The Bathing Women by Tie Ning Read Free Book Online Page B

that this desire has turned into fear. And moreover, I have the uncouth and unreasonable fear that you are with other men. From my own experience of men and women, I know extremely well the power you have. When we were drinking coffee at the Beijing Hotel, you probably didn’t notice two men sitting at the next table who stared at you the whole time. There was an old Englishman sitting across from our table—I’m certain he was English—that old man also stared at you constantly. You didn’t notice any of this; you were too nervous at the time. But I noticed; it didn’t take much to figure out; glimpses from the corners of my eyes were enough. I’m very sure of my judgment. You’re the kind of woman who can capture a man’s attention; there is something in you that attracts people. You have the power to make people look at you, even though you are not polished at it yet. I think you should be more aware of this: you need to learn to protect yourself. Has anyone said this to you before? I believe I’m the only one who has. You should always button up your clothing; don’t let men take advantage of you with their eyes. Don’t. Not that the men who admire you would actually do something to harm you. No, I have to admit those who stare at you have taste. They are not hooligans or perverts. And I’m more nervous precisely because of that. I don’t want them to take you away from me, though I still don’t know how you truly feel about me. I’ve said before it was very likely that I would go to your city—Fuan, that tiny grain of rice that I caressed with my fingers when I was in the States. I will figure out a way to disguise myself in the street. Someday I will do that.
Now let me talk about the book you asked me to write. I tried to write the beginning and finished fifteen hundred words. It was very difficult because I couldn’t find a direct, uncluttered tone. If the readers are kids, the writer should first get himself an open heart. My heart is open—at least to you, but not very clean. I feel very guilty and challenged by it. I plan to focus on writing the book after I finish shooting Hibernation . I’m curious to find out my potential as an author. Will you think I’m too wordy? But wordiness is a sign of aging. Do you know what else I’m thinking about? How I look forward to you getting old quickly. Only when you get so old that you can’t get any older, and I also get so old that I can’t get any older, can we be together. By that time we’ll both be so old that people won’t be able to tell what sex we are: you might be an old man and I might be an old woman. We’d lose all our teeth, but our lips would still be all right so we could still talk. The human body is so strange, the hardest things, like teeth, disappear first, but the softest things, like tongues and lips, will come along with us to the last moment of our lives …
    6
    One day in the autumn of 1966, Tiao, as a new student in the first grade of Lamp Alley Primary School in Beijing, participated in a noisy and confusing denouncement meeting on the school’s sports field. It was an assembly that the entire faculty and student body attended, where many desks were brought together and stacked to make a tall stage. In front of the stage, students from all grades sat on their own little chairs that they brought out of the classrooms.
    It was new to Tiao, who had just become an elementary school student a few days earlier. Back then she didn’t have a clear idea about what having such a meeting meant. She thought sitting this way on the field was like having class in the open air, and felt freer than having an ordinary class. During class, teachers required children to sit straight with hands behind their backs; only correct posture would help their bodies grow healthily. But today, on the sports field, their class teacher didn’t ask them to put their hands behind them; they could keep their hands wherever they wanted. Maybe, with the