Chapter 13
From 2000 to 2004, the Zhou family's life was no different from before, except that the husband never returned home, and the wife became like Xianglin Sao, complaining to everyone she met: "Do you think I deserve to die? I just went out for a meal..." She had to pause here, wipe away her tears with the back of her hand, and say with deep sorrow: "But you can't blame the child. She was only ten years old, what did she know? She knocked her father's oxygen mask off while playing!"
Most of the residents of the Audit Office's family compound are prominent figures. Those who got rich first tend to hide their wealth, and each one behaves in a more low-key manner, hoping no one will recognize them on the street. How could they care less about their neighbors' affairs? When it comes to the couple in Room 801, Building 7, the most they mention is "handsome man and beautiful woman." Within a few years of moving in, they've raised a son and a daughter. The daughter is also beautiful, like a doll, and she's cheerful and lively, calling out to everyone she sees: "Hello, Grandpa and Grandma!" "Hello, Uncle and Auntie!" She's incredibly popular.
The strange thing is the son. He is dark, strong, and looks average. He doesn't look like the couple's son. Other boys of eleven or twelve years old would not care about their sister. As soon as school is over, they would go out to play with boys of the same age. But he is different. After school, he would silently follow his sister, carrying two schoolbags and holding two water bottles. When it was hot, he would hold his sister's school uniform and never take his eyes off his sister. The entrance to the family building is an arched corridor. Every evening, the two children would slowly walk out of the arched corridor. The warm sunset shone on their little faces, stretching their shadows very long.
People passing by never heard the boy speak. He just kept chattering like a little lark. Even when she was being naughty and got angry at him or scolded him, he would still follow her with a smile, looking down at her lovingly, as if her temper was so cute that it made him feel distressed.
But the more he did this, the angrier she got. "You're just trying to piss me off!" She cried and rushed forward like crazy. At this time, he quickly caught up with her, stuck close to her and begged for mercy in a low voice: "Yueyue, don't be angry anymore. Do you want some candied haws? I'll go buy some now."
To be honest, the people in the family compound had a much better impression of the two children than the couple. The girl looked like she had not been to school much, with big wavy hair, big red lips, a tight skirt, and a worldly look. She spoke in a loud voice, as if she was arguing. The boy was gloomy and didn't like to talk, with a pale face. It was obvious that he was in poor health, so it didn't seem too surprising that he died at such a young age.
In the final analysis, the children are the ones who are pitiful, so when the neighbors first saw the widow of the Zhou family, they still comforted her and asked her to take good care of the two children. However, she kept talking about her late husband's death. They felt sympathetic after hearing it once or twice, but they got annoyed after hearing it too much.
The way decent people express their boredom is to hide. Gradually, the widow of the Zhou family could only stand in the open space of the family compound holding her daughter's hand. Looking up, she saw the rows of family buildings, and looking down, she saw the yellow earth scorched by the sun. There was no one around. Even the old people who loved to gossip the most, saw her bringing her daughter out, and they left one by one, fanning themselves with palm-leaf fans and pulling their own children.
There was no one at Zhou Tiancheng's funeral, as the saying goes, when the tree falls, the monkeys scatter. But the more important thing was that in the next few years he actually wanted to clean himself up and move up, which alienated him from his brothers.
Finally, a few brothers who had been with him when he was in his teens and twenties and was the poorest showed up. Lei Zi even knelt on the ground and kowtowed because Zhou Tiancheng had blocked a knife for him in the past. After kowtow, he stood up, glanced at Dai Yan, smiled, called her "sister-in-law", left a stack of money and left.
In the end, only Dai Yan, Zhou Yue and Kang Xingxing were in front of Zhou Tiancheng's tombstone.
Zhou Yue never laughed again from that day on. She was dull and didn't respond to anyone who spoke to her. During the day, her mother would pull her out like a puppet to act out crying scenes in front of the adults, but she couldn't cry. Every time, she would sit on the sofa in the neighbor's uncle and aunt's house and listen to her mother talk about how she accidentally killed her father, and listen to the uncle and aunt's sad "Oh...", "Oh...", "The child was young, she didn't mean it." Her mother hadn't finished talking until the ice cubes in the shaved ice on the coffee table melted and water droplets flowed down the glass all over the table. She missed Kang Xingxing more than ever. He was upstairs, locked at home by her mother.
