The few days before wheat harvest, the looms stopped for two shifts. The mill called it overhaul. Everyone was out in the fields; the compound held old people and children.
The broadcast came on three times a day. Music at six thirty in the morning, notices at noon, the weather at seven at night.
The rest of the time it stayed on, saying nothing, only the snow underneath.
I'd heard that snow all my life. Erya said the machine was tired. I said machines don't get tired. She said then it was broken.
The two days the wheat came into the yard, all the kids went gleaning. A handful turned in bought one pencil.
Erya gleaned three handfuls and got a red one. I didn't pick up a single stalk. Those two days I was at the mill office.
Dad was out in the fields. He came home at night with mud on his shoes; the mud dried and flaked off, a little pile by the door.
When Mom swept she swept the flakes out; two strokes didn't finish it, so she crouched down and gathered it with her hands.
Mom worked nights. She slept days in the inner room, curtain drawn, two clips pinned on it against the wind.
After school I went home first, set my bag on the stool, drank half a mug of cold water, then walked over to the mill office.
Reporting happened at the east end of the ground floor, in Master Qiao's room. He cleared half a table for me and Wang Chaosheng.
Master Qiao never shooed us out. He set his soldering iron on the stand, touched it to the rosin, and up came white smoke.
His desk always held a heap of oddments: resistors, screws, half a pencil, one enamel mug.
The tea grime in the mug was thick; drain it to the bottom and you saw a ring of yellow. He never scrubbed it. Scrub it, he said, and the taste goes.
He had a theory. The sound in a loudspeaker, he said — the life of it is full, the tone of it is empty. Only the empty part has room to hold anything.
He said this not looking at us but at his iron.
I didn't get it. Wang Chaosheng asked me what he meant. I couldn't say.
Wang Chaosheng said: Maybe the speaker's broke.
I said: The speaker's not broke.
He let it go. He hoisted his bag up and stood waiting for me.
The recorder came at three thirty. He wasn't mill people.
Chalk dust on his hands. A layer of white on the sides of his fingers, white in the creases too; it didn't wash off.
He carried a metal clip pinching a wad of paper, the corners curled.
He set the paper on the half table and weighted the corners with the clip. The windowsill stood high; wind came down off it and the paper stirred and stirred.
He asked me: How many today.
I said: Five.
He asked: What.
I said: Press.
He asked: How big.
I said: Three.
He wrote. Fountain pen, blue-black; the notebook's paper thin. When he finished he lifted the page to the window to see if it showed through.
He'd taught us the rules: one word, one report, no stringing them together; no guessing; guesses don't count.
He said: A guess and a thing heard are two different things.
I asked: Which two.
He said: One goes in the book. One doesn't.
For a stretch I reported Press every day. Ten days of it and I was sick of it.
I asked the recorder: Can I report something else.
He said: You report what you hear.
I said: Every day it's Press.
He said: Every day it's Press, so every day you report Press.
He thumbed back two pages and turned them to me. Both pages were Press. He said: You're not the only one.
He had a habit after writing: he read the line back to me.
He read: Such a day. Five times. Press. Three.
I listened. If he read it wrong I shook my head, and he erased and wrote it again. If he read it right I didn't nod, and he didn't wait.
Once I reported Bright. He asked one question extra: How big a bright.
I said: Two.
He wrote a two. Then he asked: One or two, which is bigger.
I said: Two.
He said: Then what about three.
I said: Never saw a three.
Tuesday went the same. Wednesday I reported three. Thursday, seven — four of them Press.
Friday he came without the notebook, with loose sheets instead. He knocked the sheets square against the table edge, three knocks.
Then he took an awl and punched holes. Three holes, threaded with white cord, one knot, the knot pressed flat.
He clipped the stitched wad in with the old sheets and squeezed the metal clip over them.
He said: The two of you together this week, how many all told — I'll add it up back at the office.
Wang Chaosheng said: Does my nine day count.
The recorder said: It counts.
Wang Chaosheng said: Then I'm ahead of her.
The recorder ignored him. He bit the cord end off, spat it into his palm, kept it in his fist, and only threw it away outside the door.
Wang Chaosheng held more words than I did. Six or seven a day. Reported, then gone; next day he reported them again, the same few.
I reported less. Two or three a day. But I could hold yesterday's.
Yesterday's and today's I could join up. I don't know how I joined them. They joined themselves.
Once Wang Chaosheng reported Go, and I reported Go too. His go was go. Mine was go east.
I told him so. He didn't believe it.
He said: Go is go.
