Chapter 3 novella old cloud three

one She heard the dead leaves "rustling" on the roof and on the ground, and she heard the crackling sound of the reed stems in her body.She hadn't had a bowel movement for a week, maybe everything she ate turned into reeds sticking out of her belly.She drank water from a glass jar on the table, and she had to keep drinking, or the reed would catch fire and burn her.For a moment she opened her mouth, and a burnt smell came out of her mouth. She exhaled heavily, and all of a sudden smoke came out of her mouth, with some sparks in it. "You must drink some water." The shadow said from the window.

She drank the whole glass jar of water, and went to open the door.The shadow floated in, and there was a scent of sunflowers. "You smell like sunflowers," she said, turning her back to him. "That's right, I was thinking about some distant things just now. A row of sunflowers was planted on a long hillside, and spring water flowed at the foot of the hill. Because I was thinking about those things, I smelled like sunflowers. You are also imagining You must have smelled that, it's not real." "I have to keep drinking water or I'll burn to death." She poured another full glass jar of water on the table. "Something's wrong inside me."

"I've given up on those efforts," he said embarrassedly, "You're so accurate, I'm nothing at last. I crawl around against the walls and shit in my crotch. Often it's late, my shadow It was stretched on the ground for a long, long time, and I started to cry." "That's right," she gazed at him thoughtfully, and his image became more and more blurred in her eyes, "Look at me, how peaceful I am. I am not stimulated by the outside world, and my troubles are different , something went wrong inside me. I had to keep drinking water, so sweet. Somewhere in the sun outside, cicadas chirping on the branches, monotonous and peaceful. It's autumn, isn't it in the woods Is it boring enough to burn?"

"You taped up all the cracks, and I still hear the reed stalks crackling and popping inside you. Is it true that you haven't had a bowel movement in a week?" "Not only that, I don't even sweat. I used to get up from the bed in sweat. A little cricket I fed in the crock died yesterday, and it hasn't grown up yet. Maybe The crickets in this house don't grow big. I didn't notice it before, it's a pity. You have a daughter, what's the matter?" "I'm also surprised by this. I close my eyes here and think about it, but I can't imagine what she looks like. You want to say that she can't exist at all, because I am also a floating thing, right?"

"There was a blood-red sun hanging by the edge of the wood, it was terribly red. I happened to go there to see it, and my temples on both sides were swollen and painful. The sparrows were noisy above my head, and the dead leaves kept falling. , landed on my head and shoulders. A man walked by the road, spit at me angrily, and stepped heavily on the side of the concrete road, making a loud bang." "I went there at the same time. I was on the other side of the woods, and I stood until the sun went down. Then the crickets chirped vigorously, and the surrounding vegetation swayed as if alive, and my whole body glowed. Those crickets , maybe the last batch."

As they lay there, they heard the autumn wind rushing across the roofs, heard a child hitting a stone with a slingshot on the tiles, heard the last little cricket groaning in the crock.They hugged each other in fear, and then separated in disgust. "Your T-shirt smells of sweat in the armpits." "The undershirt was changed this morning!" "Maybe, but I smell it. You said it was a sweet smell. Maybe you were wrong. It's just a sour smell." "But I love to say it, and something has to be said." "Yes, I also like to say, maybe we all made a mistake, or maybe we made a mistake on purpose, so there is something to say. For example, when you came just now, you smelled like sunflowers. Let's just talk about this sunflower, but there are none of those, as you know."

"My father-in-law instigated his daughter to keep stealing things from the house to her natal family. They thought I didn't know, like acting." "Actually, you don't care at all." "I pretended not to see through their tricks and acted angry. Sometimes when I saw the strange appearance of the old man teasing my daughter, I really wanted to hide and laugh for a while. Yesterday my daughter came to me and told me that she hated her mother to death. Can't stand it anymore. She puts pressure on her all day long, hides mice under her pillow before bed, steals and burns her letters to friends, and makes her dress like a beggar so that when she goes out, she Just keep an eye on her to see if she is flirting with someone, which makes her ashamed of others. Instead, she brags to her colleagues, saying that her daughter is working hard and will have a big future soon. The daughter also said that everything in the house is Her mother and grandfather colluded to get it out."

"what do you say?" "Me? I will never be fooled! I bulged my eyes and shouted: Get out! She was so frightened that she was scared out of her wits, and it took a long time before she said aggrievedly: I came to inform you, but you yelled at me. Who Telling you to tell me?! I said aggressively, doing this kind of espionage! I learned this trick at a young age. She glanced at me in horror and ran away. Sure enough, at night, my wife lost her temper. Said that I suspected she was a thief! I rushed to the room where my daughter slept, messed around on her bed for a while, and found a cardboard box with half a cat's tail in it. I threw the cat's tail at my daughter's face, and she suddenly Convulsions! These people are crazy."

"You make it sound like you're serious. You said you were standing on the other side of the woods at the same time? You saw something." "While I stood there, I saw a long column of smoke, the whole city was shaking in red light, and the air was crackling. Something, stumbling through the mud, had a crack in its back, dark red There was a long trail of blood." "The sky is full of red light?" "The red light in the sky made me dizzy, and I thought to myself that the thing might not be able to climb it, and that the nearest protruding rock would throw it on its back. Where was it going?"

"Where is it going?" she echoed. The wind blew the curtains open, and the fine, white dust on the table was blown away by the wind, flying all over the room.The cold water in the glass jar jingled.They held down the blanket so it wouldn't fly into the air.An airplane was coming, humming heavily, as if frozen over their heads.The wind brought to their ears the voices of the two men speaking, sometimes distant, sometimes close. "Everything of value is in the well behind the house, old friend." A sweet voice coaxed, "You'll be rich overnight if you can borrow the pump. How long have you waited, I Sometimes I'm afraid you'll sneak up and cut off my head."

