The Rental Shop Owner

Chapter 2

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The shop opened late even during the Lunar New Year’s season when everyone else was off on holiday. It was the third day of the first lunar month and a cold, snowy day. I didn’t want to go out after closing the shop at ten o’clock so I decided to sleep there.

I was watching Legend of the Fall and mumbling about Brad’s six-pack when I dozed off. Someone started knocking in the middle of the night and woke me from my light sleep.

It was unusual so I asked, “Who is it?”

The knocking continued but no one answered. My stomach did a little uneasy flip. I got dressed and went to the door, opening the door a tiny crack.

The moment I opened it, a person barged in.

A tall guy wearing a sterile mask and wrapped in a scarf and down jacket stood in my shop, scolding me with a glaring look in his eyes. “Aren’t we the daredevil, opening doors in the middle of the night? You ain’t got nine lives!”

Seeing him fling his clothes away, the retort I was about to make got stuffed back down my throat. All I could see underneath the jacket were b.l.o.o.d.y bandages.

Nonchalantly, he lied down on my clean metal cot, muttering. “I have a fever.” By the time I comprehended it, he was already unconscious.

I was at a complete loss.

×××

I told you that I had led a simple life; I did not want women or men. He, well, he was younger than me and was still a little thug out and about on the streets just three years ago. He kept coming to my shop to borrow videos. He had bad taste and also never paid. But he was a leader of the local scene nonetheless, and I wasn’t one to bother with kids anyways.

Winter of 1997, he came running into my shop, asking me, “Yo, you got any movies with Leslie Cheung in it?”

I looked up from the screen playing Lethal Weapons of Love and Pa.s.sion. One glance at him almost made me cough out last night’s dinner—oily, wax-yellow hair with a tuft in the front dyed green and purple, a fake gold earring on the left ear, a pair of coffee brown sungla.s.ses, a fake black leather jacket, a metal-studded belt and an unbelievably fat pair of red pants.

Disgusted, I asked, “Which do you want?”

“That f.a.g one, of course!”

I was very repulsed. I knew he was talking about Happy Together, which was the best gay film I had ever seen. Although I didn’t count as a legitimate queer, I did feel disgusted when people called gay people f.a.gs. But what could I say to garbage like him?

Still disgusted, I spat, “I don’t have any! Take this. s.e.x and Zen. It’s got Shu Qi, Chingmy Yau, see–”

“You f.u.c.kin’ deaf? You got what I want or not?”

Your mother f.u.c.king has it, I swore in my head.

“Yes.”

“Hehe, knew you got all the goodies. Bet you’ve seen it already too.” He stuck his disgusting yellow and purple coloured, sticky-looking hair in my face. It smelled like cheap hair gel.

I crinkled my nose, “Nothing special,” and said no more.

Sullenly, he left with the disk. As expected, that copy of Happy Together did not return.

Some days later, he showed up again. “Yo, you got anymore? The ones with h.o.m.o Cheung if you can.”

I clenched my teeth before flashing a smile. “I wonder why you always watch them.” I took a full look at him. His face was nicely proportioned but he was just another bony teenager going through p.u.b.erty.

“Hehe…” I snickered meaningfully.

“Whatchu laughin’ at?” He shot up and glared at me with a pair of disgruntled eyes like a vulture. It made my hairs stand up.

What was with that reaction?!

But there was one thing I could stand about that piece of garbage—his eyes. Aside from the disgruntled look that he had acquired, they were a pair of pitch black and bottomless eyes.

I wiped my smile off and stopped fooling around. “This one, right? Just take it.” I tossed the American gay film towards him since I didn’t expect it back anyways.

What really infuriated me was when he nicked my entire private collection one day. The rascal rummaged through my cash drawer while I went to take a p.i.s.s. Farewell My Concubine: this was thin on the ground back in ’98 and was brought by someone all the way from Guangzhou; The Wedding Banquet starring Winston Chao; Cheap Killers (not Hold You Tight) starring Alex Fong;Total Eclipse, the best DiCaprio film; and the three j.a.panese dramas I had spent a fortune on,Dousoukai, Ningen Shikkaku: If I Were to Die and Kira Kira Hikaru; and…

He took them all.

Now that I think about it, QAF was everywhere. There was nothing special about my stuff.

He slapped my back before he left and made faces at me. I did my best to keep it together, telling myself: amiability brings riches, amiability brings riches, amiability brings riches…that motherf.u.c.ker. He just had to take my gay films. As if they were easy to get my hands on!

After a while, the d.a.m.n jerk strode into my shop again after the Lunar New Year’s holidays.

I was stupid and quickly hugged my drawer close.

