Chapter 9
JIANG CHENG TOSSED the cigarette and turned to walk toward the mouth of the alley.
“Hey! Don’t go out there!” Wang Xu shouted. “You think I’m just scared?
You can’t afford to mess with Monkey and his gang! Last semester, they beat up someone from Seventh High so bad that he was in the hospital for months!”
“I can’t afford to mess with them?” Jiang Cheng turned to look at him. “If they’re so badass, why is it okay to ask Gu Fei to mess with them?”
“Da-Fei’s different,” Wang Xu said. “He’s been roughing it around here since he was a kid. And… Anyway, just listen to me. You helped me out, so I’m not sending you out there to die.”
And… And what? And he killed his own father? Suddenly, remembering what Li Baoguo had told him, Jiang Cheng found himself laughing. There were urban legends every few streets in the old districts of small cities like this one; it was kind of amusing.
That just made Wang Xu angry. “The fuck are you laughing at?!”
Jiang Cheng ignored him. He was about to continue walking, but as he put one leg forward, Wang Xu wrapped his arms around him from behind and dragged him back.
“Hey, hey!” Jiang Cheng exclaimed in alarm. “Let go! What’s wrong with you?!”
“What’s wrong with me?” Wang Xu froze, then abruptly loosened his grip. “Nothing! I didn’t mean anything by it! Don’t get me wrong! I didn’t mean it!”
Jiang Cheng gave him a look. “Did I say you meant something else by it?”
Wang Xu didn’t speak. He pulled out his phone again and dialed a number.
Jiang Cheng sighed. Once again, he lit a cigarette and put it in his mouth.
Crouching at the foot of the wall to get out of the wind, he picked up a twig and scrawled aimlessly in the snow.
“Da-Fei, Da-Fei,” Wang Xu called out in a hushed voice as he held his phone, as if Monkey’s gang was standing guard in the yard next door, “Monkey found us… Yes, we got away. No—we can’t leave right now… He’s running around with a bloody face, of course he’s not going to let us go! Who else? Me and Jiang Cheng.”
Wang Xu peeked at Jiang Cheng as he spoke. Jiang Cheng didn’t meet his eyes. Wang Xu wasn’t that tough, but he wasn’t a coward either. If those people scared him this badly, they probably were the type you shouldn’t mess with.
Honestly, even back when he himself had hung around a rough crowd, he was reluctant to offend people outside of school. It was too much trouble.
When he remembered it was Gu Fei on the other end of that phone call, Jiang Cheng almost preferred the idea of going back out there to face a beating.
But the rational part of him won out: Going out there could cost him more than just a simple beating or two.
“Da-Fei’s coming over soon.” Wang Xu hung up and dragged his foot back and forth through the garbage heap. “He took his sister out for noodles.
They’re still eating.”
Jiang Cheng was utterly speechless.
Wang Xu found a stick in the garbage, about three feet long. He chucked it at Jiang Cheng’s foot. When rummaging earned him nothing else, he began to take apart the raggedy, three-legged chair.
Jiang Cheng stared at him. “What are you doing?”
“Getting us some weapons,” Wang Xu said. “Monkey’s gang knows this place pretty well, too. What if they find us before Da-Fei gets here?”
Jiang Cheng sighed. He rifled through his school bag and found a knife, which he threw at Wang Xu’s foot. “Use this.”
“Fuck me!” Wang Xu leaped in shock the instant he saw the knife. He whipped around to glare at Jiang Cheng. “Are you really a top student? What kind of top student carries a knife in his bag?!”
“I’ve never used it,” Jiang Cheng said. “It hasn’t even been sharpened. It’s just for scaring people.”
Wang Xu picked up the knife and studied it intently for a while, then walked over and crouched before him. “Jiang Cheng, I’m no match for you.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him in silence.
“This is the end of our disagreement,” Wang Xu continued. “After this, we’ll stay in our own lanes. How’s that?”
“Sure, you can keep that in mind,” Jiang Cheng said. “Overachievers like me are too busy studying to waste time screwing around with guys like you.”
Neither of them spoke after that. They crouched, facing each other in silence.
They had been crouching for some time before Wang Xu spoke again: “A word to the wise.”
“Uh huh.” Jiang Cheng gazed at the lit cigarette between his fingers. The smoke that rose from it twisted madly in the air for an instant, then vanished without a trace.