"You're totally mistaken. I don't want to get rich. I just want what's mine. You're always making things out of nothing, telling people stories." Another voice said stiffly. "Why not get rich? A man should be ambitious. When I was young, the idea of ​​finding a brick of gold always tempted me. Then I went to rob graves. On those nights, the little fir tree hoarsely said Screaming, will-o'-the-wisps floating around you like falling stars, countless black shadows haunting those chaotic mounds, I saw that golden brick, it was shining under the ground... For these years, every night you They used a syringe to extract my daughter's bone marrow, put it in a glass bottle at the foot of the bed, and soaked it in centipedes. As soon as my daughter took a bath, you poured the contents of the bottle into the tub, and you completely broke her. You and I make friends and think I'm completely in the dark about these things, but my daughter comes to me every day and tells me what you're up to, and she's crying afterward. You're doing this because you can't get money from me Do it, right?" "I want to tell my mother about your slander against me, and let you experience how powerful she is. She is not easy to mess with. She spits in one place every night and can drown you. Your family is a conspiracy Man, your daughter went crazy long before she married me, and I, an honest man, didn't see it, bah! Think about it, she has been secretly raising crickets and centipedes in the house for eight years, it's really nasty. My day Worrying day and night, constantly buying insecticides, and fighting these poisonous insects for eight years, I almost lost my mind. Eight years of youth! The best time of my life! My God! You can now Go and have a look, there has long been a bug nest, and if you sleep all night, the bugs will eat you down to nothing but your skeleton." "Don't make me laugh. Eight years of youth? The best time of your life? Who are you pretending to be? Aren't you ashamed? My daughter tells me about you every day, and sometimes wakes me up in the middle of the night to tell about you crime. If I taught you what she said, you might have nightmares and die of fright..." The footsteps of the two men gradually faded away and disappeared.Two big flies rushed into the mosquito net and kept circling around, trying to bite their faces, but they couldn't get rid of them.He stood up ruefully, turned his sweaty back toward her, and began to put on his T-shirt.The undershirt was crumpled and a pockmarked moth stuck to it. He shook it violently in fear, and the moth fell to the ground.She stared at his narrow, sweaty back, imagining that her eyes had turned into a moth, and then hiccupped twice, reached for the glass jar, and drank a full drink.When she put down the glass jar, she heard his footsteps coming down the steps.There was a sunken semicircle on the pillow he slept on. She picked it up and sniffed it, and there was a sour smell of sweat.She threw the pillow to the corner of the wall and fell asleep again.Someone urinated in the ditch behind, and the sound of "crackling" rang out unscrupulously, a long pee.She went to the window and looked out, and saw the T-shirt. He was buttoning the front of his trousers nonchalantly and blowing his nose.She quickly dodged to the side and hid.He heard him yawning loudly, and at the same time, he could see from the window pane that the seams of his sweatshirt were stretched open, exposing the black hair in his armpits.Then she closed her eyes and tried her best to sink into a burning imagination. In her pictures, there was always a grown man in a duffel coat, who was generous at one moment, and spoke some beautiful words softly at another moment. , kept talking until her ears buzzed.It was already dusk, and the setting sun shone dimly on the window panes, and many bugs were crawling around on them, as if some kind of rally was being held.Somewhere in the distance there was a funeral procession, and an old woman howled comically in a drawn-out voice, a nasty imitation of mourning.There are always countless small voices sounding in the evening, and there is a commotion.Behind it all, is the imminent imminence of an overwhelming, irresistible destruction.Once, she tried humming an old tune at dusk, and it froze on her lips like icicles.She opened her eyes and scanned the room, felt the firmness of the iron grille, and said "Hello" to the man next door.The man turned around in amazement, and examined the woman standing behind the gray glass for a long time.A confident sneer crept across the corner of her mouth.She draped the blanket over her body and started running wildly around the house.The