He clearly stood on the shore
But felt like he was drowning
The rushing river appeared even darker in the murky night, and the rolling waves felt as heavy as mercury, violently pounding his body. He felt himself sinking, and his survival instinct made him desperately call for help towards the faint light he could vaguely see nearby. He eagerly hoped that the light could save him from imminent death, but unfortunately, his cries for help were in vain. Soon after, that savior-like light also went out, and the surroundings fell silent again in the long night. His senses became heightened, and he could feel the water flowing over his skin, his body growing colder, and he had no strength left to struggle. This treacherous river severed his vitality, but no one cared.
In the spring of 1950, during the month of March and April, bone-chilling winds howled across the Qinghai Plateau. The winter's accumulated ice and snow had not yet begun to melt, and low, withered shrubs sparsely dotted the vast land. In this season, there was a rare sense of desolation in the air.
But for most herders on the plateau, this season was a time of joy. Several months ago, the People's Liberation Army had liberated Qinghai, and people had received livestock and food to varying degrees. For many poor herders who had spent their lives selling their blood and flesh, this was truly a great happiness.
It was also during this desolate yet joyful season that a family gave birth to a boy, and due to their place of residence, the parents called him "Weak Water." He was born very beautiful, different from the appearance of the average herder child, with gentle eyebrows and eyes, fair and delicate skin. If one didn't know, it was easy to mistake him for a girl. This often made his parents feel ashamed, as they longed for a strong, clever, and capable son. Weak Water, who was rather effeminate, was not well received and was often subjected to beatings and scolding.
At the age of eight or nine, Weak Water started attending a collective school. Away from his parents' beatings and surrounded by many children his age, he felt joy and eagerly wanted to make new friends. But as his parents complained, these strong herder children saw him as different. They mocked Weak Water for not being a boy or a girl, and even forcibly pulled down his pants. Tears welled up in his eyes as he protected his lower body in fear and shame, not daring to say a word.
These experiences made him develop an extreme disgust towards his own body. Coincidentally, at that time, the entire herding area was calling for steel and iron production, and many strong male laborers were conscripted. Weak Water saw this as a perfect opportunity to prove his masculinity. Despite his weakness, he picked up an iron rod used to pick dry grass from the furnace, but because he lacked strength, he burned a horrifying wound on his arm. Weak Water was extremely scared, afraid that his father would find out and punish him severely for his mischief. Ignoring his own injury, he hurriedly ran towards the vast plateau outside the door. He didn't know how long he ran, but Weak Water felt that his father would never find him again, so he stopped. However, he found himself in a completely unfamiliar place, unable to remember the way he came. After the fear subsided, a piercing pain came over him, and he looked at his arm covered in blood and flesh, helplessly bursting into tears.
Weak Water also didn't remember how he fell asleep, he only knew that when he woke up, he was lying on a soft felt mat, and a clay pot on the stove was emitting steam. Standing next to it was a tall man. He sat up and recognized that the man was someone he didn't know, which made him extremely scared. He only wanted to escape back home, but the man pulled him back.
"Why run away? I'm not going to eat you."
"You're a brave kid, aren't you afraid of being carried away by wild wolves when you run away?"
Weak Water knew he was in the wrong, so he lowered his head and clutched his already untied shirt. The man also noticed his embarrassment and found a shawl for him. Seeing that his body was not seriously injured, he rode a horse and sent him back home. The man deliberately slowed down, so there was no jolting sensation on the horse's back. Weak Water saw that his wound had been wrapped up, most likely by the man. He couldn't help but feel a sense of warmth in his heart. Compared to his violent father, this man could clearly provide him with comfort.
Back at home, Weak Water expected to be punished by his father. However, when his father saw the man, he suddenly became extremely respectful. From their snippets of conversation, Weak Water learned that the man was the commune secretary of the herding area. He didn't understand what being a commune secretary meant, but he knew that this man could intimidate his father. After talking for a while, the man left. For the first time, his father didn't have a stern face, but instead wore a friendly smile and hugged Weak Water.
"Good boy, you've made your father proud."
"With this connection, our family will prosper in the future."
His father was very happy, and Weak Water was too.