“If Monkey gets here first, just surrender,” Wang Xu said. “Sure, we can get rough, but we’re only students. We can’t tough it out against real-world thugs.”
Jiang Cheng looked at him, somewhat taken aback. So there were some surviving dregs of sense in this silly little dude’s head.
“That’s what Da-Fei said,” Wang Xu added.
Ah. Jiang Cheng felt a bit like stubbing his cigarette out on Wang Xu’s face.
Gu Fei wasn’t that late, really; he showed up about ten minutes later on his bike. What perplexed Jiang Cheng was that he brought Gu Miao along. The little girl was on her skateboard, hanging onto one end of a cord that attached to the back of the bike. A whole family of lunatics!
The moment Gu Fei’s leg braced against the ground, Gu Miao leaped off her skateboard. She kicked the tip of her foot against the board and caught it in one hand as it flipped into the air. Hugging the skateboard, she walked over to Jiang Cheng and smiled at him, then ran back to Gu Fei’s side, leaning against his leg as she stood.
“Who made the first move earlier?” Gu Fei asked.
“Me.” Jiang Cheng stood. “What’s up?”
“You ran into Monkey?” Wang Xu asked Gu Fei.
“Outside the alleys.” Gu Fei glanced behind him. “Probably coming in now.”
“Fuck.” Wang Xu frowned. “Will we be able to get out?”
“Depends how you want to do it,” Gu Fei said, then looked at Jiang Cheng. “Two possible solutions…” Jiang Cheng knew he was probably in real trouble this time. He sighed and stuck his hands in his pockets as he leaned against the wall. “Go on.”
“Let him get you back,” said Gu Fei. “Once you’re even, it’s settled. If you don’t want that, I’ll escort you both out now, but where and when they get you after that is just luck of the draw.”
Wang Xu quickly looked to Jiang Cheng.
“Getting even is fine. But let’s be clear,” Jiang Cheng said. “One hit more than even, and I’ll fight back.”
When Monkey showed up, his nose was stuffed with cotton. Jiang Cheng thought he must have a low platelet count to bleed for so long without it clotting.
Like Wang Xu had said, Monkey brought a lot of people with him this time. At a glance, there were seven or eight of them. The air was thick with small-town gangsterism.
“Er-Miao, wait for me on the street outside,” Gu Fei said.
Gu Miao gave Jiang Cheng a look. She put the skateboard down, got on it, and kicked a few times, shooting out of the crowd like a rocket.
“You go, too,” Jiang Cheng said.
Leaning his weight on the handlebars, Gu Fei stared at him for a moment.
“Wang Xu, come out with me.”
“I…” Wang Xu hesitated, looking at Jiang Cheng.
“Go,” Jiang Cheng said. He didn’t want an audience watching him get hit.
Gu Fei grabbed the handlebars and swung his bike around. Wang Xu followed.
Monkey walked over to Jiang Cheng, his face dark. When Gu Fei brushed past him, he suddenly seized Monkey’s right wrist and yanked it out of his pocket.
Monkey glared at him. “What?”
Gu Fei didn’t speak. He roughly ran his fingers down Monkey’s wrist and took something from his hand before chucking it at the foot of the wall. The sound of metal clanging against brick was crisp and clear.
Jiang Cheng glanced in the direction of the noise. It was a black brass knuckle.
Motherfucker.
“Rules still apply,” Gu Fei said without raising his voice. With a kick of his foot, he rode his bike out of the network of alleys and toward the main road.
“He won’t be in trouble, will he?” Wang Xu stood by a bald tree at the mouth of the alley. He tucked his neck in from the cold as he watched Gu Miao spin nimble circles on her skateboard around a heap of snow underneath the tree.
“If you’re scared of trouble, don’t go looking for it,” Gu Fei said.
“I didn’t! I always run when I see Monkey,” Wang Xu said. “Fuck’s sake, how was I supposed to know we’d run into him today? Jiang Cheng didn’t know about him, so he went straight for the punch!”
“Are you two settled?” Gu Fei glanced at his face. “Did you kneel down and beg him not to hit you in the face?”
“…It’s settled.” Wang Xu sighed and turned to peer into the alley. “Today I learned they make all kinds of nerdy overachievers. I can’t afford to piss him off.”