thread blanket floated in the air, making an angry "whoosh".The moths on the ceiling flew down in terror, and were knocked to the ground by the blanket again, struggling for death.Panting heavily, she caught a glimpse of many festering tongues in the wardrobe mirror as she paused.She was afraid of the dim sunset light on the window pane, that yellow streak, which hurt her eyes very much.She covered the glass with a dark blanket, but sporadic spots of light still came through. "I don't want to eat stewed pork ribs today, can you come up with something new? For example, fried radish with chili or something." The man next door said. "I can't get enough of stewed ribs," replied the woman, with sarcasm in her voice, "it would be even tastier if I added more pieces of meat. I can't imagine you hating stewed ribs, it's only a madman." That's why I thought so. Perhaps you're out of your wits, poor man." two She opened a corner of the curtain, looked gloomyly at the few people outside, then tried to pull the iron fence a few times, made a presumptuous grimace at them, and lowered the curtain. "Unless the sun comes out in the west!" she called defiantly from the room. The four people outside the door were stunned for a moment, and then rushed forward to beat the door together, until the whole hut trembled.Suddenly, as if they had made an appointment, the four of them stopped together and looked at each other. "We can't fight her." After a long silence, the old Kuang finally said in frustration, "All the doors and windows are nailed with iron bars. She instigated me to do it beforehand. It turns out that she had such despicable intentions a long time ago. She's always cheating on me." She staggered ahead.The moisture in her body could not be drained out all the time, which made her whole body feel heavy, her skin was very stretched and uncomfortable, and it was also difficult to bend and stretch her hands and legs.She always took diuretic medicine, and she was still taking it when she got up early this morning. The doctor had warned her many times not to take it continuously, but she was really uncomfortable. He wanted to catch up with her, his slender legs trembling, his thin shadow hesitantly overlapped with her huge black shadow, and then separated.He could see that she was suffering from puffiness, her old white face trembling with excitement. "So she lied to us all." When he was walking beside her, he said, "It's a historical misunderstanding, and now she's giving us a blow!" She was startled, as if she was about to stop, but then changed her mind and walked with him in silence. "What do you think? Isn't this a shame? What will people think? What will happen to our reputation outside? Never expected! Isn't everything over now? Huh?" He said happily Rubbing his chest. "I'm going to destroy that hut," she said through her teeth.He could smell her smell of an old body. "The two of us are going to unite." He announced without hesitation, then glanced around, and began to chirp mysteriously: "First of all, we must find out her motives, what motivated her to close herself in the hut Here, isolated from the world? This is really a delicate question. I have some clues, and these clues are related to that rogue son-in-law. I wonder if you have noticed that every night, he walks up and down the street, collecting passers-by The spittle left behind was packed in a briefcase. One day he quarreled with me and threatened to drown me with the spittle he collected! Since then, I can’t sleep well, and my calves keep cramping.” She moved her eyes to him, and there was a hint of warmth in her eyes, but every wrinkle on her face was full of gloomy breath.Panting, she lifted her rocky legs vigorously, twisted her lips in pain and said, "I'm like a big piece of rotten meat that has sucked up dirty water." When they stepped into the dusty old house, they heard the limestone from the ceiling falling down in every room, and the rats racing in the room.He was sitting in the carboxyl cup of milk again, playing with the auntie, looking for roundabouts, and remonstrating at the tomb. Then the ringing sounded scary, hollow and long, a total of twelve rings. "The clock is always deceiving now," she said, with a sneer on her face. "Everything in the house is against me. I opened the window one day, and the wind blew in the smell of moss on the wall Every piece of furniture was covered with that smell. When the sun was setting on the patio, I started nailing the sparrows to the wall. It didn't work out very well, and the feathers were flying everywhere. What did you just say? What's going on with her trick? I can tell you that her goal is only