts, Meili keeps climbing the path that’s still covered with old mattresses and tabletops laid down during downpours to prevent it turning into mud. She’s wearing the two left purple sandals that she’s been practising walking in for three days. Red, orange, yellow, green and blue clothes swing from washing lines tied between floor lamps and exercise machines flanking the path.
At the top of the hill, she sits down on an ancient flagstone of the ruined convent and thinks of Suya, who treated her like an older sister. She has read her journal from beginning to end, skipping the words she didn’t understand. There are no addresses inside, so she won’t be able to find Suya, or give the journal to her boyfriend as she promised. Even if Suya is still alive now, she’s unlikely ever to see her again. But she knows that if she hadn’t met Suya, she herself would probably be dead now . . . When I thought about killing myself after the rape, Suya, I knew how angry you would have been. You were raped every day for a year, sometimes twenty times in one night. What were you hoping to gain from that life? Independence? Revenge? I can feel you looking down on me now. The pink clouds above are filled with your eyes. Even without looking up, I can see you . . .
As the autumn wind begins to whistle, Meili opens her throat and sings, ‘My dearest sister! Alone you cross the Bridge of Helplessness and step onto the Home-Viewing Pavilion from which the dead may throw a last glance at their families in the living world. Before you drink Old Lady Meng’s five-flavoured Broth of Amnesia, turn back and look at me one last time . . .’ Feathers of gold light flutter through the rosy clouds like strips of satin, then, seconds later the sky becomes as murky and grey as the field of waste below. In the darkness at the bottom of the hill, the mad dog struggles out of a pool of mud and starts trudging up the path, the bra and plastic net hooked to the springs on his waistcoat trailing behind him. A glimmer of hope sparkles in his eyes. High above in the ruined convent, Mother’s lament pounds against the broken tombstones and crumbles into the sweet, fetid air.
At dawn a week later, Meili senses that she has finally emerged from her state of shock. Although her body still aches, her mind has cleared. She knows now that she won’t kill herself. She will keep the rape a secret from Kongzi, and will struggle on until she finds happiness. As Suya wrote