Gu Fei laughed.
Barely a few minutes later, Monkey and his gang emerged onto the road.
Monkey didn’t seem all that pleased, but he looked normal overall. The one behind him didn’t look so pretty, though—there was a large bump adorning his forehead.
Wang Xu started in shock the instant he saw it. “He fought back?”
Monkey met Gu Fei’s eyes and said nothing more. He led his men away.
“Fuck. Where is that moron?” Wang Xu watched the mouth of the alley.
Gu Fei frowned. By the looks of it, Jiang Cheng had indeed fought back, and it probably wasn’t of his own volition; someone had given that one hit more.
Monkey wouldn’t break the rules again under these circumstances.
So where was Jiang Cheng?
Even if he took several turns around the place, he shouldn’t take this long to come out… Gu Fei’s phone rang in his pocket. He was surprised to find that Jiang Cheng was calling him.
“Where are you?” he asked as he picked up.
“I…got lost,” Jiang Cheng said.
“What?” Gu Fei was flabbergasted. “Lost?”
“Yeah, lost! We went around in circles when we came in, so I don’t know where I’ve circled round to. Did you people build alleyways or a fucking labyrinth?” Jiang Cheng grumbled, pissed off.
“You… Hang on.” Gu Fei glanced at Gu Miao. “Er-Miao, go in and lead Jiang Cheng-gege out.”
Her foot on the skateboard, Gu Miao turned and sped into the alley.
When Jiang Cheng heard the sound of skateboard wheels, he called out, “Gu Miao?”
Gu Miao’s figure emerged from a turn ahead. She waved at him, and Jiang Cheng went over. In fact, that was where he’d just come from; when he followed Gu Miao down another turn, he saw the little street from before.
Damn it. If he’d known how close he already was, he wouldn’t have embarrassed himself by calling Gu Fei. He’d made an ass of himself so many times today, you could pin a tail on him.
“You all right?” Wang Xu asked the moment he saw him, looking at his face.
“I’m fine.” Jiang Cheng touched his abdomen.
Wang Xu glanced at his hand. “They didn’t hit you in the face?”
“No.” Jiang Cheng gave him a look. “Why, do you want to?”
“Just asking. They hit your stomach? Does it hurt?”
“I’m hungry,” Jiang Cheng said.
“Did you fight back?” Wang Xu continued to badger him. “I saw what’s-his-name come out with a huge bump on his head—what happened there?”
“I said I’d hit back if they hit more than they were meant to,” Jiang Cheng replied, rather impatiently. “So I bumped his head on the wall. What, you wanna try it too?”
“I’m going home,” Wang Xu said. “I’m leaving. Hey, uh, Da-Fei, I’ll buy you lunch tomorrow.”
After Wang Xu left, Jiang Cheng stood there in silence with Gu Fei, watching Gu Miao on her skateboard.
“Thanks,” he said, finally.
Though he’d ended up taking a couple of hits—Monkey punched him twice in the gut, and he still felt queasy—if it hadn’t been for Gu Fei, that solution wouldn’t even have been on the table. If he’d just left, Monkey would probably spend his days prowling the streets looking for him, and he’d never have a moment’s peace again.
“Are you really okay?” Gu Fei gave him a look.
“Yeah.” Jiang Cheng had absolutely no desire to discuss it further. He thought for a moment. “Did you eat?”
“No.”
“Wang Xu said you were eating noodles earlier. He said you’d come over once you were done,” Jiang Cheng said.
“You two would’ve been chopped liver by then,” said Gu Fei. “I was eating on the pedestrian street. If I really finished my noodles first, it would’ve taken me half an hour to get here.”
“Come on, then, let’s go get some food.” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Miao.
“What do you want to eat?”
Of course, Gu Miao didn’t answer him. She simply turned to Gu Fei.
He patted her on the head. “Lead the way.”
Gu Miao instantly shot off on her skateboard—one look told them she was headed for the roadside barbecue place they’d passed before.
“Come on up,” Gu Fei said to Jiang Cheng, gesturing at his bike.
“I’ll walk.”
Gu Fei didn’t waste any more words; he just rode away. Jiang Cheng sighed and pressed his stomach. He felt a bit nauseated, but he wasn’t sure whether it was from hunger or from Monkey’s punches.
