Eighty: Shutting the Door to All Visitors

After getting off the bus, I did not go home. Instead, I returned once more to the place where everything had once begun. Without the moon or stars overhead, the night sky seemed so dim, so leaden with gloom.

The crowd surged and swirled; passersby hurried along, as though each person were following the fixed course of his own life. Yet amid the tide of people, who would notice the boy on the roadside, gazing foolishly up into the night?

Sitting on the cold stone steps, my heart clutched tight with pain, I felt as though it hurt more than I could bear. Perhaps this place did not belong to me. Perhaps this was not where my soul had fallen to rest...

Before returning to school, I decided to call Lin Hui.

"Xiao Bei, don’t worry. If anything comes up, I’ll contact you as soon as possible." Lin Hui’s voice was soft, yet carried an irresistible strength.

Yes. With Lin Hui there, what did I have to worry about?

In the end, I still left, casting everything behind me. My steps did not pause even once, and I did not look back. I had resolved to cast off entirely those things from the past that I no longer wished to speak of—to leave this sorrowful city, this city packed with memories, this city that had born me and raised me. I wanted to quicken my pace, yet my steps were so slow, so heavy.

Was it reluctant attachment? Or merely a momentary unaccustomedness? I did not know, and did not want to know...

"Chen Yuan, can I stay out alone for a few days?" Chen Yuan was a classmate who shared a rented apartment with me near Student Street. Seated on the bus heading back to school, I sent him a text.

"Oh, it’s fine. Then I won’t come over these next few days." A few days earlier, through texting, Chen Yuan had already roughly learned what had happened to Lele, so he could understand how I felt at the moment.

Just as I was about to put my phone back into my pocket, it suddenly buzzed again: "Xiao Bei, I’m coming to your school today. Let’s go out and have fun tonight!" The message was from an online friend I had met during my preparatory year; she lived in the city center.

"Um, I’m not in a very good mood. Another time, maybe." I politely declined, then put my phone away and rested my head against the window, silently watching the scenery slide backward outside.

The bus crawled slowly along the winding mountain road. Once we crossed this mountain, we would be at school.

I got off at the entrance to the old district’s Student Street, did not return to the dormitory, and went straight to the rented apartment. The others who shared the place had not yet come back, and the large house stood empty and hollow. After seven days of no one living there, the furniture in the living room was already covered with a fine layer of dust, but I had no heart to clean it now.

Going into my room, I locked the door behind me, did not turn on the light, and flung myself face-first onto the bed.

Clutching a pillow, I murmured Lele’s name over and over again, yet Lele could never answer me again, could never smile at me, cry for me, or act spoiled and coquettish with me...

At home, with my parents there, I had always had some restraint, more or less. But now that I was alone, I could finally weep as wildly and unrestrainedly as I wished.

I don’t know how long I cried. When I was exhausted from it, I took from my wallet the photo strip Lele and I had taken together during summer vacation. Looking at Lele’s radiant smile in the picture, I could not help but feel another wave of bitterness in my heart.

My backpack still had the little tea dog hanging from it, the one she had given me when we went to KFC together last year, the tea dog that had stayed with Lele for an entire year. I gently took it down and brought it to my nose. It seemed that Lele’s own scent of green apples still lingered on it.

"Piggy Bei, this tea dog really suits your backpack!" In a haze, I seemed to see Lele again, fastening the tea dog to my bag. "You silly pig. When I’m not by your side, if you miss me, just pinch this tea dog, and I’ll know naturally!"

Almost unconsciously, I pinched the tea dog in my hand. Lele, I miss you. But can you feel it?

"Xiao Bei, are you back?" Footsteps suddenly sounded outside the door, and it seemed to be Yang Yang. I did not answer. I only gripped the tea dog tightly in my hand and lay curled up motionless on the bed.

The room was pitch-black, so dark I could not see my own hand before my face, yet I did not want to close my eyes. For as soon as I did, I would see Lele’s face, covered in blood...

The next morning was a microeconomics class, and the teacher took attendance every lesson. Though I was unwilling in every possible way, I still had no choice but to leave the room.

Zhang Qi was sitting on the sofa in the living room gnawing on a piece of bread, and Yang Yang was still brushing his teeth in the bathroom. When they saw me come out of the room, both of them stopped what they were doing at the same time and fixed their eyes on my hand, wrapped in bandages.

"What happened to your hand?" Both of them looked stunned.

I did not answer. I only gave them a regretful, wry smile, then turned, opened the door, and ran downstairs at full speed.

I had cried the entire night, and now, with the wind blowing against me, my eyes felt raw and painful. I made my way to the classroom almost squinting.

Because I was early, there were only a few girls scattered about in the classroom doing morning reading. Without greeting anyone, I quickly went to my seat in the back row and lay down.

Soon, classmates arrived one after another. Groups of three or five gathered together, talking excitedly about the various amusing things that had happened during the National Day holiday. I had no mood to listen, so I simply turned my head toward the window.

"Lele, are you doing well up in heaven?" Looking at the blue, blue sky, I could not help but think of Lele again. Tears once more slid shamefully from the corners of my eyes, even though I kept telling myself that men do not cry.

"Li Xiaobei, come answer my question!" Just as I was sinking helplessly into memories, the teacher suddenly called my name. I jolted back to myself and hurriedly wiped at my tears, then stood up with my head bowed.

Peanut turned instinctively to look back at me, then, as though discovering a new continent, quickly turned to the boy beside him, Xiao Lang. "Xiao Bei seems to have been crying?"

"Tch, none of your business. Why do you care so much?" Xiao Lang shoved Peanut irritably, signaling him not to meddle. Peanut pouted in frustration and lay back down on the desk.

I saw all of this. Unable to help myself, I looked at Xiao Lang with gratitude, though he did not notice.

"Li Xiaobei, can you answer?" The teacher had been waiting at the podium for a long while, yet I still had not said a word, and at last he grew somewhat impatient.

"I can’t." I kept my head bowed as if it were nailed down, afraid that if I lifted it even a little, the whole class would see how wretched I looked.

"Sit down then, and pay attention in class!" The teacher waved a hand helplessly, indicating that I should sit.

...

The tenth was Lele’s first seventh-day memorial. I bought two pure white candles from the supermarket and set up a small, makeshift memorial shrine in the corner of my room. Lele in the photograph was still smiling with that same bright happiness, but beneath the flickering candlelight, that smile looked strangely pale.

I’m sorry, Lele. Right now, this is all I can do.

The chapter was revised and completed on October 11, 2010.