In the following period of time, the man would occasionally visit their collective school for inspections. On inspection days, the entire school would suspend classes, and all the teachers and students would go to greet him. Weak Water looked at the man sitting in the main seat and felt a sense of pride, as if he himself had become noble. After the greeting, the man would shake hands with each student and pat their heads. When he passed by Weak Water, the man stopped.
"It's you, kid. Are your hands more skillful now?"
As he spoke, he rolled up Weak Water's sleeves and saw that the wound had healed well, which made him smile with satisfaction.
"I really like this child, he's very clever!" The man muttered to himself. But everyone knew he was saying it for the teachers to hear. After that day, Weak Water was no longer bullied.
Weak Water enjoyed interacting with the man, and after one inspection, he secretly asked the man if he could visit his home. The man was straightforward and quickly agreed. The furnishings in the house were no different from last time, and the man asked Weak Water to sit on the felt mat while he made milk tea for them to drink. The fire in the stove burned brightly, quickly warming up the room. The man handed the milk tea to Weak Water and sat down next to him. Weak Water felt happy but also uncomfortable. He didn't know what to say to the man in front of him, so he silently sipped his milk tea. The man broke the awkwardness and talked about school matters, learning about Weak Water being bullied by male students. A trace of strangeness flashed in the man's eyes.
"Why did they take off your pants?"
"I'm not sure, they said I didn't have that thing."
"That's not true, all men have it."
"But they said I'm neither a boy nor a girl."
"Let me see, can I?"
"......"
A dead silence filled the room, and a thunderous feeling passed through Weak Water's heart. He didn't know why the man wanted to see, but he knew that the man was different from those children who had humiliated him. The man must have had his best interests at heart. Weak Water didn't think much and took off his pants. The man's warm and slightly rough hands touched him, and Weak Water's breathing became rapid, and his face started to blush. He wanted to see what the man was doing, but being pinned down, he couldn't move at all, only feeling his legs slowly being spread apart, and then a scorching object slowly sliding into his body. A bright red blood lotus bloomed on the gray felt, appearing particularly glaring. He felt a lot of pain, as if he was being torn apart. He started sobbing, but the man seemed to have no intention of stopping.
Weak Water didn't know what had happened, but at that moment, he longed for his father.
The man told him that if Weak Water were to speak about what happened today, he would never come to see him again. Weak Water struggled, he didn't like the feeling today, but he also didn't want to lose the man's care for him, so he reluctantly agreed. The man would often bring Weak Water home and repeat what happened that day. Their family's situation also improved, even during the most difficult three years, they had more fish than other families. His father's love and indulgence towards Weak Water grew, a complete change from before. But only Weak Water knew the reason behind it.
These days didn't last very long.
On Weak Water's seventeenth birthday, it was spent in the Revolutionary Committee. At the end of February, something big happened in Xining, causing panic among the people in the province. Naturally, the Revolutionary Committee took control, and the herding area where Weak Water lived was no exception. Perhaps because the man had been too kind to Weak Water's family, the Revolutionary Committee accused him of embezzling means of production and imprisoned him in a filthy stable. Weak Water, who had a close relationship with him, naturally couldn't escape being implicated. However, he couldn't scrape off any benefits, Weak Water only slept on a cold chair for one night and endured several beatings before returning home. Even so, for a weak person like him, it was still a significant torment.
But Weak Water also learned where the man was being held. As he grew older, he also gained an understanding of male and female matters. He knew what the man had done to him at that time. However, he didn't hold any grudges. On the one hand, the man had brought him a good life; on the other hand, the young Weak Water discovered that he seemed to have a different kind of feeling towards the man who violated him. Perhaps it was because of the life-saving favor, or perhaps it was because of their repeated encounters.
Weak Water decided to visit the man, but the man's identity was too special, making it difficult for even relatives to get close. Although he had strong reservations, Weak Water knew that he had to become a member of the Revolutionary Committee to have a chance to see the person he missed. So he joined the Red Guards, a group of children around his age, and destroyed school facilities; or they would rush into other people's homes and snatch valuable fur and liquor bottles. Weak Water gradually became numb, ignoring the women who knelt at his feet, begging him not to take away their husbands. He only wanted to see that man, and nothing else mattered.