Gu Miao chose the farthest barbecue stall. By the time Jiang Cheng walked over, she’d already picked out a heap of things to eat. When Jiang Cheng smelled the aroma of the barbecue skewers, the discomfort in his gut finally began to subside, leaving only an intense hunger. He went over and pointed at the meat.
“Ten skewers of each, and two pounds of mala crawfish.”
They didn’t have mala crawfish, so he ran half a street away to buy some from another stall. When he piled the large platters of meat onto the table, Gu Fei had to ask. “Do you always eat this much?”
Jiang Cheng grabbed a skewer of lamb and took a bite. “There’s a reason Xiao-Ming’s grandfather lived to a hundred and three.”(7)
Gu Fei chuckled and asked the shopkeeper for a bottle of Red Star erguotou.(8) Jiang Cheng felt the urge to ask if Gu Fei needed booze with every meal, but he was stopped by the memory of Xiao-Ming’s hundred-and-three-year-old grandfather.
Gu Miao didn’t speak, as usual, and the two boys had nothing to say either. Like the last time they ate barbecue together, they finished their meal in silence. It was pretty nice—Jiang Cheng managed to eat until he was full.
Whenever he ate with Pan Zhi, he found himself still hungry by the end of the meal because they ended up talking so much. He typically had to eat another meal after.
The only issue was that the other tables at the barbecue stall were so lively that theirs stood out like a beautiful and quiet sore thumb—even the owner shot them a glance every time he walked past. Maybe people thought that they were here to discuss the terms of a duel, and they might stand up with knives drawn at any moment.
When Gu Miao was done eating and took off her hat to scratch her head, Jiang Cheng finally broke the silence.
“Why’d you buy her a green hat?” he asked Gu Fei. It had been bothering him since he saw Gu Miao at the store the other day.
“She likes the color green,” Gu Fei said.
“Oh.” Jiang Cheng looked at Gu Miao’s green hat. What infallible logic— Gu Fei’s answers were always impossible to refute. “It’s a miracle you managed to buy a hat in that color.”
Gu Miao shook her head.
“Hm?” Jiang Cheng looked at her.
“It wasn’t bought,” said Gu Fei.
“Hand-knitted?” Jiang Cheng touched the hat. He couldn’t tell; it was pretty well made. “Who knitted it for you? Your mom?”
Grinning, Gu Miao pointed at Gu Fei.
Jiang Cheng turned sharply to look at him. “The fuck?”
“Language,” Gu Fei chided him calmly.
“Oh, right.” Jiang Cheng gave Gu Miao a slightly abashed smile, before turning back to Gu Fei. “You knitted it? You know how to knit?”
“Mm,” Gu Fei replied.
The edges of Jiang Cheng’s mental image of Gu Fei suddenly went fuzzy:
a guy who carried sweets in his pocket, knew how to knit woolen hats, and committed murder—patricide, no less… After they finished their skewers, Gu Fei hopped onto his bike. Gu Miao unwound the rope tethered to the back of the bike and held it in her hand as she stepped on her skateboard.
“Be…careful.” Jiang Cheng really didn’t know what else to say.
“See you tomorrow.” With that, Gu Fei sped off on his bike, disappearing into the bustling crowd of the narrow street with Gu Miao in tow.
It wasn’t until Jiang Cheng had finished paying that he thought:
Tomorrow? Was today over already?
Obviously not. There were three more periods in the afternoon, and two of those were dedicated to Political Science class. The moment Jiang Cheng saw the schedule, he’d felt a wave of drowsiness.
Gu Fei didn’t make an appearance all afternoon. Jiang Cheng really wouldn’t see him until tomorrow.
Jiang Cheng lay on his desk and slept the afternoon away. The advantage of Gu Fei’s absence was that Zhou Jing didn’t keep turning back to speak. It was perfectly quiet.
The Political Science teacher had even less presence than Lao-Xu. This was the most invisible teacher he’d seen today; they had to speak louder and louder as the lesson went on to be heard above the uncontrolled droning murmurs of the class.
During the final period, Pan Zhi texted him.
– No teacher wanted to take self-study period. Niiice Jiang Cheng glanced at the teacher at the lectern and replied to Pan Zhi.
