Chapter 12

Chapter 13

Before school started in September, Zhang Xiaotong received a call from Liu Mingyao. Wan Bochen had given them a job assembling two hundred computers. Zhang Xiaotong told Liu Mingyao to give Wan Bochen a cash kickback of ten percent of the profits once they received payment, and to take ten percent himself. For now, the principle was simply not to lose money.

Liu Mingyao was immensely grateful for Zhang Xiaotong's decision. This assembly job would bring in nearly five hundred thousand in profits, so his share alone would be fifty thousand. At this rate, it would be hard not to get rich. When he first agreed to work for Zhang Xiaotong, the salary had been secondary; the main reason was that he really liked her novels. I figured Liu Mingyao's family couldn't be too badly off. Presumably, he was also doing this because he wanted to accomplish something to show his family.

School started in September, and I moved up another grade. It wasn't that a school like this didn't allow students to skip grades, but my main reason for coming here was in my current class. How could I bear to leave? Zhang Xin's face gradually matured, becoming the face that had once haunted my dreams. Whenever I had nothing to do in class, I sketched and doodled, producing plenty of quick sketches of my classmates. Those drawings made many of them take an interest in me, someone who hardly ever spoke. They came over to look at my work and asked me for drawings. Even the art teacher thought I had potential and treated me with particular favor.

Yang Yuanzhe and Ge Jinqiu came to school to find me. My deskmate, Xu Jiajia, saw them as we were leaving through the school gates together. She pointed at me. "Aha! You're hanging out with older students from another school. I'm telling the teacher."

I waved a hand. "Go ahead."

Seeing that I ignored him, Xu Jiajia said almost pleadingly, "Draw me a picture, please. I really want to dance ballet. If you draw me one, I won't tell the teacher."

"Learn to do it yourself. Drawing isn't hard."

"The teacher said I have no talent."

"The teacher has no eye for talent. I think you're very talented. Try it yourself if you don't believe me."

Yang Yuanzhe waved at me. "Hey, Xingwen, what are you doing? Is that your girlfriend?"

I laughed. "Don't fucking talk nonsense. I'm only in elementary school. Besides, would I pick someone like her?"

Ge Jinqiu chimed in from beside him. "Then what kind would you pick?"

"Someone like Zhang Xin."

I blurted it out almost without thinking, only realizing afterward that Xu Jiajia was right beside me. Her face was full of disappointment, and there were tears too, whether from anger or something else. "Zhou Xingwen, you creep! I'm telling the teacher!"

I sighed inwardly. Go ahead. There's nothing I can do about it anyway. "Go ahead. I'll give you the drawing tomorrow, whether you tell the teacher or not."

Leaving Xu Jiajia crying on her own, we jumped into a taxi as though fleeing.

"Where should we go?"

"Let's go to my sister's," I said. "She's home alone. My aunt and the others are abroad, so we can do whatever we like."

"Sure."

I gave the driver directions. "The west gate of Knitting Factory No. 1."

Zhang Xiaotong was reading at home. Seeing that I had brought friends, she greeted us cheerfully. "Xingwen, you should have told me you were bringing friends. I'll take you all out to a restaurant tonight."

"Sounds good. Sis, you're not watching TV, are you?"

"No. You want to play games, right? I'll plug it in for you."

Yang Yuanzhe said beside me, "Your sister's so good to you."

Ge Jinqiu added, "I wish I had a sister that nice."

"I'm lucky," I said. Zhang Xiaotong smiled, her eyes narrowing, and sat beside me to keep reading.

In 1992, very few families let their children play video games at home. Yang Yuanzhe and Ge Jinqiu were far more interested in the game console than in my having a good sister. I barely played. I had gotten tired of these games years ago and mostly watched Ge Jinqiu and the others play.

After finishing a chapter, Zhang Xiaotong put her bookmark in and closed the book. "Aren't you playing?"

"I'm in no hurry. Let them play."

Zhang Xiaotong stretched and rested her feet on my legs. "Our homeroom teacher got married this afternoon, so the whole class got the afternoon off. Will you go out for a walk with me tonight?"

"Sure. You've spoken, sis. How could I refuse?"

Zhang Xiaotong laughed. "Now that's my good little brother."

I lightly tickled her foot, making Zhang Xiaotong laugh even harder.

