Lin Xiaoman stood at the foot of the hill in the suburban cemetery for a long time.
Raindrops trickled down her hair and seeped into her collar. She counted the steps as she climbed them, the wound on her right foot still bleeding, and every step felt like stepping on blades.
Row 17, Area D—The secret code left by Li Zhou was like a thin thread, pulling her through this silent forest of stone tablets.
The crooked neck pine is taller than I remembered.
There was a half-empty bottle of cheap liquor in front of the tombstone under the tree, with a supermarket receipt at the bottom of the bottle, dated yesterday.
Lin Xiaoman squatted down and ran his fingertips over the list of products on the receipt: 2 compressed biscuits, 1 iodine tincture, 1 bandage.
Her breathing suddenly became rapid.
"You're three days late."
Lin Xiaoman nearly knocked over the bottle when the voice came from behind her. She turned and saw Li Zhou leaning against the other side of the pine tree, his left arm wrapped in a bloody bandage, his face as pale as the porcelain statue on the tombstone.
He was wearing a stolen sanitation worker's uniform, his trouser legs were stained with mud, but his right hand was firmly holding a fruit knife - the tip of the knife did not drop until he saw clearly that it was her.
There was a distance of two meters between them, and the raindrops fell in silence.
Lin Xiaoman suddenly rushed over and grabbed his collar, and the smell of disinfectant mixed with blood hit his face.
She wanted to scold him for leading the pursuers away without permission, and wanted to ask him how deep his wound was, but in the end she buried her face in his shoulder and bit her lip to stop herself from crying out.
Li Zhou's chest vibrated.
"It's okay." He patted her back with his right hand, like soothing a frightened cat. "I stole the funeral home's cadaver truck to get rid of them."
The water on the pine needles hit Lin Xiaoman's neck, icy cold. She felt the gun on Li Zhou's waistband, and the cold, hard touch of the metal made her fingers tremble—this wasn't the old-fashioned pistol they bought on the black market.
"The standard weapon of the Xinghui Security Team." Li Zhou noticed her pause and suddenly lowered his voice, "I picked it up near the pharmaceutical factory."
Lin Xiaoman looked up suddenly: "Did you go to Xinghui?"
Li Zhou did not answer.
The gravekeeper's coughing could be heard in the distance. Li Zhou quickly put away the photo and pulled Lin Xiaoman down to squat.
As the flashlight beam passed over their heads, she saw a new mark carved into the pine tree trunk: a small boat, exactly like the one in the coal bunker.
"Welcome to our new home."
Li Zhou pointed to the tin house on the hillside. Raindrops dripped down his jawline onto the back of Lin Xiaoman's hand. "Although the neighbors don't talk much."
The lock on the tin house had long since rusted away. Li Zhou pried open the floor with a dagger, revealing a narrow, one-meter-deep cellar below.
There was a suspicious bulge in the sleeping bag on the folding bed. Lin Xiaoman opened it and saw that it was a dozen stolen sacrificial apples, each of which had a small bite taken.
"Poison testing." Li Zhou turned his face away a little embarrassedly. "The day before yesterday, the core of an apple turned black."
Lin Xiaoman grabbed the reddest one and bit into it fiercely. As the sweet and crisp juices burst in her mouth, Li Zhou suddenly turned her face and wiped the fruit residue from the corner of her mouth with his thumb.
There were fresh calluses on his palms, but the temperature was heartbreakingly familiar.
Outside the cellar, torrential rain washed over the nameless tombstones. At one point, Lin Xiaoman imagined he heard a distant siren.
But the candle lit by Li Zhou had already illuminated the corner of the wall - there was a crooked outline of an island drawn with chalk, and there were two more coconut trees than on the wall of the unfinished building.
————————(time dividing line)
The river calmed down at dawn, and Feng Yulan was awakened from her light sleep when the boat gently approached the shore. Lao Zhou had already jumped ashore and was tying the boat with a hemp rope.
Shrouded in morning mist, a small town built on the mountain is looming, with houses with green tiles and white walls arranged in an orderly manner on both sides of the river.
"Where is this?" Feng Yulan asked while rubbing her sore neck.
"Qingxi Town." Old Ma lowered his voice. "It's at the junction of three counties, a place that no one cares about."
Zhang Shumin also woke up. Her brow furrowed at the wound, but her eyes were much clearer than yesterday. She sat up and looked around the unfamiliar town warily: "Is there a clinic?"
Old Ma shook his head. "There's a barefoot doctor who's quite skilled." He pointed to a house with red lanterns hanging on the hillside. "Doctor Liu's house. Just say she's my cousin."
Feng Yulan helped Zhang Shumin off the boat. Old Ma pulled a cloth bag from the cabin and stuffed it into their hands: "Some dry food and money. Don't refuse."
Zhang Shumin thanked him, something she rarely did, and then suddenly asked, "Why are you helping us?"
Old Ma's dark face showed a simple smile: "Brother Jianhua saved my whole family's life."
He paused, "There's a 'Hong Jie Grocery' at the east end of town. The owner is kind, maybe I can find a job there."
After bidding farewell to Lao Ma, the mother-in-law and daughter-in-law walked along the slippery bluestone road toward town. Qingxi Town was serene and picturesque in the morning mist. Occasionally, an early-rising woman would open a carved wooden window and pour out a basin of water for washing her face.
Feng Yulan felt as if she had returned to the small town where her grandmother lived in her childhood. The long-lost tranquility made her nose sore.
Doctor Liu was a lean old man who didn't even raise an eyebrow when he saw Zhang Shumin's gunshot wound. He expertly cleaned the wound, sprinkled homemade powder on it, and finally bandaged it with clean gauze.
"It was a grazed wound, no bone damage." Doctor Liu's voice was as hoarse as sandpaper. "But it got caught in the rain, so it's a bit infected. Change this medicine every day, and don't let it get wet."
He took five yuan and gave me a few packets of herbs: "Boil it and take it to reduce the fever."
After leaving the clinic, the two decided to go to Hong Jie's Grocery Store first.
The store is easy to find - it is the only two-story building painted sky blue at the east end of the town. A wooden sign that reads "Hong Jie Grocery" hangs at the door. The glass windows are polished to a shine, and various daily necessities are neatly displayed inside.
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