– It’s always niiice here, going to class is like going to the marketplace
– Even when it’s quiet, all you do is sleep. I bet the noise is just interfering with your naps
– You don’t get it
Jiang Cheng sighed. Pan Zhi really didn’t understand. Sure, he often slept in class, but he wasn’t always asleep; there were times when he would listen to the lecture with his eyes shut, and during exams season, he never slept through or skipped class. In an environment like Fourth High, he really was a bit worried that his top-student status would lose its value.
When the final bell rang, his class erupted with noise. Almost everyone packed their things instantly. Some left, some chit-chatted; everyone was cheerful.
Jiang Cheng packed his bag and left the classroom. When he reached the walkway outside, he sensed a number of people were watching him. He snuck a glance out of the corner of his eye. Students were leaning against the railing and staring at him; he couldn’t tell if they were juniors or seniors, but their eyes were curious and probing.
Tsk.
He turned to look for Wang Xu. That miscreant must’ve said something— probably bragged about the earlier incident like it was something impressive.
When he got downstairs, his phone rang. He thought it would be Pan Zhi, but when he took it out, he saw that it was an unknown number.
“Hello?” he answered the call.
“Is this Jiang Cheng? You have a package. Please come and collect it.”
Jiang Cheng blanked for a moment before reacting. After a couple of clarifying questions, he learned that the call wasn’t from a delivery service, but a logistics center—he had to go collect it himself. He asked for their address and where the parcel had come from before hanging up.
His mom had sent it. It was probably the mess of stuff from his room. She had set up a bank account for him before he left, and now she’d mailed his things over. How considerate. She’d gone to all this trouble, yet she hadn’t even gotten in touch with him.
Jiang Cheng didn’t know whether to thank her or hate her for it.
He didn’t feel that bad, though. Over the past few days, he’d started to grow numb to it all. His heart still lurched in his chest whenever he thought about it, but the feeling always passed quickly.
Slowly, he walked back home. At this hour, Li Baoguo would still be out;
Jiang Cheng might be alone for dinner again. He pondered over it as he walked and finally decided to just have dumplings—he’d eaten a lot at lunch, so he wasn’t that hungry yet.
Near Li Baoguo’s place there was a small square surrounded by various eateries. Jiang Cheng had passed by on a walk before—it was quite busy, and there was a dumpling place that looked very clean.
There was an overpass on his way to the square. As he neared the bridge, he glanced up ahead, then paused. The snow had stopped falling around midday;
all afternoon, the sun had shone brightly. Now, even though the sun was setting, half the sky was still colored with golden light, spreading like ink in water. Even the little bridge was dyed in warm hues.
For an instant, Jiang Cheng felt his heart at peace. All the misery this chaotic day had brought him dissipated.
He quickened his steps toward the overpass. If he’d been earlier by half an hour, he thought, it would have been even more beautiful. In all the days he’d spent in this crappy little city, this was probably the most beautiful thing he’d seen.
There weren’t many pedestrians here. When he approached the middle of the bridge, he saw someone holding a camera, likely to take photos of the bridge and the sky. Just from his profile—no, just from his legs—Jiang Cheng could tell who it was.
Gu Fei.
It wasn’t surprising in the least that he could recognize Gu Fei by now.
What was surprising, however, was that Gu Fei was here after skipping lessons all afternoon, holding a camera bag and what looked like a professional-grade camera. No wonder he didn’t want to lend it to Zhou Jing.
Jiang Cheng hesitated, trying to decide whether he should walk over, or cross to the other side and pretend he hadn’t seen him. They had nothing to say to each other, anyway.
Before he could take a step, Gu Fei turned in his direction and started walking—he must have finished taking his pictures. Pretending not to see him was now out of the question. Jiang Cheng sighed and walked toward him.
Just as he was about to greet him and force some small talk, Gu Fei caught sight of him, paused, and lifted the camera in his hands. In his surprise, Jiang Cheng didn’t have time to block his face with his hand before he heard the shutter go click.
Son of a cockeyed calico cat!
[7] “Do you know how Xiao-Ming’s grandfather lived to be a hundred and three?” “Because he minded his own business.” This is a style of silly joke that’s used to tell someone not to be nosy.
[8] A colorless liquor made from sorghum. Its twice-distilled process sets it apart from other sorghum-based spirits such as fenjiu. Red Star is one of the most popular brands of erguotou.