Page 105 - I Live in the Slums: Stories (The Margellos World Republic of Letters)

THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PARTITION

When I was a kid, we lived in a place where all the neighbors shared a
kitchen. It was large, holding more than ten coal stoves. It also had a tap;

everyone took turns getting water to wash vegetables. Cooking was easy in those
days, for in general each family had two dishes every day—greens and tofu, or
greens and strips of meat fried with pickles. The kitchen was liveliest when
people were cooking. We all chatted in loud voices, mingled with the ding-dang
noise of metal scoops striking the woks.
If we all stopped making noise at the same time, we could hear a strange
buzzing sound coming constantly from the other side of the kitchen wall. People
said that a workshop on the other side of the wall made tin gardening pots. But it
had been closed for several months, probably because there wasn’t enough
business. Ordinarily, when we walked through that narrow passage to reach the
street we saw a big lock hanging from the workshop door. What was making the
buzzing sound? Adults paid no attention to things like this; they acted as if there
was no sound.
We loved playing hide-and-seek in the kitchen at night. By then, most of the
stoves would be cool and the lights turned off. The two or three stoves that kept
the fires burning inside looked like monsters, each with a single fiery red eye.

Xiaoyi and I climbed from a stove to the top of the partition and stood in a
dark spot under the ceiling.
“There’s a ladder here,” Xiaoyi whispered.
I went down the ladder with him to the other side of the partition. So dark!
But you could hear noise in the kitchen: probably some hapless guy had been
caught there. Xiaoyi didn’t want me to stir. I grabbed his hand and moved slowly
ahead with him. I was shaking.
“Are you here?” someone asked in a rather weary voice.
“Yes, yes!” Xiaoyi said enthusiastically, as if trying to please that person.
It was hot all around, and a faint aroma reached us. Was someone stir-frying
soybeans? Xiaoyi wanted me to sit down, so I sat on a pitted stone bench. This
wasn’t a bit comfortable. I sensed many people around me, and the atmosphere

was tense. They seemed to be observing my attitude about something, but I had
no idea what it was.
“Take a stand,” Xiaoyi said, as he poked me.
“About what?” I asked.