me. She wants to ruin my reputation, just like she always thinks about. No one can guess what her plan is, but I know very well But. I was standing outside the window, and she was grinding her teeth in the tent, and she bit me, do you remember? I almost died that time. Maybe you want to dine with me? For a long time, I don't Cooking, I have been eating instant noodles bought from the store. They said my swelling is due to lack of vitamins. I was strong for a while, and I could have competed with her to the end, but now I completely collapsed because she wanted to That's the trick. Do you see the dark spots on my face? I won't live long. If there is a thunderstorm tonight, I must go and see the condition of the tree..." A heavy, muffled sound came from under the rotting floorboards, shaking the dust to its feet.He jumped up from his seat, his face turned pale, and his voice was choked in his throat: "what sound?" "Stone mill," she answered in a low voice. "Great, ghastly monsters that grind and crush everything day and night. Don't be afraid, just get used to it. Look at these mice, they're used to it too." It was already afternoon, and the light in the room dimmed.They talked so much intermittently that their throats became hoarse, and the outlines of each other's faces became blurred, floating in the air as if severed from the neck.The wall clock on the wall rang every half hour.When the clock strikes, their thoughts are interrupted, and then they start again with difficulty and painstaking effort.At last they fell into a restless silence, and their heads fell as heavy as rocks upon their necks.At that moment a sparrow came in through the hole in the rotten screen, made a half-circle in the room, and darted under the bed, making furtive noises there. "A sparrow gets in through that eye every day. There's my mother's ashes urn under the bed." Her voice trembled, and she breathed a sigh of relief, as if she was about to stand up and look for something. "Sparrows come into the room! How can you allow such unreasonable things? There are such scary ghosts everywhere, stone mills! Sparrows! Maybe there are wandering corpses? You have survived to this day, this thing That alone gives me goosebumps." "I pissed shit into an old wine glass yesterday, threw two bugs in it, and hiccupped all night." She smiled as she lost herself in the memory. He jumped up as if bitten by a dog flea, and ran out staggeringly. "You should die!" he shouted over his shoulder. The huge stone mill turned.The old woman had a frozen smile on her face. "Mom, we're in trouble!" She stared at him sternly, and her eyes pierced him through like two awls.The pigeons cooed, and the flowers from the plucking cotton factory floated past the window like dense groups of moths.She looked at him with contempt, solemnly picked up the spit box, and spit into it forcefully. "I used to be a little girl." "Yes, Mom." "I have a lump in my chest. It has been growing for ten years. Recently, an abscess has developed in it. It hurts like a throbbing pain. When I hear you talking to me, I feel so uncomfortable that I lose my balance mentally. Don't you Talking to me easily is not good for my nerves. I have a suggestion, how about we nail the door in the middle and go in and out through the door of our own room? In this way, we can prevent each other from disturbing each other and keep our hearts calm." "Yes, Mom." He walked out with his back bent.She saw his trouser belt fall from the hem of his clothes. One night not long ago, she was having a dream of catching locusts, when suddenly a thunderclap in the dream woke her up.She turned on the light, and heard a second, a third... She put on her coat and walked towards her son's room, and saw him curled up like a meat ball, and the thunder came from inside that trembling meat ball What came out: "Boom, boom..." All night, she paced up and down the cinder road outside the window, her feet "chattering" and her chest moaning furiously. "Who?" A blind fortune teller raised his dark eyes at her. "A ghost." She replied savagely. It was not until dawn that the thunder gradually subsided. But the next night, everything happened again.At first it was a dream of locusts, and then woke up again... She strode into her son's room and shook him violently awake. "It's raining a lot, Mom." He said in a daze, "I was catching locusts in the field when there was a sudden thunder, and then it rained heavily." She listened dumbfounded to his dream, and then, glanced at the door connecting the two rooms, and understood.It turned out that his dream entered her room through that door, and then entered her body. That door became her