Qiao Fei
This was what followed in the (a little more than an) hour plane ride.
In the morning, the soft sunlight came into the airplane and country music played. Cheng Jia Yang held my hand.
At first we did not say much, his other hand held a magazine. I checked his profile every once in a while, his dark eyes, high nose, and thin flying lips, he clenched my hand and bit it, “What are you peeking at?”
I said, “Has anyone said that you are very good looking?”
“Don’t mention it,” he said, “From a little age in the kindergarten, because they thought they was a girl, there was no shortage of fights.”
“Really?”
“I burned off my eyelashes and eyebrows using my big brother’s lighter.”(Um what?)
“Then wouldn’t you be turned into ET?”
“Even if I took it out I was still a handsome brother.”
I laughed, “You have a big brother?”
“I have a big brother.” Cheng Jia Yang said, “I didn’t tell you before. My parents had two sons. Guess who was the most spoiled one?”
“You.”
“Correct.”
“Guess who was happier?”
“……”
“It was him.” Cheng Jia Yang said, “We had a casual relationship.”
I basically understood.
“Ever since he was little, my big brother never needed my parents to care for him. He independently read books, tested into school, and lived.”
“You’re so big now, you still need your parents to care for you?”
He looked at me, “Sometimes, there is invisible pressure.”
He did not want to continue to complain to me, and asked me, “What about you? Do you have any siblings? I remembered last time you talked about it.”
I wanted to tell him some interesting stories.
“I am the only child. Did you not see this last time?
When I was little, I was so ugly and so sick. My mom had to take me to the hospital every few days.
Later, she thought of a trend.”
“Speak.”
“She asked my uncle who lives in the countryside to find me a demiG.o.d fortune. Guess what I was reincarnated from?”
“A good wealthy boy?”
I shook my head.
“The fire cloud cave master’s red child?” (This actually comes from a game and the fire cloud cave master seems to be a boss of some sort so if anyone knows where this reference comes from please let me know!)
“Why are you so vulgar?”
“Quickly speak.”
“I was a,” I looked at him intently, “real worm.”
Cheng Jia Yang was drinking some water at the time, and he choked, “Don’t tease me,
“How are you not cultured? Real people come from people who have become deities: Real worms come from bugs that have achieved Dao.”
Cheng Jia Yang laughed, almost pa.s.sing out, “What happened then?”
“The demiG.o.d said the reason I was so sickly was because of my special ident.i.ty so he wanted to take me in. My mom became anxious and pleaded with him to save me.”
“He gave you a burn and you drank the ashes right?”
“How did you know?”
“It’s always like that on television. And then what? Then were you no longer sickly?”
“That night I had diarrhea, dehydration, and I had to live in the hospital.”
He put his chin on my shoulder and laughed soundlessly, his hot breath making my ears itch.
“I was like this, sick, then you know, my parents didn’t say anything, they were very anxious and pleaded with another person to teach me to talk and pleaded with another person to look at my illness. They used their lifetime savings to buy a television, I watched this every day.”
He gradually stopped laughing, “Then what?”
“I went to elementary school, my body was not very good, but my legs were very long and I entered the track and field team, running, running, my body became well again. Later I became stronger and stronger, have you seen me run yet? Let me tell you, I have special talent. When I run, my legs stretch horizontally and my feet are straight, you know, average people cannot do so, when you run it is an “8” shape (Chinese character for 8 is 八 so it’s this shape). Believe me, it’s real, average people all have “8” shaped feet.
My character changed, and I could talk a lot. After cla.s.s I talked, during cla.s.s I talked, the teacher frequently punished me by making me stand.”
My grades were average, they weren’t the best, but when I went to middle school and high school, I leaned on my physical education grades to add points. Furthermore, when I came here for college, that was also because my Physical Education grades were added in my Gao Kao (Chinese SAT) grades.
Don’t tell anyone else.”
He tightly grasped my hand: “I feel that you have lived very happily.”
I shook my head vigorously: “Exactly, I have always felt that my luck was exceptional.”
“I think I have never seen you unhappy before.”
“Sometimes, I will be unhappy. Then I’ll stand in front of the mirror and tell myself: ‘Laugh’, ‘Laugh’, saying this until I laugh out loud.”
Cheng Jia Yang watched me. I felt he was very gentle, his eyes looked as if they were going to overflow with tears.
I said: “Laugh.”
He looked at me.
“Laugh.
Laugh. I command you to laugh.”
He finally laughed out loud, and lightly said, “I want to kiss you. Now.”
“How are you so indecent? Note the implications.” I pushed him, “I have to sleep for a while more, later I’ll need to work.”
He covered me with a small blanket, it was really warm and comfortable.