“What’re ya doin’? I look like a thief to ya?” The hoodlum rolled his eyes at me with a cigarette between his teeth.

“Your stash was pretty sweet!” He flashed a flattering smile right after the eye-rolling. “You got anymore? Hmm?”

Ew. Disgusting. What the h.e.l.l was he smoking?

More smoke ended up coming out of his stinking mouth.

“Hey–!” Then I broke out coughing.

“Mwahahaha!” He began laughing at me exaggeratedly.

Everyone has their limits.

And I always saw these crooks as eyesores.

So I pointed my nose up in the air. “You’re not welcome here. Please leave right now.”

Ahem. I admit I was pretty harsh. He still makes fun of me about it until this day.

The hoodlum shot me a glance before plopping onto the table without a care in the world and even started flipping through my rental records and reading out loud.

“Zhang Hua rented Ghost…”

He misread several characters and even licked his fingers to flip the pages.

I froze in place as flames of fury sparked within and rose above my head. I understood then what it meant to be driven mad.

I carefully set the drawer down and shoved the useless piece of s.h.i.t off the table.

“Get the f.u.c.k out!” I roared.

He didn’t pay any heed and kept teetering.

I was a man. Although I wasn’t as hot-blooded as Mister Lu Xun hoped our countrymen to be, I was still a man.

Thus, without much consideration, I punched him.

Actually, as a cultured person, I usually never lost my temper. I could count all the fights I had in twenty four years with one hand. He had not done anything evil or unforgivable and there were not any hate based on our social cla.s.ses, but I was just so angry.

Sometimes, one punch leads to a life of complications for two.

He was 180 centimetres tall, about half a head taller than me. Though he looked malnourished, he was apparently very experienced. My fury went into hiding once more after dealing two punches and taking four of his. I had knocked one of his teeth out since my first punch landed on his mouth—which I wasn’t told until much later—and that truly angered him. We fought like there was no tomorrow. Disks were cracked and shelves were tipped over. The thunderous racket brought over a crowd of curious people.

What they saw was the mild-tempered Qian Jr. beaten b.l.o.o.d.y by some thug, the popular Qian Jr. getting his store wrecked by a hoodlum lowlife.

I don’t know what happened after that: I got knocked out. What a joke. A twenty-four-year-old man getting knocked unconscious by an eighteen-year-old kid.

I was the Qian family’s only child. My uncle’s son-in-law’s second brother worked in the police station in the East District and the scoundrel was arrested on the day of the incident. My dear mother told me this when I woke up in the hospital that night.

“…wouldn’t have let you if I knew opening a book store would get you beat up…I told you not to…” My sixty-year-old ma could barely breathe through the sobbing. “It’s all your old man’s fault…making you apply for that stupid agriculture university. If only you listened to me…”

I felt guilty. This is going to be the last time that I make you worried, I promised silently.

My head still didn’t feel too well so I stayed another day.

I was on the hospital cot, drinking the dates, white fungus and lotus seed soup my mom made me and skimming through Slam Dunk.

“Hahaha!” Hanamichi Sakuragi was really adorable but I still liked Mitsui the best.

“Excuse me…” A small, skinny woman appeared by my bed. I was certain I didn’t know her. She had a very thick layer of foundation on her face which still couldn’t hide the thin creases all over her skin. She was probably close to my mom’s age. I only knew afterwards that she was only in her early forties.

“Are you Comrade Qian Jiying?”

I frowned. Apparently Jiying was the name of a famous poet from our hometown in the imperial times and my self-crowned, learned intellectual father named me after him. But I’m Qian Jiying, not Comrade Qian Jiying.

“What can I do for you?” I asked kindly.

A giant bag of bananas and apples popped out of nowhere. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m ShenBin’s mom. He shouldn’t have fought with you. I didn’t do a good job raising him. Sorry…”

So the rascal’s name is Shen Bin, I thought. I was nowhere as furious after the fight.

“I’m sorry but I don’t have anything else I could give you other than these fruits. Shen Bin’s still young. He’s only going to turn nineteen after the next New Year’s. I’d hoped that he’d amount to something. They said he started a fight in your shop and broke lots of things and even hurt you. I know I have to pay but I really don’t have any money. I’ll educate him in the future, I promise. He’s already in jail now. I just hope you can find in your heart…”

I wonder how a tiny woman like her could raise such a tough son. Honestly, I did not want to make a fuss over it too much. He was a kid after all and I was the one who started it.

“You don’t have to pay. But there’s no use in begging me. I’m not the one who arrested your son.”