heart disease from that day on. He leaned against the crack of the door and listened to the movement in the next room. In the evening after the door was closed, the white-haired beggar came. With one hand in his bosom to catch lice, he said loudly, "Why is this room so stuffy?" Then he stared at him and bowed three times. He bowed and sat down on the edge of the bed. "I'm going to sleep with you tonight," he added, taking off his shoes.He smelled of rats. "Mother! Mother..." he whispered terrifiedly, pacing around the room, but the door was sealed. He murmured and complained all night.The bed was very narrow, and the old man's stinky feet stuck out to his mouth from time to time, and the lice attacked him non-stop. "Why don't you turn off the light?" Mother said majestically from the next door. "Mom, there's a person here..." The old man suddenly kicked him with all his strength, and it just hit his vital part, and he almost fainted from the pain. I heard my mother curse viciously, and soon there was a snoring sound.She must have slept soundly that night.The blind fortune-teller came again and knocked on her window a few times, but there was no response from inside. Yet he never had a dream.The yellow light shone on the old man's face, his long white hair spread out in all directions, like some arrows, his face was hideous and hideous.He squeezed him to the side of the bed, and clamped him with his thin withered legs. Many gray scales fell from his body, and they were all over the place.The yellow light was shining, and there was a hidden evil in the house.When it was almost dawn, the old man got out of bed and limped out. "Mom! Mom..." He knocked on the door, his voice was as thin as a baby's. When the sun was sinking from the glazed-tiled roof and the wind was blowing mournfully in the air, the old man came again.Still carrying the long rag bag, he sat on the bed and took off his shoes as soon as he entered the room. The rag bag moved mysteriously. "What's inside?" "cobra." Crazy, scary night, snake pokes its head out of the bag. Wrapped in a blanket, he stuck to the door and waited all night.His nostrils were filled with boils the size of rice grains. "We can't fight her," he said mournfully, going around to the door over there, grabbing his mother's sleeve, "she's going to do a miracle, and all the doors are nailed with iron bars, and I nailed them myself." "Speech!" She spit into the spit box, and closed the door with a "bang" in front of him. Now she sleeps deeply every night.Her son was alone on the other side of the wall catching locusts. On the night of the thunderstorm, he stood outside the hut under the mulberry tree under an oilcloth umbrella.The room was pitch black.Through the window he heard a heavy breathing inside that reminded him of a smoking chimney.He climbed up the window and looked in through the flash of lightning, and saw that she was drinking the water in the glass jug with her head up. Sure enough, two thick smoke spiraled out from her dilated nostrils. "Is that a big spider hanging on the window?" She asked in a mocking tone from inside, and then hummed strangely, and actually hummed a song.The song was hummed and hummed, long and monotonous, and it kept talking about a blind, beardless white cat, and about a baby whose thumb was bitten off by the cat, and it was bloody and horrible. "Why don't you turn off the lights?" "I'm afraid, Mom." "Seeing the light coming from the crack in the wall, I mistook it for a fire in your room. Take care of your soul." "Don't leave me, mother, I'm crawling and crawling in the fields, and the locusts are biting my legs full of holes." three He poured a casserole of stewed ribs on the doorstep.When Mulan set the tableware and asked him to eat, he silently walked over to pick up the casserole, and splashed the ribs on the steps with a "bang!" cleanly. He sat down, looked at his wife's mocking eyes, and felt like vomiting. "A dead bird fell through a hole in the roof next door to the ceiling. How could it die if no one shot it," she said nonchalantly. She went out, and Ma Laowu walked in with a smile. "No insecticide," he said hastily. "Is that so?" He glanced at him in disbelief, pretended to sit close to him on the edge of the bed, and whispered into his ear: "Today I sat on the armchair in the house and thought about it for a whole day. In the morning, I don't know what kind of relationship you have with me? You are my neighbor and friend, right? I often feel that you and I have a very old, very old relationship. In the womb, you and I were determined to be close to each other. The first day you moved in, I looked at you very familiar. That day