At night, she lay in Kang Xingxing's arms, looking at the moon and stars in the sky, listening to him whispering in her ear over and over again: "Don't blame Yueyue, Yueyue did nothing wrong. It's enough for us to know. It's just the two of us. Don't care about them. We don't care about anyone else." The warm breath brushed her earlobe, but she remained silent.
She didn't know what to say in front of her father's tombstone. In the black and white photo, her father was still smiling, as if saying to her: "It's okay, don't cry, Dad is here!" She also missed her father more than ever.
Kang Xingxing's face was covered in bruises, and his eyes were so swollen he couldn't open them. Every time Dai Yan said she wanted to take Zhou Yue to buy groceries, he would block the door and refuse to let her go. The look in his eyes made one want to dig his eyes out.
But at this moment, he looked peaceful, standing in front of Zhou Tiancheng's tombstone, as if he didn't feel any pain at all.
The rustling sound of the wind in the trees always reminds me of that scorching August when he was running on the streets of Guangzhou, with Zhou Tiancheng chasing him. After all, the child couldn't outrun the adult, and was finally dragged onto the train by Zhou Tiancheng, who slapped him on the head and said, "Call me dad!"
He knelt down in front of the tombstone, kowtowed three times, and called out "Dad."
So in the end, Dai Yan returned to the group of sisters from her youth. The sisters were all middle-aged women in their thirties and forties. Those who were married had divorced, and those who were with the eldest brother had been dumped by him long ago. Those who were lucky could get some breakup fee, while those who were unlucky ended up sick.
In the final analysis, she is the one who has the best life. Although Zhou Tiancheng is a rotten guy, he has a clear mind. The women outside follow him and spend money on wine and women, and he coaxes them into being so beautiful, but in the end he doesn't make a penny. All the money is in the hands of his wife. Dai Yan, who has not appeared for several years, is still "Sister Yan'er" when she returns. Once she sits at the card table, she will stay there for a whole day and night, and she will lose tens of thousands of dollars.
The chess and card room was filled with smoke, and the lights in the disco were shining. Everyone was surrounding her to praise and flatter her. In addition, when she was young, she did look a bit like the Hong Kong star Zhou Haimei. A few experienced old men would just hold her shoulders and whisper in her ear, "It's worth dying for to have dinner with Zhou Haimei today!" She would be so happy that she would slap the hand on her shoulder and curse, "Get out of here!" But she would turn around and smile happily. Her fingers painted blood red were rough, but the movement of taking out the bank card from the wallet was smooth and graceful, and she could get a table full of Maotai Zhonghua with one swipe.
Of course, she had a few fleeting romances in those years that were not worth mentioning, but Zhou Tiancheng was a role model before her, and those who were more handsome than him were not as talented as him. She met them all in dance halls. They were all greasy-haired and empty-headed. They slept during the day and changed into dance costumes as shiny as peacock feathers to go in and out of the dance floor at night. They just wanted to hook up with women like her and spend women's money. They had no other interests except for a good body.
It's hard to describe the appearance of those who are more capable than him. They are all bald and have big bellies. They don't say a few words at the card table before their stinky feet come up from under the table. She can't stand this kind of person the most. They will flatter her for a few words in public, but they will cut off contact when they turn around.
In short, she never brought a man home in those years, but she would get drunk every night. As soon as she opened the door, she would throw her bag away and stagger onto the sofa in her high heels, with a smile on her face, intoxicated in the glory of her youth. Every day, Kang Xingxing would carry her to the bedroom, cover her with a quilt, and close the door.
She had a good alcohol tolerance and usually fell asleep, but she would vomit if she drank too much white wine. She rolled around in bed, and it was Kang Xingxing and Zhou Yue who had to wait for her to vomit, one holding her legs and the other squatting by the bed with a basin. This lasted for most of the night.
But people always have their moments of clarity. Dai Yan curled up on the sofa during the day, watching TV and cracking handfuls of melon seeds. From time to time, she glanced at the two children's rooms. The hangover headache was over, her mind was clear, and she felt uneasy no matter what she thought. She took the opportunity to go to the bathroom and walked through the bedroom to take a look. The two children were doing nothing, just gathered together to discuss problems. Zhou Yue's math was a mess, and she had to break it down and explain it to her for her to understand a little. Unconsciously, they got closer. Kang Xingxing's mouth brushed Zhou Yue's temples, as if kissing her ear, "Do you understand?" He looked at her with a smile. Under the dim desk lamp, his eyes were really as bright as stars. His eyes slowly lingered on her face, like a leaf floating in the air, and would always fall on her lips in the end.
