Big Breasts & Wipe Hips: A Novel

sudden illness, and the two brothers carried his body home, a full fifteen hundred li, experiencing untold hardships along the way. When they arrived, Du Baochuan accused them of killing his brother and greeted them with resounding slaps; unable to say anything without stammering uncontrollably, they took out the reference letters from their regiment commander. Du Baochuan snatched them out of their hands and ripped them up on the spot. Then, with a wave of his hand, he said, “Once a deserter, always a deserter.” All they could do was swallow their bitter feelings. Their tempered shoulders were hard as steel, their legs well trained for their profession. Riding on a litter carried by them was like being in a boat floating downstream. Waves of light tumbled across the snowy wasteland.
    A stone bridge stood on pine pylons across the Black Water River. It swayed beneath us, making the roadway growl at our feet. After we had crossed, I turned and saw the lines of footprints on the snowy wasteland. I spotted Mother and Eighth Sister, and all the small children of the family, plus my goat, coming up behind me.
    The sedan-bearing brothers carried me all the way to the highland, where I was welcomed by the spirited looks and tightly shut mouths of people who had arrived before us, men, women, and children. The adults wore somber expressions; the children all had mischievous glints in their eyes.
    Led by Taoist Men, the brothers carried me up to a square earthen platform smack in the center of the highland, where a pair of benches stood behind a large incense burner with three joss sticks. They placed the litter between the benches, so I could dangle my legs as I sat. The silent cold nipped at my toes like a black cat and chewed on my ears like a white one. The sound of burning incense was like that made by worms as the curling ash fell into the burner and rumbled like a collapsing house. Its fragrance crawled up the left nostril of my nose like a caterpillar and out the right. Taoist Men burned a bundle of spirit money in a bronze brazier at the foot of the platform. The flames were like golden butterflies with wings covered with golden powder; the paper was like black butterflies fluttering up into the sky until they were worn out, and then settling down onto the snow, where they quickly died. Taoist Men then prostrated himself before the platform of the Snow Prince and signaled the Wang brothers to lift me up again. I was handed a wooden club wrapped in gold paper, its head formed into a tinfoil bowl — the Snow Prince’s staff of authority. After choosing me as the Snow Prince, Taoist Men had told me that the founder of the snow market was his teacher, Taoist Chen, who had received his instructions from Laozi, the founder of Taoism himself, and that once he’d carried out his instructions, he’d risen up to Heaven to become an immortal, living on a towering mountaintop, where he ate pine nuts and drank spring water, flying from pine trees to poplars, and from there to his cave. Taoist Men explained in great detail the duties of the Snow Prince. I’d already carried out the first — receiving the veneration of the multitudes — and was at that moment carrying out the second, which was an inspection of the snow market.
    This was the Snow Prince’s divine moment, as a dozen men in black-and-red uniforms stepped forward; although they held nothing in their hands, they assumed the posture of musicians with trumpets,
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, bugles, and brass cymbals. The cheeks of some puffed out as if they were trumpeting loudly. Once every few paces, the cymbalist raised his left hand to shoulder height and pretended to strike his cymbal with his right hand; the silent clangs were carried far off in the distance. The Wang brothers bounced and swayed on springy legs as the citizenry ceased their silent transactions and stood straight, eyes gaping, arms at their sides, to watch the procession of the Snow Prince. The colors of those familiar and unfamiliar faces were enhanced by the glare of the snow: reds like dates, blacks like charcoal briquettes, yellows like beeswax, and greens like scallions. I waved my staff of authority in the direction of the crowd, momentarily sending them scurrying in confusion; their hands now swung wildly in the air and their mouths were open, as if screaming. But no one dared or was willing to make a sound. One of the sacred duties bestowed upon me by Taoist Men was to stop up the mouth of anyone who