The bar shook with noise. Every time the television replayed the words "The 2008 Olympics are awarded to the city of Beijing," another round of cheers rattled the walls. Glasses clashed, beer sloshed onto sticky wood, plastic flags waved until their sticks bent. Cigarette smoke hung low, thick enough to sting the eyes.
At a corner table, six men leaned close around their drinks, laughing loud enough to drown the crowd. They had known one another since childhood — hutong alleys, rooftop kites, stolen cigarettes behind the schoolyard wall. Now they were older, carrying the city's years in the creases of their faces: clerks, engineers, traders.
Li Ming sat with them, yet apart. He was taller than the rest, his shoulders still carrying the shape of the uniform he had once worn. His glass was full, his eyes dark and unsettled, fixed on the television as if mocking it.
"Brothers!" shouted Chen, lifting his beer high. "We did it! Beijing! The Olympics!"
"To Beijing!" the others echoed. They raised their glasses and drank in a single swallow.
Ming raised his glass slowly, like a man dragged into the toast. "To Beijing," he muttered, then drained it without a smile.
Zhao slapped the table. "Ha! You act like this isn't history. This is the biggest thing since '84 — Xu Haifeng winning that first gold in Los Angeles. Remember? The whole country cheered like we'd just conquered the world."
The men nodded, voices tumbling into laughter and memory.
"Don't forget the Asian Games in '90," Chen added. "Beijing lit up for weeks. Fireworks, flags, the city glowing like never before."
Sun leaned back, eyes shining. "Lin Li in the pool. Won us gold and looked like a goddess. My whole dorm had her poster pinned to the wall."
That drew hoots from the table. Zhao wagged his finger. "Forget Lin Li. What about the foreigners? Tall blond sprinters, skin like porcelain. Half the guys in Beijing suddenly started running laps just to impress them."
Liu chuckled, softer. "I remember the money. Those souvenir kiosks — if you had dollars or yen, you could buy anything. Everyone wanted to hold a foreign bill, just to feel it."
Chen laughed. "I sold balloons outside the Workers' Stadium. In two weeks of Games, I made more than my father did in a year. Foreigners handed out bills like candy."
The table roared. Zhao turned his chopsticks toward Ming."And where were you, Lao Li? Not around to enjoy the show, eh?"
The others piled on, grinning."While we were chasing athletes, he was marching in circles with a rifle.""Yeah, missing all the pretty foreigners for five years of army gruel."
Laughter shook the table.
Ming lifted his glass, his smirk thin. "Marching in circles, yes. At least I didn't waste breath drooling over foreigners who wouldn't have looked at you twice."
The table erupted again, half jeers, half harder laughter.
Chen slapped his back. "That's our Lao Li — too proud to cheer, too bitter to laugh. Even when history walked past him in shorts."
Liu raised his hand, steering them back. "Anyway, tonight isn't just about the Olympics. Don't forget the World Cup — our boys on the same field as Brazil next year."
The table roared again, already arguing the matchups.
Ming cut in, dry as ash. "Stand on the field, yes. But don't expect them to touch the ball much. We'll be running laps while the Brazilians dance."
Groans rose, half protest, half reluctant agreement.
"Still," Zhao grinned, "it means we're there. Not invisible anymore. Olympics, World Cup — China's on the map."
Ming snorted. "On the map, yes. Like a pawn on a chessboard."
The boos came again, but laughter softened them.
Chen leaned forward, eyes glinting. "Forget football. Think business. WTO's coming. Foreign goods, foreign money. My cousin's already got a German contract. In a few years he'll own a flat in Chaoyang."
"Chaoyang?" Sun nearly spat his beer. "At those prices? He'll need to sell a kidney."
The men howled. Someone joked about renting kidneys to foreigners, another about selling hutong courtyards just to pay a bride price.
Zhao slapped his thigh, nearly spilling his drink. "You know who's the happiest about tonight? The old grandfathers! Mine was hopping around the courtyard like he was twenty again, shouting the Long March wasn't over yet — just delayed!"
