Shenzheners by Xue Yiwei

Author:Xue Yiwei
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Linda Leith Publishing
Published: 2016-09-09T04:00:00+00:00

The Prodigy

Only I knew the real reason why I did not attend the award ceremony. It was a special event organized by the municipal education commission for my teacher and me. I had come in second place in a national amateur piano competition, in the youth division. When the organizers of the award ceremony informed my parents, they said every media organization in the city would be there and that the deputy mayor, who was in charge of education and the arts, would give a speech and present me and my teacher each with prize money and a certificate.

But twenty minutes before the start of the ceremony, the organizers received a call from my parents. They told them I had a high fever and could not make it. They said I had gotten sick two days before. The doctor had done all he could, but my temperature just would not come down. They offered their apologies and said they could attend and accept the prize and certificate on my behalf. But they would not have the time or the inclination to be interviewed by the media. They hoped that the commission would understand.

The truth was that my parents had no idea where I had gone. At dawn they had discovered I was no longer in my room. They looked everywhere for almost eight hours without success. They had to make that call. They had to lie. They assumed I’d run away from home for the second time. The first time was when they refused to find me another piano teacher. That episode ended when they got a call from the Guangzhou Railway Police Office telling them to come get me. This time, though, they were wrong: I had not run away. I’d been hiding in the power room in the basement of our building since dawn. I decided to remain there until the ceremony had gotten under way.

By the time they were hurrying home from the ceremony, I was already sitting in my room. They were much relieved to find me there. They didn’t ask me anything. They should’ve known that if they hadn’t refused another of my requests, I would not have responded in such a way.

Two days earlier I had asked them to let me stay home from the ceremony. If they had just been more patient in letting me finish my explanation (which I’d even prepared beforehand), the situation would never have gotten that out of hand. But they simply refused, no buts. They said that even if I were so feverish that I couldn’t walk, they would take me to the ceremony on a stretcher.

My parents approached the side of my bed together. They did not reprimand me or ask any questions. They just said it was a pity I had not gone. The deputy mayor had given a rousing speech. My teacher’s account of my rapid progress in the past year or two fascinated all the parents and child pianists in the room. It was the climax of the evening.

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