I said: It isn't.
He said: Then say which way it goes.
I couldn't say. He took it for a forfeit.
Wang Chaosheng stamped when he reported. One stamp and the paper on the table jumped.
The recorder warned him three times. The fourth time he said nothing; he moved the paper to the inner half of the table.
When Wang Chaosheng stamped the fourth time, the paper didn't jump.
He looked at it himself, and stopped stamping.
My blue booklet had reached No. 36. When it was handed out it was printed only to fifty; from fifty-one on, numbers and no words, the paper blank.
Wang Chaosheng had more, up to No. 41. Every day he piled new words onto the pages, writing crooked, one character sprawled across two cells.
Once he asked me: How come you don't write.
I said: I can't write them.
He said: You hear it, you write it.
I said: Some I hear and still can't write.
He said Oh, and asked no more. The pencil stub in his hand went into his mouth and came out with a ring of teeth marks.
There was a kid in our compound, older than me, whose book was filled dense. Once I saw him writing what he hadn't heard — two lines of it.
After a while he stopped coming.
I don't know why he stopped. Nobody told me.
Reporting done, I walked home with daylight left. The compound lamps lit by pull-cord: one pull, one lamp, the cords hung high — you had to run right up under one to reach.
I could reach. Erya couldn't; she had to carry a brick.
Later I noticed the numbers I reported were getting smaller.
First it was three. A week on, still three. Another week, and it was two.
I asked the recorder: Am I hearing wrong.
He said: Not hearing wrong. Report two.
I said: Before it was three.
He said: Before is before.
He wrote down a two.
That night I counted the numbers in my booklet. Three, three, three, two.
I took an eraser to the last three, meaning to change it to a two. The paper fuzzed up under the eraser, and I didn't dare write.
At home I told Mom. She was kneading dough, flour to the wrists. She wiped her hands twice down her apron before she reached for the knitting notebook.
That notebook was the word book; along its edge an oil stain had soaked in, and where it soaked, the characters yellowed.
She asked: Two of what.
I said: Press.
She wrote. She wrote slowly. Two years of school in her, and some characters took thinking.
When she finished she asked: The two of them together, what do they mean.
I said: Don't know.
She said: Don't-know still gets written.
Then she set the pen down.
That day was a Wednesday. I remember it was Wednesday because there was no class in the afternoon and I got there early.
Master Qiao wasn't in. The soldering iron sat out on the table, cold, a coat of black on its tip.
The recorder was correcting the previous wad, rubbing with an eraser till the paper fuzzed.
I finished reporting, put my booklet away, stood up. I got to the door and came back.
I said: Over there it's reporting a very slow thing.
The recorder's pen stopped. The nib bled a small blot into the paper. He didn't erase it.
He said: Say it again.
I said: Over there it's reporting a very slow thing.
He wrote it. Slow, one character at a time. When he finished he read it through.
He said: What does reporting mean, here.
I said: It's reporting on its own. Not reporting to us.
He said: A very slow thing. How slow.
I couldn't find the word. I thought a long time.
I said: Like setting a bowl down onto a stack.
He said: What bowls.
I said: The ones by the stove. Washed, and stacked one on another.
You set it on and your hand can't let go right away. You steady it a moment. It has to sit steady, and only then is it done.
He said: Who is it that needs it to sit steady.
I said: That thing. It's still setting. It's been setting a long time, and it hasn't gone steady yet.
He didn't understand. I could see it. He laid the pen across the paper.
He said: Is what you're saying that word.
I said: Which word.
He said: Which word is heaviest. Do you know that yourself.
I said: I know.
He said: How heavy.
I couldn't say. I put my hand on the table edge and pressed down.
He looked at my hand once. He said: All right.
He said: Of what you just said, the heaviest one. Say it again.
I said: All right.
I opened my mouth.
What came out wasn't the word. I said Bright.
Wrong. I heard myself say it, and it was wrong.
I said Press. Wrong too.
I said Set. I said Bowl. None of them.
I shut my mouth, waited, and opened it again.
Inside there was a shape. Round, a little frayed at the edge, like a thread end. It wouldn't come out.
He said: Think again.
I shook my head.
He said: If you remember tomorrow, say it then.
He wrote in the notebook. He wrote Slow, and then Bowl.
After those two he paused, started a third, and stopped halfway — only the left side written.
He capped the pen.
I asked: What about the character after.
He said: When you remember.
At the far end of the line stood two small printed words. I couldn't read them.
I asked: What do those two say.
He said: None of your business.