Chen nodded, laughing. "Mine too. Said if he still had his legs, he'd march to Moscow and thank them himself."
The table shook with laughter.
Then Sun, grinning and loose with beer, turned to Ming. "And your grandfather, Lao Li? I bet he was the loudest of all."
The words hung a moment too long. Ming's eyes flicked down, then back to the screen. He gave a shrug.
Zhao teased, softer now. "Come on, your old man was Red through and through. Probably ready to grab a rifle the moment he heard the news."
The laughter dimmed. They all remembered Ming's grandfather: the iron voice, the endless war stories, the man who carried the Revolution in his bones.
Ming said nothing, but inside, memory surged like floodwater.
His grandfather — an Old Red, veteran of the Anti-Japanese War and the Civil War, who joined the Red Army in Yan'an and never let the Party out of his heart. Every night, by candlelight, the old man made young Ming read Mao's words aloud. To him, sacrifice was not optional; it was the only reason China still breathed.
But Ming also remembered his father. Bright, ambitious, one of those sent to the Soviet Union in the 1950s to study heavy industry. He had believed in a future of steel and turbines, only to be branded a "foreign sympathizer" after the Sino-Soviet split. During the Cultural Revolution, he was dragged into prison, where he died.
The shock had paralyzed Ming's grandmother. His mother carried everything — raising her son, caring for the bedridden old woman, and whispering through tears: "Your father built for the country. He helped us stand tall after '64, when the bomb was tested. Remember, son, the times were wrong, not the ideals."
And Ming himself? He had grown up fighting those ideals. Rebelling against his grandfather's discipline. Cursing the Party that destroyed his father. Until the old man forced him into the PLA to "straighten him out." Five years of drill and hardship taught him to march, shoot, and survive — but not to believe.
Now, sitting in the smoke and noise of 2001, Ming drained his glass and muttered, "The old man would have cheered tonight. He never stopped believing. Me? I don't even know what to believe anymore."
The others shifted uneasily, but said nothing.
On the screen, Jiang Zemin stood smiling beneath floodlights, his voice carrying:"This victory belongs to the people of China, but above all, it belongs to the Party who led the way."
The bar erupted again. Flags waved, men shouted "Long live the Party!"
At the corner table, Ming let out a sharp laugh, too loud."Of course. The Party invented fireworks too, didn't they?"
The words cut the air like broken glass. Heads turned. A man at the next table jabbed a finger."Shut your mouth if you don't love your country!"
Others joined: "Traitor!" "Go drink with the Japanese!"
Ming leaned back, arms crossed, face calm. The jeers rolled over him like rain.
Chen slammed his palm on the table. "Lao Li, for once in your life — stop. Just stop."
Zhao forced a laugh, uneasy. "Seriously, with that mouth, how did you survive five years in the army? Surprised your sergeant didn't strangle you in your sleep."
The others chuckled, tension easing.
Then Sun, still flushed with drink, muttered into his glass:"Your poor grandfather. A Red soldier through and through. He bled for this country—"
The table froze. Even the drunkest lowered their eyes.
Ming's jaw tightened. He said nothing. Around them, the cheers rose again, fireworks cracking outside, but at the corner table he sat unmoved, the tide of celebration pressing against him like a weight he refused to carry.
"Your grandfather would've cried if he saw this," Wang Hao's voice broke back through the haze, pulling Li Ming into the present. "He spent his whole life waiting for China to stand tall. Tonight—this is it."
Li Ming drained his glass in one gulp, the bitter beer stinging his throat.
"Maybe," he muttered. His friends leaned closer to hear. "But don't forget—my father also gave his life to this country. And who remembers him now? Who remembers people like him?"
The table went quiet. No one had an answer.
On the screen, fireworks erupted over Beijing, exploding like artillery shells in the sky. The whole pub roared in celebration, but Li Ming's gaze was heavy, his vision swimming. The sounds faded. The smoke thickened.
Darkness swallowed him.