mudslide aftershocks
The rain started to come down hard at noon.
When Ah Yu knelt at the edge of the collapsed section of road, the knees of her work pants were already frayed. Zhong Hua's interview vehicle was half-buried in reddish-brown mud, and the rear window was shattered into a spider web. She had just been thrown out of that spider web, like a ginkgo leaf torn apart by a gale.
"Zhong Hua!" he shouted at the top of his lungs, his voice hitting the crumbling mountain walls on either side, bouncing back with the dull thud of falling mud. Three days earlier, under an ancient ginkgo tree on the outskirts of the city, he had stuffed a laminated specimen into her interview notebook—it was picked up last late autumn, the edges of the leaves slightly worm-eaten. He said it "looked like the dark circles under your eyes from always staying up late writing articles." At the time, she laughed and tucked the specimen into her hair, saying she would wear it to photograph the tailings dam pollution site of the Gu Group.
The ginkgo leaf is still stuck behind her ear, its edges stained with mud, like a piece of amber soaked in blood.
The aftershocks came without warning. The ground beneath their feet suddenly began to tremble, as if a giant beast were turning over inside the mountain. Ah Yu saw the rock where Zhong Hua was lying sliding, and the ginkgo leaves in her hair trembled gently with the jolts, like a dying butterfly. When he rushed over, his hand was cut by the falling rocks, and drops of blood dripped onto her face. Her eyelashes trembled, but she didn't open her eyes.
"Hold on tight." He lifted her up in his arms, her head resting on his shoulder, her breathing as faint as a wisp of smoke. The recorder in his backpack was still working intermittently, its buzzing sound mixed with her last words before she lost consciousness: "Ah Yu, the cracks in the dam are widening..."
The ravine was filled with mud, the deepest parts reaching above the calves. Ah Yu shuffled out, one step deep, the other shallow, each step feeling like walking on quicksand. Zhong Hua's weight made his left arm numb, but he dared not change his position—she had a wound on the back of her neck, and when he touched it earlier, blood was seeping through his fingers onto his work pants.
“Remember that ginkgo tree?” He leaned down to whisper in her ear, his voice as steady as possible. “You said you’d have a picnic under it after the news came out. I bought your favorite strawberry jam, and…”
Before he could finish speaking, a deafening roar came from above. He looked up and saw half a mountainside crumbling away, carrying trees and boulders hurtling towards them. Ah Yu whirled around, shielding Zhong Hua with her back, and rolled towards the nearby embankment. Debris pelted his back, the pain making his vision blur, but the person in her arms remained completely silent.
When he stopped, the first thing he did was check her breath. It was faint, but still there. A ginkgo leaf from behind her ear had brushed onto her lips; he carefully brushed it back into his hair. His fingertips touched her cold cheek, and his heart felt like it was being squeezed tightly by something.
"Don't sleep." He patted her face. "Zhonghua, look at me. Didn't you want to take pictures of the sunset? You'll see it once we get out of the mountains."
She still hadn't woken up. The voice recorder had somehow fallen out of her backpack, its faint red light gleaming in the mud. Ah Yu reached out to grab it, her fingertips barely touching the pen when another aftershock struck. This time it was more violent; the soil on both sides of the ravine began to collapse, forming small mudslides.
"Damn it." He cursed under his breath, hugged Zhong Hua tightly again, and began to climb towards higher ground. The slope was steep, and the soil was slippery. He could only use his fingernails to grip the cracks in the rocks, moving up step by step. Sweat mixed with rainwater streamed into his eyes, stinging them so much that he couldn't open them. He could only rely on his sense of direction.
When he reached a relatively flat platform, he finally couldn't hold on any longer. He laid Zhong Hua down and slumped down beside him, panting heavily, the wound on his back burning with pain. He unbuttoned his shirt and saw bruises all over his back, with several places still bleeding.
"You really know how to cause me trouble." He smiled wryly at Zhong Hua, reaching out to check her temperature. She was still cold. He took off his coat and wrapped it around her, then moved her closer to him, warming her with his body heat.
The rain was still falling, but it had lessened somewhat. Ah Yu looked up at the sky; it was a hazy gray, and he couldn't tell if it was evening or dawn. He took out his phone, and sure enough, there was no signal. His backpack was almost empty of water and food; he'd lost most of it when he rolled down the slope.
"We have to get out of here," he said to himself, and also to the unconscious Zhong Hua. "You still haven't told me what title you're planning to use for that report."
He remembered her excited tone on the phone last night: "Ah Yu, we'll definitely bring down Gu Yanting this time. I found someone in the know who's willing to testify." He had advised her to be careful then, saying that the Gu Group was powerful and deeply entrenched and would definitely retaliate. She laughed and said, "What's there to be afraid of? You're here."
Yes, I'm here. He gritted his teeth and picked her up again. This time, he changed positions, letting her lie on his back, his arms wrapped around her thighs. It was tiring this way, but it would reduce the jolting on her wound.
"Hold on tight." He patted her thigh and stood up. He'd only taken a few steps when he heard a soft groan from his arms. His heart tightened, and he stopped and turned back: "Zhong Hua? You're awake?"
She didn't open her eyes, but her eyelashes trembled again. The ginkgo leaves in her hair swayed gently with her breath, and Ah Yu suddenly remembered the first time he saw her. At a party hosted by the Gu Group, she was wearing a white dress, holding a camera, and hiding in a corner taking pictures of an oil painting on the wall. He walked over and asked her what she was photographing. She held up her camera to show him: "Look, the light in the painting overlaps with this person's shadow. Doesn't it look like justice and evil are fighting?"
Back then, she wore a white rose in her hair; now, it's a ginkgo leaf covered in mud.
"Hang in there a little longer." He continued walking forward, his voice carrying a gentleness he himself didn't realize. "When we get out, I'll treat you to hot noodle soup with two poached eggs."
The ravine grew narrower and narrower, the mountain walls on both sides almost closing in on each other. Ah Yu could only walk sideways, with loose stones constantly falling from above. He held Zhong Hua even tighter, afraid that a rock might hit her.
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