The Garlic Ballads

medical kit, she said, “What are you crying for? It didn’t hurt that much.”
    ‘ He said nothing, for all he could think was, She’ll be leaving now that she’s given me the shot.
    “Doctor,” the young inmate said, “I’m constipated. Would you check me out while you’re at it?”
    “Why get rid of it? Let it stay put,” she told him.
    “That’s no way for a doctor to talk.”
    “How am I supposed to talk to a little hooligan like you?”
    “You have no right to call me a little hooligan. Your daughter and I were schoolmates. We even considered marriage.”
    “Watch your mouth, Number Seven!” the warden threatened.
    The dialogue between the young inmate and the doctor pained Gao Yang. He hoped she’d have more to say to him. But it wasn’t to be, for she picked up her bag, slung it over her shoulder, and walked out with the warden, who returned a half-hour later. “We have prepared a special meal for you, Number Nine,” he said from the corridor. “Try to eat it.”
    A gray bowl slid under the door, flooding the cell with a delicious fragrance. Green lights shot from his cellmates’ eyes. The middle-aged inmate personally carried the bowl of noodles over to him, and when Gao Yang sat up he saw a pair of golden eggs nesded in the noodles and a layer of green onions and oil floating in the broth.
    “Warden, Officer, I’m sick, too!” the young prisoner yelled. “I’ve got a bellyache!”
    “Little Li,” the warden called to one of the soldiers pacing the corridor. “Make sure they don’t steal his food.”
    Rattled, the middle-aged inmate quickly set the bowl down on Gao Yang’s cot and returned reluctantly to his own cot.
    The sight of the noodles and eggs triggered Gao Yang’s appetite. Picking up his chopsticks with a trembling hand, he stirred the slippery white noodles—the thinnest and whitest he’d ever seen—then lifted the bowl to his lips and delivered a mouthful of the warm broth to his stomach and intestines, which rumbled pleasurably. As tears brimmed in his eyes, he faced the door and muttered to the soldier, “Thank you, Officer, for your great kindness.”
    Gao Yang, you’re a lucky man. An aristocratic woman you could only gaze at from afar before actually touched your head, and noodles the likes of which you never saw before now rest in your stomach. Gao Yang, people are never content with their lot. Well, it’s time for you to be content with yours.…
    He ate every noodle in the bowl, and slurped up every drop of broth. With some embarrassment, he noticed that the old and young inmates’ eyes were glued to his bowl. He was still hungry.
    “Still sick?” the guard asked through the bars. “You could probably polish off a bucketful if you weren’t.”
    “Officer, I’m sick, too,” his young cellmate wailed. “I’ve got a bellyache … ow! Dear Mother, it’s killing me!”

3.

    A shrill whisde signaled the exercise period, a time for prisoners to stretch their legs and get some fresh air. Two guards unlocked the cells, and as Gao Yang’s older cellmates stepped into the corridor, the younger one removed the plastic pail, which was brim-full of the inhabitants’ waste. An idea hit him. “Hey, new man,” he said to Gao Yang, “since you ate a big bowl of noodles, you should be the one to dump this.”
    Without waiting for a response, he darted into the corridor.
    Feeling a bit sheepish about being treated to a bowl of noodles and an injection by an aristocratic woman, Gao Yang strained to sit up. After stepping barefoot onto the cold, damp cement floor, his head swimming, he stood wobbily, his injured foot so numb it felt as if he were stepping on cotton. He picked up the plastic pail, which wasn’t particularly heavy but stank horribly, and tried to hold it at arm’s length. Unfortunately, he wasn’t up to the task, and each time it bumped against him it splashed its stinking contents onto his bare leg.
    The sun’s rays were blinding, his eyes ached unbelievably, and his face was awash with tears. After a moment, his eyes stopped hurting, but he still couldn’t get his arms and legs to stop quaking; so he halted, put down the pail, and grasped a post to steady himself and catch his breath. His respite was short-lived: a guard at the end of the corridor screamed at him, “No pails on the floor!” Frantically he picked it up and fell in line behind other prisoners carrying similar pails. At the end of the corridor they turned southwest,