there was a fire cloud, and I was chasing a dozen or so roosters I raised , all of a sudden you came, poor gray and blue and blue. I felt a very kind feeling in my heart, like a sweet paste. And you, you don't understand, you think I'm Haunting you? I have a tumor in my crotch, look, here, I know you're going to gloat, but the doctor said it's okay. Let me tell you, so you don't feel like you're liberated. It's It must be fine, the doctor promised. You and I depend on each other, and this was decided in the mother's womb." He stood up, looked around again and again as if he had lost something, and then left resentfully.But when he walked out of the room, the pants fell down again.Ma Laowu's assault on him has become more and more unbearable recently. Yesterday he grabbed him in the street, put his stinky face in front of him and kissed him a few times, then jumped away, laughing loudly.He once again told the onlookers that he would reveal his private secrets to the public.At that time, his face was ashen, and his soul was frightened.However, at this moment, he didn't feel liberated. He stared blankly at his back, and saw his trousers falling down, revealing his thighs like chopping wood and the black hair between his crotch (he obviously let the trousers fall down on purpose. ), feeling as if he had eaten rat poison.He's not at all gleeful, he's smoking like a skinny cat about to be poisoned. "Where did your glasses go?" The director patted him on the shoulder and said, "Oh, so you are fooling around! You did it so cleverly! Comrades, look, this is really a strange social phenomenon! This man , He sits here every day, what is going on? Once upon a time, I had a colleague who sat in the office during the day and robbed graves at night, without anyone noticing... Ha!" Old Liu headed closer to him and sniffed a few times, shook his head suspiciously and muttered, "There's something wrong, extremely wrong... What's wrong with this man? He's not going mad, is he?" He heard the "jingling" sound of the woman next door pouring water from the glass bottle, and the sound of "gudong gudong" in her throat.He remembered what they had seen in the woods they had talked about, and he felt hot and painful all over his body.Those were the things he was trying to forget, the things he was willing to get rid of completely.Ma Laowu's move completely crushed him. When his pants fell down, his whole body twisted like an earthworm.He had heard of intestinal perforation. Could he have intestinal perforation himself? "The old man was sent to the hospital." Mu Lan stared at him and farted a few times. "Who?" "Who else. He also left a message to the neighbors, saying that you must not let you know about his hospitalization. They are going to amputate his legs. What is going on between you? The neighbors are already talking about it, Saying that you met him was like a mouse meeting a cat, and that it's doubtful that you're a man, because no one has seen it with their own eyes, so there's no way to prove it..." "I've got a perforated bowel," he said, then fell to the ground and gasped. "How much time has passed since then!" The woman's voice hissed through the cracks in the wall, "Have you noticed? The leaves are completely withered, and when you step on them, they immediately shatter into dust. On the day it rained, I dreamed that its roots swelled and split. Why did it drink so hard? Now all the water has evaporated. The fire started from the inside. All turned into charcoal again. I opened the curtains this morning, and saw green smoke curling up from the top of the tree, and the branches were painfully opened, very open. That fire is a false fire, a dark fire, and there will never be bright sparks... ... At noon yesterday, Lao Kuang dreamed of the grape trellis under the tree, as soon as he came, I smelled his body, and immediately guessed what his dream was, and he was very annoyed because of this." "If you wait a little longer, what will happen?" He refuted her in his heart. "Ma Lao Wu is about to turn into a ball of meat." His wife's voice was like a fly buzzing in her ears, "Think about it, such a ball is rolling around on the ground, rolling around, why are you afraid of him?" ?" "How fast my windows and doors are nailed! How safe I am now! They have come, and come every night, but what can be done? To walk to and fro in vain outside the window, dreaming of unfulfilled ideas. The sun rises, My heart is pounding in my chest, I'm going to keep the curtains shut, they say I'm a mouse, they're right, I do like to hide in dark places and gnaw on furniture, and my teeth I once sharpened it very sharply. The old man said that he