"What do you mean, 'now'? Haven't I always been good?"

Zhang Xiaotong said no more. I rested my hand on her ankle, and we watched Yang Yuanzhe and the others play.

After playing for over an hour, the two of them grew a little tired. Turning to stretch his neck, Yang Yuanzhe saw Zhang Xiaotong and me watching them and looked a little embarrassed. "We got so caught up we forgot about you... Xingwen, don't you want a turn?"

I shook my head. "No, I've played all these before. If you're tired, let's go eat."

We went downstairs and found a nearby restaurant. Zhang Xiaotong asked the two of them, "What would you like, Xiaozhe? Jinqiu, you order something too. Don't be shy."

Yang Yuanzhe and Ge Jinqiu bashfully ordered two dishes, and Zhang Xiaotong and I added two each. We ate there often, and the food arrived quite quickly.

After we finished eating, Zhang Xiaotong paid. We went outside and hailed a taxi to take Yang Yuanzhe and Ge Jinqiu home. "You two head back. I'm going shopping with my sister in a bit."

Sitting in the taxi, Yang Yuanzhe watched me hand the driver the money and said, "Your sister's really nice."

I smiled. "You're my friends. Be careful going home. Don't get yourselves told off."

After seeing Yang Yuanzhe and Ge Jinqiu off, Zhang Xiaotong and I strolled along the street. In the early nineties, more and more people were going into business, and the city's nighttime appearance had begun to change. The newly built Huayi Hotel in the city center had neon lights flashing against the night sky like something from a Hong Kong movie. As we walked, Zhang Xiaotong and I actually ended up outside Xueyuan Branch No. 2. A crowd packed its entrance in the early evening. Zhang Xiaotong went up to a sales assistant. "Two ice creams, cream flavor."

We looked around, but my uncle didn't seem to be there. Zhang Xiaotong rarely came here, and none of the staff currently on duty knew us. Seeing no seats anywhere, I said to Zhang Xiaotong, "Feeling pleased? Your business is doing this well. Let's go. Sitting here is actually pretty silly."

"Don't say that," Zhang Xiaotong said. "Isn't this yours too?"

I spread my hands. "It doesn't matter. I'd be fine giving it all to you. Once you've made a start, making money is easy."

Zhang Xiaotong gave my head a smack. "Listen to you brag. You're the only clever person in the world."

"Of course. If Earth's gravity weren't holding me down, I'd have reached the moon ages ago."

"Show-off!"

That evening, Zhang Xiaotong called my family and said I had stayed up too late playing games at her place, so I might as well stay the night. Zhang Xiaotong now carried considerable weight in the family, and she was still nominally teaching me English and math, so there was nothing unusual about me staying at my younger aunt's home. The adults didn't care much about which children were closer to whom. In their minds, children were simply children.

I lay on the floor at Zhang Xiaotong's home, watching her walk back and forth beside me. She had changed into a pale white, knee-length skirt, and her two bright, fair legs kept swinging before my eyes, almost making them sting. I knew this girl was deliberately teasing me, so I could only pretend she was invisible and stare straight at the television as I played.

When I reached the part in Final Fantasy V where the old man died, Zhang Xiaotong sat down beside me. "You understand Japanese?"

I kept my eyes on the screen. "Didn't I teach you before? You didn't learn."

Zhang Xiaotong crossed her legs and cradled my head in her lap. "How about teaching me now?"

"Sure. Do you want to study it in depth, or just learn a few simple things to use?"

"In depth." Zhang Xiaotong looked at the Japanese text on the television with me. "There's hiragana and katakana, right? First, tell me the Chinese meanings of some common kanji."

My cheek rested against Zhang Xiaotong's leg. It felt cool and very comfortable. "Right, let's start here. 'Bukimi' means eerie, and 'tegami' means a letter."

"Then what does 'shinpai' mean?"

"It means worry."

Zhang Xiaotong asked and I answered. Lying across her thighs, I shifted positions as I explained Japanese to her, until we both fell asleep. On the television, the heroes fighting in real time were wiped out...

When we woke the next morning, both Zhang Xiaotong and I blushed. She lay across the carpet while I hugged her thigh, my head having somehow come to rest on her lower abdomen. Zhang Xiaotong's skirt had flipped up, exposing a corner of her underwear. I sat up as fast as I could, straightened my posture, and gave two dry coughs. The first thing I said was-

"So they're pink..."