This was not the first time she had seen this look in her eyes. Dai Yan couldn't tell when it started. When Zhou Yue looked at Kang Xingxing, he still hid, just like when he first came home at the age of six. When she looked at him, he immediately lowered his eyes, but when Zhou Yue looked elsewhere, his eyes came back, falling on her face and hair, timid and focused, sparkling and full of longing, as if he was looking at a beautiful dream.
But this dream was destined to be impossible to realize. Kang Xingxing was kicked out of the bedroom. At first, he slept on the sofa, but Dai Yan felt that it was still too close to Zhou Yue's bedroom. Finally, she simply drove him to sleep in Zhou Tiancheng's chess and card room. The room was on the shady side, with no light during the day and even colder at night. It rained for several days in a row, and the quilt and pillow were so damp that water could be squeezed out of them.
But her sense of responsibility towards her daughter was not as great as her addiction to playing mahjong. There were always a few days a week when Dai Yan would invite people to her house to play mahjong, and Zhou Tiancheng's chess and card room became hers. There was constant noise all night long, and vulgar laughter and scolding drifted out of the windows. The entire family compound was filled with obscene words cursing at ancestors. But Zhou Yue was happy at this time. She talked to Kang Xingxing who was sleeping on the sofa through the wall.
"Are you asleep, Orangutan?" She knocked on the wall.
"No, where's Yueyue?"
"I can't sleep. These uncles are so fierce."
No matter how hooligans Zhou Tiancheng's brothers were, they would not dare to make any noise when Zhou Yue was sleeping. But Dai Yan's friends did not follow this rule. The sharp shouting and laughter scared Zhou Yue so much that she wrapped herself in the quilt and pressed against the cold wall. She missed Kang Xingxing's warm embrace. His breath was soft, but his arms protected her like a solid wall. As long as she was in his arms, she was not afraid of anything. Dai Yan often forgot to lock the bedroom door, but she did not dare to go against her mother's wishes.
"Is Tiantian here?" Kang Xingxing leaned against the wall with her hands clasped into the shape of a trumpet.
"She's here!" She nodded vigorously in the darkness across the wall, "I'm holding her!" As she spoke, she gently stroked the doll's hair in her arms. Night after night, the doll's two hairs were almost plucked out by her.
"Then Yueyue will treat Tiantian as me. Tiantian will protect Yueyue when I'm not around."
"As long as Tiantian is here, Yueyue will be safe."
Apart from the unstable factor Dai Yan, Zhou Yue and Kang Xingxing still went to and from school. Zhou Yue loved singing and appeared at various galas all year round. Her every frown and smile made those ignorant boys stare blankly. As for why they stared blankly, the naive boys didn't quite understand, but they just looked for opportunities to pull her braids, and the bold ones even lifted her skirt. However, the desires of these young beasts would always be shattered by Kang Xingxing. A Pegasus Meteor Fist would swing at them, and even the restless blood would cool down. They would cover their bleeding noses and flee in disgrace.
Everything was the same, except that Zhou Yue never celebrated her birthday again. She refused to eat the cake Dai Yan bought her. Dai Yan felt guilty and started cursing: "If you don't want to eat it, then forget it! You're so heartless..." After cursing, she slapped the cream cake into the sink. Under the warm orange light, the cream flowed along the tiles into the sewer. The only sound in the whole kitchen was the flickering of the light bulb. Zhou Yue lowered her head and saw Kang Xingxing holding her black hand tightly. He held it so tightly that her round fingernails turned white like coins.
Two years passed in the blink of an eye. The children had grown up unnoticed. The twelve-year-old girl had developed a naive love affair. Although she was in sixth grade, her mental state was similar to that of a junior high school student. The female classmates Zhou Yue was close to would always whisper to her on the way home from school, "Your brother is so handsome."
"Really?" Whenever this happened, Zhou Yue would lower her head and look at the shadow on the ground. Her ears would burn, and her heart would feel sour. "What's so handsome about that... He's so dark."
"Handsome! Single eyelids, tall and mighty, such a man!"
"Yes! Very manly!"