wanted to poison me with rat poison, but he just thought about it. He has no guts at all. He is a roundworm. Intestines, very snuggly on there. Maybe one day his mother will suck him out, it's funny to think of him being pushed out of his mother's anus." Her voice was getting weaker day by day, but the ragged blanket was screaming more and more fiercely every day. Mulan raised her head, pretending to be listening, and then hissed and said, "That woman is finished. I wonder how she can manage to keep quiet all day long? I leaned against the wall and listened." , can't hear a slight sound, it's been like that for a long time. A few times I thought she was dead, but the lights came on again in the middle of the night. Did you notice that the lights didn't come on last night?" "You should write this down in your little notebook." "what do you mean?" "What do I mean? I can't remember the meaning of what I was going to say, and I ended up saying something I didn't understand. I'm always thinking about something I don't want to do. For example, just now, I was wondering if we Build a cistern in the back to raise fish, and I wondered if the wall would burst open, and the snake's head would come out of it, I was obsessed with these thoughts all day long, it was so hard, it made me suffer from neurosis Weakness. You are asleep, but I keep my eyes open, listening to the sound of bugs chewing clothes in the closet, day and night." As soon as the wife walked away, the father-in-law's red nose came in through the window again.Of course, they were in collusion. "Did you think I was in cahoots with her?" He wrinkled his nose comically. "You're mistaken, son-in-law. I've always hated her. Every time you quarrel, I wish you could kill her." I'll hide behind the door and try hard for you secretly. But you don't dare, why are you so weak. Every time I come back to get something, she will make a fuss and call me a thief, but you are not at all. Don't know what's going on. I took things from here and went home, and she stopped me on the way, forced me to share with her, pay her at a reduced price, and once quarreled, and pressed my head into the mud. She has Many lovers, she brought her lover to my house to sleep with her, and forced my old man to stand outside the door to help her watch, even if it rained heavily. Clearly, no matter what the situation is, I can't escape my old eyes. For example, I know all about your troubles. The person you fear most is Ma Laowu, who always makes a fool of you in the street..." "I want to kill you!" He suddenly jumped up and grabbed the old man's collar, his eyes straightened. "Shh! What's the matter with you?! Huh?" He shook his hand hard, "I'm sorry, I'm leaving, what am I talking about? What do you expect from an idiot?" After twelve o'clock, the two ghosts came again, pacing up and down in the moonlight, making the dead leaves rustle painfully.Through the window he heard his weary whisper: "On the way here, one of my legs sank into a deep mud pit, and I couldn't pull it out. Something bit my calf, and it hurt like a needle prick. A newborn litter of rats in this house Grown up again, do you hear their scurrying footsteps? We're like two wolves in the wilderness, aren't we?" "Just now I got up from the bed and couldn't lift my feet. The diuretics made me suffer. These days and nights, every half o'clock I heard the wall clock on the wall beating crazily. Now the gears in it It's rusted, it's about to bite, and it's this dying struggle that terrifies me." "We are all like this. I didn't sleep yesterday. I have been waiting for something to happen. I saw many ice hooks floating in the night air. A cat sighed like a human in the corner, stepping, stepping, stepping."踏踏……数不清的小偷在窗外钻来钻去。奇怪，我们怎么能活得如此长久，我们不是早就垮了吗？" "我的头发是怎么掉的你清楚吗？那个秋天老是落雨，到处湿漉漉的，我坐在摇椅里读报，她像猫一样溜进来了。我有一种预感似的打了一个寒战，这当儿她闪电一样跳起来在我头皮上啄了一下，然后逃跑了。从那天起我的头发就大块地脱落，头皮全部坏死了。你摸一摸这树，像是烧着了一般烫手……对啦，我的全部灾难正是从那个秋天开始的，那时所有椅子上的油漆都坏了，一坐上去裤子就被紧紧地粘住，脚板也老出汗，鞋子里又冷又潮，脚一伸进去全身都肉麻得不行。" 那两人呻吟着，痛苦地踩响着地面："踏--踏--踏--踏……" 他在床上抽着风，被单像鞭子一样抽打在他赤裸的背脊上，他学会了像蛇一样蠕动。 清晨，他的全身肿得紧绷绷的，僵硬难受。 Four 她的一条腿像被钉在床上似的不能动弹了。昨天她烧好了水到浴室去洗澡，因为常年不打扫，浴室的地面溜溜滑滑，她一进去就摔倒在水泥地上了。当时她听见左腿里面有什么东西发出瓷器破碎的声音，那声音很细弱，但是她听到了。她用手撑起来，爬回卧室，和着粘糊糊的有腐烂味儿的衣服倒在床上。现在死亡从她的伤腿那里开始了，她等着，看见它不断地向她的上半身蔓延过来。麻雀一只又一只地从纱窗的破洞里钻进来，猖狂地在半明半暗中飞来飞去。她用尚能活动自如的手在床上摸索着枕头，向这些中了魔的小东西投去。外面也许正出着大太阳吧？屋顶上的瓦不是被晒得"喳喳"作响吗？石磨在地板底下发出空洞干涩的声音，她将死在太阳天里，她的死正如这座阴森的老屋一样黑暗，她终将与这老屋融为一体。壁上的老挂钟最后一次敲响是在昨天夜里，那是一次疯狂的、混乱的敲打，钟的内部发生了不可思议的爆炸，其结果是钟面上的玻璃碎成了好几块。现在它永久地沉默了，带着被毁坏了的死亡的遗容漠然瞪视着床上的她。她的身体从伤腿那儿正在开始腐烂，那气味和浴室里多年来的气味一模一样，她恍然大悟，原来好多年以前，死亡就已经到来了。她挣扎着想要脱掉这件在浴室里跌脏了的衣服，然而办不到，衣服紧紧地巴在她身上，与她的皮肤不可分割，那气味也已渗透到她身体内部的器官里面去了，这件衣服将跟着她一道死亡。床底下的骨灰坛子抵着了她的背脊，像冰块一样袭人。