The old lady puckered her lips and almost burst out in tears. I never liked seeing women cry so I hurriedly said, “Come on, it’s okay. He’ll be released in a couple of days. It’ll be fine!”

Her old, teary face made me feel so sorry for her and even a bit regretful. I wondered to myself if the rascal would learn his lesson this time.

She took out another bag after wiping off the tears on the powder. “I know he broke the videos in your store. I found these in his room. I’ll try looking again when I go–.”

I had just taken the bag from her when my ma came in like the Tasmanian devil. “How dare you show your face around here? Probably thought our sweetie’s easy to fool, didn’t you? Your thug of a son is gonna end up in jail sooner or later, I tell you. If anything happens to my son, that piece of s.h.i.t is gonna be dead meat! Now, get the h.e.l.l outta here!”

The woman left unkemptly in a hurry with her fruits.

I frowned as my mom started on me. “Don’t you be nice now. You almost got beaten to death! What are we gonna do if you died, son? Hmmph. She thinks a few apples is all it takes? How funny!”

By then, I was already regretful. I felt really sorry for Shen Bin’s mom.

I opened the bag. There were approximately forty or fifty disks in there. My entire collection.

“Don’t you be fooled by her appearance now. She used to be that little widow up the street. Tons of lovers. They say b.i.t.c.hes raise sons of b.i.t.c.hes, and they’re darn right about that. Don’t you start feeling sorry for her.”

Sigh. I guess even the kindest mother would become a witch when it came to her son.

There were other stuff in the bag aside from my disks: The Longest Nite, Young and Dangerous,Midnight Cowboy, The Sting, Sniper…even Rouge, Centre Stage, and Three Colours.

My collection had not been lying abandoned in the trash but rather, they were perfectly fine. I was quite dumbfounded.

My old lady was still grumbling, “Gotta make sure he goes behind the bars…”

“Let’s forget it.”

“But son!”

Only after my persistent pleading did my family decide to go easy on Shen Bin.

However, my brother-in-law’s second brother came back saying that the rascal had the guts to beat the living daylights out of the big fellow that was locked up with him on his second night at the detention centre, breaking three ribs, blinding one eye and almost rupturing the spleen.

I gasped out loud. My so-called injuries were nothing compare to those. Why was he so misbehaved though? He wasn’t going to get out easily after something like that.

I opened shop again in a couple of days, alive and kicking.

I had just opened for business when these little scoundrels dressed like thugs showed up at my door. “Qian! You won this time wit’ your dirty tricks! Disrespectin’ Shen Bin like that…just you wait!”

What tricks? I was puzzled

“Don’t play innocent with me. E’eryone knows what that motherf.u.c.kin’ Ol’ Wu does. You Qians sure are cold!”

Then they left after not being able to do anything in broad daylight.

I smelled something fishy so I went to ask the second brother.

He hesitantly told me after my interrogation, “We were thinking the fellow didn’t behave, plus he had beat Qian Jr. up, so, um, we put him with Old Wu ‘cause we thought, you know, but who knew he’d be that b.a.l.l.sy? Old Wu is one big guy. You should’ve seen that giant being beaten to a pulp…”

I glared at him.

“Hey buddy, your mom was the one who asked me!”

I continued to glare at him.

“’Kay, fine. I heard Old Wu’s done that kind of stuff before, but I didn’t know about it beforehand. I ain’t that wicked. I really didn’t know!”

“What kind of stuff?”

“You know, the usual. They say he did a few little boys before.” He patted me on the back after my silence. “Qian Jr., this really ain’t our fault. I only heard about it afterwards, if not I would’nt’ve–.”

“Of course,” I nodded. “It’s not your fault, brother.” Then I left.

After reporting this to the family, my old man announced, “We are at fault for–.”

But Mom interrupted before he could finish, “What’re you saying? They’re all the same—karma, I reckon! Say, you think those little punks are gonna take revenge?”

×××

I felt kind of uneasy and had trouble sleeping for the next several days. All I could think of while tossing and turning were Shen Bin’s disgruntled, black eyes and his mom’s ancient, wrinkly face. I decided to visit their home.

The Shen household was located on the only street in town that had not been upgraded yet, and consisted of three tattered brick rooms with a roof sticking out for a kitchen.

Shen Bin’s widow mom was Ding Hongmei. She used to work at the No. 1 Cotton Spinning Factory and had been a looker once upon a time. Later on, she got involved with a s.a.d.i.s.tic brute and often got beaten blue and purple. Apparently, she was rescued once and had been naked, covered with b.l.o.o.d.y burn marks on the skin and piercings on her nose, belly, v.a.g.i.n.a…

No wonder she aged so fast.

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