Red Mandarin Dress

a crucial part of the story,” Chen said, “for which your opinions will be invaluable. So I’d better read from my draft instead—it’ll be more detailed, more vivid.”
    Chen took out his notebook, in which he had scribbled some words the previous night in the nightclub, and then again early this morning in the small eatery. Sitting across the table, however, Jia wouldn’t be able to read the contents. Chen began to improvise, clearing his throat.
    “It was because of a counterrevolutionary slogan found on the garden wall of the mansion. J didn’t write it, nor did he know anything about it, but ‘revolutionary people’ suspected him. He was put into so-called isolation interrogation in a back room of the neighborhood committee. All by himself, all day long, he was denied all contact with the outside world, except for interrogations by the neighborhood committee and a stranger surnamed Tian, who came from the Mao Team stationed at the music institute. J had to stay there until he admitted his crime. What supported him through those days was the thought of his mother. He was determined that he would not get her into trouble, that he could not leave her alone. So he would not confess, nor do something in the footsteps of his father. As long as she was outside, waiting for him, the world was still theirs, as in that picture in the garden.
    “But it wasn’t easy for a little boy. He fell sick. One afternoon, unexpectedly, a neighborhood cadre came into the room and, without any explanation, told him that he could go home.
    “He hurried back, anxious to surprise her. He climbed up the staircase soundlessly. Opening the door with his key, he was anticipating a scene of reunion, of rushing into her arms, a scene he had dreamed of hundreds of times in the dark back room.
    “To his horror, he saw her kneeling on the bed, stark naked, and a naked man—none other than Tian—entering her from behind, her bare hips rising to meet each of his thrusts, groaning and grunting like animals—
    “He shrieked in horror, whirling back down the staircase, lost in a nightmare. For the boy, who had worshipped his mother like the sunshine of his existence, the scene delivered a shattering blow, as if the whole earth had been snatched out from under his feet.
    “She jumped up from the bed, unclothed, and ran out after him. He quickened his steps frantically. In his confusion, he might not have heard her stumbling down the staircase, or he might have mistaken it for the sound of the world tumbling behind him. He tore down the stairs, across the garden, and out of the mansion. His instinctive reaction was to run, his mind still full of the bedroom scene, so vivid with her flushed face, her hanging breasts, her body reeking of violent sex, her raven-black pubic hair still dripping wet. . . .
    “He didn’t look over his shoulder once, as the image of the moment had fixed and transfixed him—of a naked woman, distraught, disheveled, rushing like a demon after him—”
    “You don’t have to go into all these details,” Jia said in a suddenly husky voice, as if reeling under the blows.
    “No, those details are important for his psychological development, and for our understanding of it,” Chen said. “Now, back to the story. J ran back to the back room of the neighborhood committee, where he broke down and fainted. People were puzzled at his return. In his subconscious, the room was the place where he could still believe in a wonderful world with her waiting for him there. An act of psychological significance, like trying to turn back the clock. And in that back room he wasn’t aware of her death that same afternoon.
    “When he finally woke up, it was to a changed world. Back in the empty attic, alone, in the company of her picture in a black frame. It was too much for him to stay there. He moved out,” Chen said, putting down the notebook. “No need dwelling on that period. I don’t have to read sentence by sentence. Suffice it to say that now an orphan, he went through the stages of shock, denial, depression, and anger, struggling with all the emotions twisted and embedded deep inside him. As a Chinese proverb goes, a jade is made out of all the hardships. After the Cultural Revolution, J entered a college and obtained a law degree. At that time, few were interested in such a career, but his choice was motivated by a desire to bring justice for his family, particularly for her. He managed to track down Tian,