At that time, Kang Xingxing was less than fourteen years old and could not be considered a man in any way. Zhou Yue looked up in surprise, but her heart tightened when she saw his back. He took off his school uniform and was only wearing a white short-sleeved T-shirt, which made his arms look darker and his figure look stronger. It was not an exaggeration to say that he was a high school student of fifteen or sixteen. He walked in front, keeping a distance from the girls. Whenever Zhou Yue was with female classmates, he would do this, walking forward with his head down and his back straight.
Seeing that Zhou Yue and the others' voices were fading away and becoming smaller, he turned around suddenly and fixed his eyes precisely on Zhou Yue's face. As the sun was setting, his long eyes were heavy and his nose was high, casting a deep shadow on his face. Just this one turn of his head touched some nerve among the girls, causing several of the little crazy girls to scream.
He suddenly panicked, looking at them one by one blankly, and then looking at Zhou Yue blankly, but he didn't know what nerve this confusion touched in Zhou Yue, and she ignored him the whole night.
After arriving home, he cooked rice and also fried her favorite shredded potatoes with green peppers and scrambled eggs with tomatoes, and asked her to come and eat. She rushed out of the bedroom with a thud, sat down and buried her head in the food, the clinking of the dishes and chopsticks, but she didn't say a word.
Kang Xingxing felt completely innocent and helpless. She racked her brains but couldn't figure out what was going on. Holding the bowl, she carefully asked, "Yueyue, don't be angry anymore. Do you want to eat..."
"Eat, eat, eat! You only know how to eat! I won't eat!" Zhou Yue was so angry that her face turned red and rice grains flew everywhere. "Haven't you noticed that I've gained weight? I'm so ugly!"
Kang Xingxing didn't say anything. He didn't dare to say anything because she would get angry if he said anything. He wanted her to be fatter and uglier, as ordinary as him. Every day, it would be just the two of them together, with no one to disturb them and no one to care about them, walking quietly across the Bridge of Sighs. She was no longer so keen on looking at her reflection in the water, but at him. He also dared to look at her, openly and passionately.
Finally, he put down the bowl, took the keys, went out, walked two blocks, and went to the night market to buy her candied haws.
The candied haws were bright red, and drops of syrup dripped down from the white porcelain plate, filling the plate with blood-red syrup. Zhou Yue didn't touch it.
Kang Xingxing didn't understand Zhou Yue's feelings. She thought she was in a bad mood because she felt she was fat. Zhou Yue herself didn't understand either. She took a shower and stood in front of the foggy mirror. Her face was as red as a tomato. She bit her lip and hesitated for a long time before she touched her chest. It was bulging, like a small bun, and it hurt. She rubbed her back, which was also bulging. The bulges in these two places and the accumulation of fat during puberty were the culprits that made her look fat and strong.
The morbid aesthetic of East Asia is like a formula engraved in the genes of East Asian girls. They hate the ugly and cumbersome changes in their bodies, but they don’t know that this is the girl turning into a woman.
That night she rolled around in bed in stomachache. Dai Yan was not at home. Under the dim lamp in the bedroom, the bright red on the sheets was glaring. Kang Xingxing was anxious like an ant on a hot pan. "Yueyue, be good and bear with it." He turned around several times on the spot, forced himself to calm down, went to the bathroom to fill a hot water bottle and put it on her stomach. She barely stopped screaming. Her hair was soaked with sweat and stuck to her face and neck. Her mouth was as white as paper.
"Yueyue, be good and bear with it." He repeated this sentence over and over again, sweat pouring down his face. He wiped his face and rushed downstairs. In the small northern town at night, there were no shops open. He ran for an unknown amount of time before he saw a shop door with a small pink light on. Two women were standing outside the door. Their skirts were short to their thighs and their red nails looked like the ghosts in Hong Kong horror movies. "Handsome boy, come and play!" After saying that, several people laughed. His face turned red to his ears. He bit the bullet and went forward to gesture to them for a long time before he explained the whole thing. He was laughed at by them again. The sharp laughter was particularly piercing in the silent night. "What sisters? My dear sisters, hahaha!"
"Okay, now that I'm here, I'm really your sweet sister!"
"Hahaha!"
In the end, I asked for a few white square things, but I already had them at home, in the bathroom cabinet, and sometimes they would appear on the shelf next to the toilet. Dai Yan was using them.
He stuffed the things into his trouser pockets like a criminal with nowhere to hide. Even at night in the summer, the heat was so hot that his whole body felt sticky. Once those soft little things were in his pockets, they turned into a fire, burning against his flesh, along his blood vessels, and all the way to the top of his head.
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