Zhang Xiaotong blushed even harder. I feigned nonchalance, though my heart was beating quite fast. "I told you I was a pervert, and you still weren't careful."

Zhang Xiaotong's voice was as faint as a mosquito's hum. "It's you, anyway, so it doesn't really matter..."

I looked around, mumbling vaguely as I changed the subject. "It's getting late. Let's hurry up, wash our faces, and go to school."

Zhang Xiaotong pulled me to my feet, and we went to the bathroom mirror together to wash our faces and brush our teeth.

The taxi dropped Zhang Xiaotong at her school first, then took me to mine. As I got out, I happened to see Xu Jiajia and Zhang Xin approaching side by side along another road. They saw me too, and Zhang Xin greeted me warmly. "Good morning, Zhou Xingwen."

I waved at her. "Good morning."

Xu Jiajia glared at me, then turned away with a cold snort. "Come on, Zhang Xin. Don't bother with people like him."

"Jiajia, don't be like that. Classmates should..." Apparently, Zhang Xin still didn't know about the conversation between Xu Jiajia and me and intended to talk her around.

Xu Jiajia wouldn't listen. "Don't believe him, Zhang Xin. He's absolutely disgusting. Let's go."

Ten years ago, when I was thin-skinned, a situation like this might have left me red-faced, furious with embarrassment, and at a loss. Of course, that wasn't going to happen now. I smiled faintly and stepped back to let them go first.

Xu Jiajia froze for a moment, then snorted again and dragged Zhang Xin, who seemed to want to say something, into the school.

Once in the classroom, Xu Jiajia showed no sign of anything unusual. I opened my schoolbag on my desk and handed her the drawing I had finished before playing games the previous evening. Xu Jiajia turned to look at me and took it.

"Yesterday, you said you liked Zhang Xin?"

Xu Jiajia asked very quietly, keeping a cautious eye on Zhang Xin as she spoke, afraid she might notice.

I thought for a moment. "I think I said something like that, but that wasn't what I meant."

"Then what did you mean?"

"I only meant that if things keep going like this, I might come to like Zhang Xin."

"Isn't that still liking her?"

"I don't like her enough yet," I said. "Life's unpredictable. Nobody can say what will happen in the future."

Xu Jiajia hadn't expected that answer. She frowned in thought for a while, then smiled. "That's right. Nobody can say what will happen in the future. Thanks for the drawing."

Hearing Xu Jiajia say that, I let out a long breath and thought, That probably settles it, right?

After school, I planned to flee the scene as quickly as a rabbit, but Xu Jiajia caught hold of me. "Zhou Xingwen, you seem to take a taxi home every day."

"Yes."

"Give us a ride part of the way." Zhang Xin stood beside Xu Jiajia. I didn't understand what she was up to.

"Where are you going?"

"Ximiaokou."

I knew that arguing right and wrong with women was an utterly pointless business, so I obediently hailed a taxi and took them to Ximiaokou. Just before getting out, Zhang Xin thanked me quite naturally. I felt something surging inside me and couldn't resist turning back for another look at her. Then I paid and got out too.

Seeing me get out as well, Xu Jiajia pulled Zhang Xin over and asked, "Why did you get out too?"

I looked at the entrances to the crisscrossing alleys. "I want to meet someone. It's a little dangerous, so don't ask."

Xu Jiajia frowned. "Zhou Xingwen, are you really planning to become a hoodlum? I don't believe it. Take us with you."

Zhang Xin tugged at Xu Jiajia. "Jiajia, let's not go. Don't cause trouble for Zhou Xingwen."

I thought it over. There seemed to be quite a few delinquents around here, and I was a little worried about letting them go on their own. I asked Xu Jiajia, "What did you come to Ximiaokou for?"

Xu Jiajia thrust out her chest. "I heard this place was fun, so I wanted to take a look. I heard there's a market here selling flowers, birds, fish, and insects?"

I cast a mischievous glance at Xu Jiajia's chest, which was as flat as though it had been bombed, and said slowly, "There is, but I'm afraid someone might rob you of all your money before you even get there."

A voice behind me said, "He's right. It really is that rough around here."

Hearing that familiar yet unfamiliar voice, my heart immediately sped up. I hadn't expected the person I wanted to find to appear so easily.