Then it was his turn to salute them. He raised his bowl to each in turn, careful to say “Suiyi” and take only a sip. Still, by the time he finished, there was a light, pleasant buzz in his head.
The first round of toasting came to an end with much laughing and joking. “I have more good news for you all,” Chu couldn’t resist saying. “I’ve been selected to head an elite battalion of commandos. Except for our political officer, it’s an all-Fukienese-speaking unit.”
Chu himself wasn’t sure of the significance of this last fact. But it sounded mysterious and important to those present, who, like all Chinese, held their own province — in this case, Fukien — in high regard.
This announcement set off another round of toasting, though by this point in the evening the men scarcely needed an excuse. Chu’s father rose, wobbly and unsmiling, to toast him again, and downed another great bowl of rice liquor.
The women had been listening from the kitchen, and before the men drank too much on empty stomachs began serving platter after platter of food. It turned out that Chu had underestimated his mother. In addition to the dishes on his imaginary menu she had added a broiled goose, a rare delicacy and his favorite. Steaming in its succulent juices, chopped into chopstick-sized pieces, she placed it in front of him with a smile. Chu reached out with his chopsticks and deftly snared a prime slice of goose. No one else would eat until the guest of honor had taken the first bite. He popped it in his mouth. It was delicious. “Hao chi,” he pronounced. “Good to eat.”
With that, everyone else tucked into the heaping platters of food with abandon. Everyone, that is, except Chu’s father. He seemed more interested in the bottle of rice liquor sitting beside his bowl. Chu reached out with his chopsticks and attempted to put a slice of goose on his father’s plate, but his father stopped him. “I’ll serve myself,” he said gruffly, and took a drink out of his bowl instead.
As the evening progressed, Chu noted that his father’s mood seemed to darken further. He, who had always taken great pride in his son’s accomplishments, didn’t respond to his son’s efforts to talk about his promotion or his new command. He took no notice of the talk and laughter that went swirling around him. Chu lost count of the number of times he refilled his bowl. If he doesn’t stop, Chu thought, he’s going to drink himself into a stupor.
His mother apparently shared his opinion, because she came over and attempted to fill up her husband’s bowl with rice. He roughly pushed the rice scoop away. “Can’t you see that it’s already full, woman!” he slurred, pointing to the clear liquor in his bowl.
Chu regarded his father’s red face with astonishment. He had never seen him drunk before.
Chu’s father drained his bowl once again, refilled it, and then lurched to his feet. “A toast!” he shouted thickly, “I’d like to propose a toast.” A dozen conversations died as everyone in the room turned to regard him. “I’d like to propose a toast to Secretary Fu Mingjie.”
Secretary Fu was not a popular figure in Chu’s village. The sound of his name was greeted by a muttered round of curses.
“I toast this corrupt, rapacious official,” Chu’s father said in a ominous tone. “We break our backs to make a living, and he drives around sucking our lifeblood. I toast this parasite! I toast this son of a bitch-dog.” Chu’s father lifted his bowl high, then flung it against the wall. It shattered into a dozen pieces with a loud crash.
He started to sway, and instantly Chu was at his side. “Why don’t you go rest for awhile, Father,” he said softly.
But his father grabbed onto the table and pulled himself up to his full height. “I swear before the tablets of my ancestors,” he said slowly and distinctly. “If Secretary Fu harms my family again, I will kill him.”
Chu half-carried, half-walked his drunken father out of the room. He was snoring as soon as he hit the bed.
Chu’s uncle tried to make light of his younger brother’s outburst, but the threat had cast a pall over the evening’s festivities. The guests looked self-consciously at one another, and one by one excused themselves for the night. The room was soon empty.
When Chu came back into the central room, his mother was clearing the tables alone. “You go to bed, son,” she said to him. “I’ll clean up.”
Chu didn’t want to go to bed, at least not until he’d solved the mystery of his father. He carried a stack of rice bowls into the kitchen. “I always thought we got along well with Fu Mingjie,” he said when he came back out.
His mother, who was wiping a table, stopped and looked at him. “We’ve always pretended to get along with him,” she responded, “ever since he came to the village as an arrogant young official thirty years ago at the end of the Cultural Revolution.” She started wiping the table again. “But your father has never forgiven him,” she added in a low voice.
Chu was puzzled. “What do you mean, mother? Forgiven him for what? For demanding bribes?”
“The bribes came later,” his mother responded. She moved to another table and continued to wipe. “A long time ago, when Fu was a junior official, he was in charge of the one-child policy in this part of the county. When population control first began.” She took a deep breath and let out a sigh. “I was pregnant when the policy was announced. But since it was our first, your father and I thought we had nothing to worry about.”
A look of inexpressible sadness came across her face. “Then we discovered that I was carrying twins.”
Twins? Chu blinked in surprise. He had been a twin? He had always thought that he was an only child, the first of a generation of only children born under the one-child-per-couple rule. More than three-quarters of the men in his unit were dusheng dz, only sons. The military preferred them. They needed less training to kill on command.
“Fu told us we had to choose,” his mother said, her eyes welling up with tears. “I couldn’t choose. I wouldn’t choose. But Fu said chose we must. ‘We want the boy,’ your father said, picking you up.”
“And what happened to my… sister?” The word sounded strange on his tongue. He had had a twin sister.
His mother’s shoulders slumped over and her chest began to heave. The sound of sobbing filled the air — and went on long enough for Chu to regret a dozen times over ever having asked the question. His mother only gradually regained her composure enough to speak.
“They did…” her voice broke. She made a visible effort to pull herself together, and started over. “They did what they always do with… with illegal children. They gave her a poison shot. She was killed at Fu Mingjie’s orders.”
“Why that son of a bitch-dog,” Chu cursed. “That turtle’s egg…”
“Don’t talk like that, Dugen,” his mother broke in. “You sound just like your father. What I just told you happened a long, long time ago. I am at peace about all of this. Your twin sister is with God, and I know that I will one day see her again. I have even forgiven Secretary Fu, though it took me many years to do so.”
“I have told your father that he must forgive and forget, too,” she went on, “but he will not listen to me. He is still filled with hate whenever he thinks about what happened to our daughter. Lately, he had even begun talking again about revenge. It doesn’t help that Fu’s demands for money have been escalating. When your father sees Fu he is filled with an almost uncontrollable rage. All I can do is pray for both of them.”
Chu was a professional warrior. He knew that his father had been ready to kill tonight. And now his mother was telling him that she had seen him rage like this before. But it was her last word that he picked up on: “Pray?”