她母亲的死亡也是发生在这间卧室里，在最后的日子里，她的躯体也是在这个床上慢慢消融掉的。她记得她老是抱怨那只挂钟的声音，说一下一下就敲在她的心脏上，但是谁都认为她是神经错乱，没人理会她的话。她死于心脏破裂，她临终的那种怨恨表情至今留在她的脑子里。她想痛哭，她的泪腺堵塞，喉咙里发出近似小猫叫的怪声音。她早已忘了哭的方法了。昨天夜里，她和她的前夫突然跳起来，拼着命用头部朝那棵树的树干撞去，后来两人一齐摔倒在地。女儿房里的灯亮了起来，那灯光是古怪的酱油色，他们从深色窗帘的隙缝里看见了她木乃伊似的身体，她全身一丝不挂，灰白的皮肤上长着许多绿的斑点，斑点上似乎还有很长的毫毛。 "外面有两条饿狼。"女儿鄙夷地说，"那孩子完蛋了，瞎眼猫最后一口咬断了他的颈脖。" "那真是一个伤心的日子， 瘦弱的金银花纷纷飘落在地……" 她一停下来，嘴唇立刻冻僵了，眉毛上也长起了白霜。她划燃一根火柴，吻着那火苗，口里哈出寒冷的白气。火苗熄灭了，她似乎冻得更厉害了，全身硬邦邦的。她找来许多报纸，在地上堆成一大堆，用火柴点燃，让那火苗舔着她的胸膛、背后。火苗越蹿越高，她的身体也越来越柔软、灵活，皮肤泛出玫瑰的红色，鼻孔里冒出烟和火星，眼睛里燃着火，恐怖地睁得很大很大。当火苗几乎舔到了天花板的时候，借着晃动的亮光，她看见前夫像一摊蜡一样融化着，越来越矮下去，头部痉挛地一伸一伸，悲惨地打着呃逆，眼珠渐渐收缩为两个细小的白点。"我的脑血管破裂了……"他可怜地哼了一声，吐出一口黑糊糊的东西。 她的光光的头皮痒得厉害，她使劲去抓，直到抓出了血。她忘不了她失去头发的那件事。那个湿漉漉的秋天，树上的枯叶红得像要滴血，墙壁上渗出黑水。她坐在摇椅里面，惶惶不可终日……然而石磨再一次响起来了，干涩刺耳，震得墙上的石灰纷纷剥落，两只受惊的麻雀被天花板撞伤，破布一样坠落在地，床底的骨灰坛子在跳跃，死人在坛内艰难地辗转。有什么东西落入两片磨盘之间，发出脆弱的一响，像是一声轻微的啜泣，很快又被无情的噪音吞没了。 在街上，前夫紧紧地跟着她，用阴谋家的眼光反复打量她，表情沉重地说："我们老成什么样子了啊！" 她的眼光从浮肿的眼缝后面挣扎出来看着他那顶有窟窿的帽子，浑身打着冷战说："你记得我们活了多久了么？" "我怎么也记不住，我的脑子早就坏了。这些日子，窗外树上的枯叶一直不肯放过我，沙沙沙，沙沙沙……我们活了多久了？" "我梦见过一些事，全是与那个雨天有关的……我一下台阶就滑倒了。" 她的眼光摇摆不定，像一只风筝那样在他脸上掠过。天上出着太阳，光线太强，她失去了最后一点气力，风筝回到了她的眼眶里。 "我眼前一片漆黑。"她诉着苦，扶住了电线杆，"我很快就要瞎了。我真后悔，我把它们用得太苦了。" "谁？"他大吃一惊。 "我的眼睛呗。" "也许有那么一天，你从你的房子里走出来，踱到天井里，那时天上飘着细雨，一只猫儿蹲在天井的墙角里哀哀地哭，于是你说：够了。好，一切都会结束。你回到屋里，马上入睡了。" 一列火车在远处奔驰而过，悠长地叫着，然后是轮子擦在铁轨上的声音，一节又一节车厢，一节又一节…… "你怎么如此肯定？"她生气地说，"正好相反，根本不可能有什么结束。它们就在我的神经里，挤得满满的，只在做噩梦的时候一点一点钻出来。我记不得这有多久了，反正一切都不会结束。我照过了X光，肾脏里面全是小石子，我一弯腰，里面就哗啦作响。" 他沮丧地瘪了瘪嘴巴，似乎就要哭起来。"啊。一直到死！一直到死！"他绝望地惊叹道，"沙沙沙，沙沙沙……我的梦里也充满了那个声音。从前在黎明，我老听见一个人在煤渣路上踱步，原来那人也受着这种可怕的折磨。他不得不踱来踱去，踱来踱去，一直到挪不动脚步，于是末日来临了。万一我们活得很长久？？" 她匆匆地要赶到前面去，他拽住她的衣袖，苦苦地哀求着："再说一点什么吧，再说一点什么吧，我心慌得发抖。" 他的手指缝里渗出许多粘液来，像胶水一样巴在她的袖子上，甩也甩不掉。他的鼻孔、眼角也开始流出那种黄色的粘液。他唏嘘着，还在说个不停。太阳从寺院的屋顶上沉下去了，空中刮着不吉祥的风。她看出来，他一点也不想死，他唠叨不停的原因正是怕死，他对自己的小命如此珍惜这件事，使她感到十分惊骇。他的手指在她衣袖上抽搐着，活像几条丑陋的泥鳅。 "我看不清你的嘴脸。"她开始说。 "说下去，说下去！" "我跟你说过了头发的事，还有一件事是你不知道的。" "说下去。" "那是关于被我钉在墙上的麻雀的事。" "好极了。" "在黑暗里，麻雀在墙上叽叫着，扑腾起来，口中流出一滴滴黑血。我把头从被褥里探出来，开始呕吐，我吐出的东西的气味和我浴室里的气味一模一样，月亮照着纱窗，窗棂苦苦地呻吟。有一个东西在天井里走来走去，像是一只狗，麻雀们立刻沉默了。在西头那间小杂屋里，天花板上又剥落了一块石灰，一只老鼠飞快地从屋当中穿过，跑到厨房里去了。" "有一天夜里，我用钥匙开开了你的大门，在天井里走来走去，一直到天亮。我没有看见麻雀，因为那天没有月亮，四周一片漆黑。" "当时我正在呕吐，月光照在纱窗上。"她恶狠狠地一摇头，"你闻到一种刺鼻的气味了吗？" "周围那么黑，我就像掉进了一个细颈磁瓶的底部。我呼吸不到足够的氧气，只好大张着嘴，像一条憋坏了的鱼。" 石磨缓缓地转，越来越阴沉，越来越杀气腾腾，麻雀在被碾碎前发出的惨叫，隐没在暴怒的、压抑的雷声里。 隔壁房里的天花板整个地塌下来了，她闻到一股刺鼻的石灰味。一只雀子"啪"地一声掉在她的被褥上，还拼命地扑腾了一阵才死。 她听见在远处的什么地方惊雷劈倒了一棵大树。 ending 她还在梦中，就已经闻到了很浓的焦木味儿，她梦见抽屉里的蛋糕全都化成了油光闪亮的臭虫。她撑起来，用最后一点干肉喂一只母鼠。她把干肉扔在床底下，倾听它"嘎吱嘎吱"的咬啮声。父母昨天没有来，也许就因为这个，她被虫牙折磨着。每隔一点钟，她就往床底下扔一小块干肉，让那只老鼠咬出响声，借以减轻神经的剧痛。到天明，干肉全部扔完了，牙痛也慢慢减轻，这时她忽然记起那两人昨夜没来，觉得诧异。大树是在清晨被雷劈倒的，滚滚的浓烟冲天而起，里面夹着通红的火星。现在它倒在地上，内部全部烧空了。隔壁的男人和女人一齐走了出来，到那零乱地散在地上的枝条中去寻找从前挂在树干上的一面镜子。两个人都把屁股撅得高高的，浮肿的嘴脸几乎凑到了地面，畏缩地用两个指头拣出那些踱了水银的碎玻璃片。她从窗帘后面打量这一对，听见发僵的脚尖在地上跺来跺去，看见紫胀的手指伸到口里含着，眼里溢着痛苦的泪水。一夜之间，男人的头发全部脱光了，苍白的头皮令人作呕。隔着窗子，她隐约地闻见了熟悉的汗酸味儿，就是他称作"甜味儿"的那种气味。烧完报纸以后，再也没有什么可烧的了，虽然外面出着大太阳，骨头却像泡在冰水里，早上起来几乎全身都冻僵了，必须用毛巾发了疯地擦才能让腿子弯转来，不然就像干竹子，一动就"啪啪"乱响。她不敢用力出气，一用力，鼻尖就出现冰花，六角形的、边缘很锐利的冰花，将嘴唇都割出血来。大柜上的镜子已经用一匹黑布遮住了，好久以来她就不愿照镜子。那一天她突然觉得身上的衣裳宽荡荡的，她剥下衣裳一看，才发现自己的身子已经变得像干鱼那么薄，胸腔和腹腔几乎是透明的，对着光亮，可以隐约看出纤细的芦杆密密地排列着。她用指头敲一敲，里面发出空洞的响声："嘣嘣嘣的嘣！"她拿起玻璃罐从水缸里舀出最后一点发黑的水，仰头一饮而尽，她清楚地看见涓涓的细流从胸腔流到腹腔，然后不可思议地消失不见了。她已有一个多月没有尿。老鼠终于丢弃了肉块，拖着沉重的身子回到洞里去了。她像一条干鱼一样在粗毛毯底下发着抖，"嚓嚓嚓嚓！"地擦得毛毯响个不停。南风从瓦缝里灌进来了，毛毯鼓满了风，裹着她一起飘离床铺，在半空中悬了一会儿，然后又"啪！"地一声落回床上。南风里有股腥味，她一闻到那股味脑子里就出现野兔的幻象，它们总是躲在很深的草丛里。萎缩症已经蔓延到下肢，很快她就要下不了床了。她算了一算，她已经两个月零二十天没吃任何东西了。因为这个，她的肠胃渐渐从体内消失。现在她拍一拍肚子，那只是一块硬而薄的透明的东西，里面除了一些芦秆的阴影外空无所有。很久以来，她就分不出白天和黑夜，她完全是按照内心的感觉来划分日子的。照她算来，她把自己封闭在房子里已经有三年零四个月了。在这段时间里，粉虫吃掉了一整把藤椅，只剩下一堆筋络留在墙角；没有喷杀虫剂，蟋蟀却全部冻死了，满地僵硬的尸体；水缸里长满了一种绿色的小虫子，她在喝水时将它们喝进了肚子；一个早上醒来，她发现她的线毯朽成了一堆烂布，用指头一点那布就成了灰；房子中央好久以来就在漏雨，不久就形成了一个小水洼，天一晴，水洼里蹦出几只小蛤蟆。她的腿子里面发出干竹子的裂响，她拖着脚步在房子里走了一圈，看来看去地看了一遍，然后用一根麻绳束起她那一头老鼠色的长发，打开抽屉，找出一瓶从前使用过的甘油，将干裂开叉的指头轮流伸进去浸泡，直到指头重新弥合，然后她小心地上了床，盖好毛毯，决心不再动挪了。她的眼光穿透墙壁，看见那男人将身体摆成极其难受的姿势，在他的长统套鞋里面，长满了滑溜溜的青苔，那些瘦骨伶仃的脚趾全冻成了青色，发疯地抽搐，他极力要站稳，脚板在巨大的鞋子底部滑来滑去。"所有的碎片都烧焦了……它的有花纹的背上渗出陌生的向日葵的味儿，泥沙割破了暴出的眼珠，忽然，漫天红光，泥浆里翻腾着泡沫，那就像一个真正的结局……哦，哦！怎么回事啊？"他咯着血，身体慢慢地倾斜，向铺满了腐叶的地上倒去。她的眼光变得那样深邃，她看见了母亲住的老公馆，那上面爬满了一种绿色的毛毛虫。在一叶纱窗上面，有一个很大的破洞，麻雀从破洞里鱼贯而入。一阵南风刮来，毛虫纷纷从墙壁上掉落地面，被无数蚂蚁袭击着。在一只破烂的木桶下面有一双开裂的木板拖鞋，她当小姑娘的时候穿的拖鞋，现在那上面奇怪地长着一排木耳。父亲在天井里摸索着滑溜溜的墙壁绕圈子，指甲深深地抠进青苔里面。他的双眼患了白内障，从他脸上神气看出，他根本不认为自己在兜圈子，而是觉得自己在沿着一条笔直的，黑暗的通道不断地前行。他在天井里已经走了三天三夜了。她看不到母亲，但是她能够听见她的声音从破棉絮里隐约传来，那声音就仿佛母亲在咀嚼自己的舌头，痛得直打哆嗦。父亲听见了母亲的呻吟，一丝笑意埋藏在他深刻的皱纹里面，他扶着墙走得更起劲了，简直像在疯跑，他的手指甲里渗出一滴一滴的血珠，脚板底长满了鸡眼。"妈妈也许会死掉的，"她听见自己的声音从天井的墙缝里钻出来，那声音稚嫩，带着热切的企望，"要是她死了，这院子里就会爬满毛毛虫。"但是父亲听不见她的声音，父亲的耳朵已经中了魔，他在听母亲的呻吟，一些遥远的模糊的呼唤传到他耳朵里来，他的面色豁然开朗，全身的神经跃跃欲试，白发可笑地往脑后飞扬。墙上的青苔被他不断地抠下，纷纷掉落在地，他还在跑--朝着臆想中的通道。她听见石磨碾碎了母亲的肢体，惨烈的呼叫也被分裂了，七零八落的，那"喀嚓"的一声大约是母亲的头盖骨。石磨转动，尸体成了稀薄的一层混合胶状物，从磨盘边缘慢慢地流下。当南风将血的腥味送到小屋里来的时候，她看到了死亡的临近。 "母亲……"她忽然觉得嗓子眼里有种不习惯的感觉，于是异想天开地想来哭一哭。她憋足了劲，口里发出一种拙劣可笑的模仿。 在天井里，她的父亲一边跑一边从口里吐出泥鳅来。 当天傍晚，更善无在回家的时候看见被截了肢的麻老五坐在破藤椅上，紧握两个拳头向他嚎叫着。他在夜里梦见了荆棘，他赤身裸体扑倒在荆棘上面，浑身抽搐着，慢慢地进入了永久的睡眠。 1984年，长沙迎宾路