I fished the blue booklet out of my bag and turned to No. 37. No. 37 was empty, waiting for me to write.
I held the pen. I couldn't write.
I just turned pages like that for a while, then closed the booklet.
He said: What the grown-ups don't ask, you don't say.
I said: I said it.
He said: This time I've recorded it. Next time, don't.
I said: Why.
He said: Don't add anything to it.
I said: I didn't add.
He didn't answer that. He closed the notebook, re-set the metal clip, and clamped it on the corner of the papers.
I went out. Wang Chaosheng sat on the steps, a popsicle stick in his mouth.
He asked: What did you say in there.
I said: A slow thing.
He asked: How slow.
I said: Can't say.
He said Oh. He took the stick out of his mouth, looked at it, put it back. He asked nothing more.
Next day at three thirty I was there on the dot. He asked how many today. I said four. He asked what. I said Press. He wrote.
He didn't mention yesterday. Neither did I.
The third day, on the road, I remembered a piece of it. I remembered the shape — the shape in my mouth.
Getting in the door I said: I remembered.
He looked up. He waited.
I opened my mouth.
Still nothing. What came out was Go.
The fourth day I tried again. The fifth day again. After that I stopped saying.
Saying didn't work, and it held up his recording of the others.
Those days I reported few. The recorder asked: Are you not hearing.
I said: I'm hearing.
He said: Hear it, report it.
So I reported. What I reported was still Press.
Once I tried at home. Mom stood at the stove with her back to me. I opened my mouth and made no sound.
Mom asked: What are you muttering in there.
I said: Not muttering.
She said: I heard it.
I said: I'm looking for it.
She said: Find it and call me.
I said: Mm.
I never called, and I never found it.
Once I tried at school. Between classes, the playground crowded. I stood by the parallel bars and tried once.
What came out was Bright. I tried again: Press. Neither.
Once I tried at the broadcast. It was playing the weather. I waited for it to finish, waited for the snow to come back.
At the snow I opened my mouth.
Nothing.
A week on, the recorder brought a machine. Square, a bit shorter than the enamel mug.
He set it on the table and told me to talk. I talked. Then he told me to say the word. I opened my mouth.
He played it back. Out of it came snow and nothing else.
Master Qiao from the side said: I told you. It won't take.
The recorder packed the machine into his bag. He never brought it out again.
Some days later he brought a man.
The man wore a dark jacket, four pockets, the two lower ones bulging.
He stood in the doorway without coming in, and looked first at the papers on the table.
Master Qiao looked up, said nothing, and nudged the soldering iron farther in.
The man came in and stood beside me. He asked me: You're one of the Lin family.
I said: Yes.
He said: Say again what you said that day.
I said it through. Starting from Over there it's reporting a very slow thing, and on to the bowls.
At the bowls I stopped a beat. I was afraid he'd make me say the word again.
He didn't. When I finished he was quiet a while.
In his quiet nobody in the room spoke. Master Qiao's iron smoked on its stand.
His hand pressed down on the lower pocket. In the pocket something square, hard, pushing the cloth out a lump. He pressed it and didn't take it out.
He said: Record it.
The recorder drew a small triangle ahead of the line in his notebook.
Before leaving, the man said to me: If you hear it again, don't say it outward first. Come to me first.
I said: I couldn't find you.
He said: The recorder will do. If the recorder writes it, I can see it.
I said: Oh.
He left. Light on his feet; soft soles.
Master Qiao watched him out the door and said one thing: That one used to be in broadcasting.
Wang Chaosheng said: What's broadcasting.
Master Qiao said: Putting words into a box.
That night Mom was home. Day shift that week. She stood at the stove washing dishes.
One washed, she set it on the stack. Set on, her hand didn't let go at once — a pause, then it opened.
I stood alongside watching.
She asked: What did you say today.
I said: I said things.
She dried her hands on her apron and took the knitting notebook from the drawer.
The oil stain at the notebook's edge had grown a little bigger.
She turned to the last page with writing, then one page farther — blank.
She asked: What word.
I said: A word. I've forgotten.
She said: Tell me when you remember.
She wrote. She wrote Slow. The cell after it stayed empty.
She closed the notebook and weighted it under the sewing basket.
Next morning I counted the stack of bowls by the stove. Seven.
The top one had a chip, the chip underneath. Water it held; soup it leaked.
Later I said many more words, past counting.
That word I never said again. By the time I stopped saying, I still hadn't remembered it.
I took the top bowl off the stack and set it back on.
It sat steady. Only then did I let go.