Cheng Jia Yang
Daylight poured in through the small window, and Fei’s face was very rosy and was sleeping peacefully. I wanted to know what kind of strength and what kind of outlook towards fate would allow her to be so relaxed and happy when talking about her own troubled life.
Her head tilted and I thought she would land on my shoulder, then she moved back, and her head was on the chair’s back. Finally she found a good posture and slept more soundly.
I thought of my own travels before.
When I was a teenager, I accompanied my parents and sat in the luxurious first cla.s.s across the land or the sea to go to a strange familiar place, North America, Europe, and the dark Africa, sometimes we would travel throughout the night, and sometimes we would travel throughout the day. When I grew up I had to have my own career and study but I still continued to travel, greeting and escorting people around, in a hurry.
But as of now, I had Fei, and I would no longer be lonely. She had walked from my young spirit to become my fellow traveler companion.
We arrived in Dalian.
Afternoon, sun shining, and a moist sea breeze, the city had neat streets and European style small buildings, as well as robust sycamore trees whose leaves had grown into the size of one’s palm, trembling extensions on the branches.
Fei brought the foreigners to eat some seafood dumplings, then shopping around Xinghai Square, and to visit the Sh.e.l.l Museum. She was energetic, enthusiastic and she worked very well, the French were very fond of her, and when they first met there was an old lady who called her “Little Cabbage.”
I thought, even though her vocabulary was limited, because she did not live abroad before, and some expressions were not authentic, with practice, she could become a very good translator.
While she explained things, I used my phone to take a lot of pictures. She first made haggard eyes to me, and later I knew that she had no way to get it from me, and deliberately posed to me prettily.
The hotel that we lived in looked out over the big sea.
Fei lived with an old granny in a standard room. Wu Xiao Ping’s travel agency had helped me get a simple room, we communicated via the station.
I first washed up and lay on my bed watching TV. I constantly changed the channel, absent-mindedly. Fei and I had already agreed that in two days time we could not act rashly but I could always think of her.
Then someone knocked on my balcony door.
No way, happiness had really flown to the door. Fei stood outside and smiled at me. Her hair was blown by the breeze and her alluring eyes were like those of a cat’s.
Cheng Jia Yang, you’ve been imagining indecent things again, I said to myself.
I opened the door for her.
“Why didn’t you open the door?” She said as she straightened out her hair.
“I thought I was having an erotic dream.”
“Go, go,” she looked very enthusiastic, “Let’s go to the seaside and walk around.”
Oh that was why.
I took off my clothes so that I could change into something else before going out.
She actually turned around.
The hotel’s bonfire party was over, as of now it was the dead of night.Since the beginning of the night tide, wave after wave, I hugged the Fei along the beach slowly walking, listening to birds singing in the dark, flying over our heads.
“Cheng Jia Yang.”
She even used my last name to yell at me.
“Yes?”
“I’m thinking right now.”
“Say it.”
“Do you remember there was a day when you were drunk and you brought me out from the winery, “Allure”?”
“Yes.”
That day it had been because of Ming Fang. I saw her future husband and felt very hurt, and went to the nightclub to free my sorrows.
“Do you remember it very clearly?”
“So-so.”
I was drunk, and I couldn’t have recognized Fei, I only recognized that beautiful girl’s beautiful tongue that brought me ecstasy.”
“We kissed, do you remember?”
Later, that time when it was our first time, I remembered her mouth and her tongue and thus recognized her.
“Yes. I remember.” I hugged her tightly and thought, Fei was very romantic, creating an artistic conception from bits of memories.
“Later?”
“I had no impression of being with you. I seem to have slept, and when I woke up I was with my big brother at home.”
“I’ll tell you what happened later.” Her two hands came over my neck and then her face changed, “You kissed me, and then you puked. You puked in the beach!”
She now had the potential to strangle me.
We chased each other on the beach, and I realized that Fei was definitely an athlete. I didn’t know how far she ran but she tackled me on the beach.
She pinched my face. She had become the best in my eyes: “I told myself that I cannot let you off.” She used her hands and feet to tickle me.
I begged for mercy, she didn’t stop.”
I finally grabbed her hand: “Fei, let me off.”
She looked tired, and lay on my body, her eyes shining in the night, watching me, “That day you were very unhappy.”
I slowly sat up and hugged her into my embrace. I picked out the sand in her hair: “Have you ever been hurt by someone?”
She was very quiet.
“I don’t want to talk about this.” I said, “Because I already forgot. After I puked, I forgot.”
“The place where you puked, later small crabs climbed over it.” she said, “They cleaned the place neatly.”
We laughed again.
At this moment I suddenly realized we were already very far away from the hotel.
It suddenly began to rain.