But before Weak Water became a cadre of the Revolutionary Committee, he learned that the man was going to be publicly criticized. He couldn't bear to imagine it, but due to his identity, he couldn't refuse. Weak Water thought back to the day he ran away from home out of fear of his father's punishment, and a sense of helplessness once again enveloped him. However, this time, the tall man would not appear.
Even though he was mentally prepared, when Weak Water saw the man kneeling on the square with a metal door hanging from his neck, covered in blood, he felt like his heart was being cut by a knife. He desperately wanted to rush up and defend the man, but doing so would undoubtedly push himself into the abyss. Behind a row of tables on the square, several cadres of the Revolutionary Committee sat, and one of them was reading out his charges. When asked where he had hidden the embezzled means of production, the man stubbornly insisted that he hadn't embezzled anything. The cadres couldn't extract any information from him, so they had the Red Guards forcefully pull his arms backward. The weight of the metal door fell entirely on his neck. The man almost fell to the ground, and blood flowed down from his collar. The man still didn't yield, but Weak Water had already burst into tears. He couldn't bear to look for another second and used the excuse of feeling unwell to leave.
On the night the criticism session ended, the man committed suicide in the stable. He died by repeatedly banging his head against the manger, and his body was in a horrifying state. Weak Water didn't learn about this news immediately, only finding out when a Red Guard who was in charge of the stable handed him a blood-stained envelope. Weak Water was in a daze when he received the envelope, resembling a lifeless corpse. The cadres knew that the man had taken his own life, and they began to investigate the information he had passed on. In their eyes, the man must have told someone where he had hidden his belongings, and as long as they could find out, there would be benefits to be gained. The incident with the envelope naturally reached their ears.
When a group of people rushed into Weak Water's home, they happened to catch him about to open the envelope. Weak Water didn't know what was happening and was about to get up when several cadres came to snatch it away. He resisted desperately, knowing that if they took it away, his relationship with the man might be completely exposed. In a moment of desperation, he took out the letter and stuffed it into his mouth, hurriedly swallowing it. The cadres became furious but had no choice but to take Weak Water back with them.
Weak Water was locked up in the stable where the man had once stayed. Time had passed, and the place he had longed for had finally been set foot in, but it had lost all meaning. Weak Water felt a wave of sorrow as he walked around, hoping to catch a trace of the man's lingering presence. But after too long, all that remained was the stench of the stable.
The Revolutionary Committee naturally wouldn't let Weak Water go, and under the guise of interrogation, he endured many beatings, often limping back to the stable with legs that were almost broken. He wanted to die but couldn't bear to die. He wasn't afraid of pain; he was afraid of no one erecting a monument for the man.
Before the Spring Festival of 1968, Weak Water was allowed to go home to celebrate the New Year. He rushed home as if he had been granted amnesty, heading straight for the man's house. Because no one had taken care of it for too long, the familiar felt mat was covered in dust. He started a fire, and the room gradually warmed up. Weak Water sat on the felt mat, gently stroking it. This felt mat carried the hidden pleasures and youthful emotions of Weak Water. He deeply missed the man who had violated him, and perhaps in his heart, that violation had already taken on a different meaning.
He decided to take the felt mat with him because it was worth Weak Water's eternal remembrance. He carefully rolled it up, afraid that something might go wrong. When he was putting away the felt mat, he discovered a notebook lying quietly in the corner. Weak Water curiously picked it up and flipped through the pages one by one.
......
The surrounding herders saw the billowing black smoke and hurried over to check the situation. The house was already half on fire, and the herders quickly formed a circle to prevent the fire from spreading, and they dragged out Weak Water, who had already lost his life. There was a deep wound on his wrist, indicating that he had cut his wrists to commit suicide. But the herders didn't know about the other horrifying scar on his arm.
In the house, there were fragments of a diary torn to pieces, recording every intimate encounter with the man.
The man had been accused of rape and was demoted to become a commune secretary.
Perhaps he had never loved him.
As for what was in the envelope, no one would ever know.