Chapter 8 lover(8)

Section VIII When she was old and gray-haired, she also went to the photo studio to take pictures, she went alone, with her beautiful dark red dress and her two jewelry, A long necklace hung on the chest and a jade hairpin inlaid with gold on the head.In the photo, her hair is neatly combed without any wavy wrinkles, just like a standard portrait.Wealthy locals also go to the photo studio to take pictures, but they only go once in their lives. When they see that the god of death is approaching, they think of taking a picture and taking a picture.The photographs they took were large in size, but all of the same size, all framed in gold, and always hung beside the ancestral altar.I have seen many photos of people taking pictures of the same appearance, and the resemblance is astonishing.It is not only that old people always have similar faces, but also that all photos are always edited, so that certain features of the face, even if they are still preserved, are greatly weakened and become the same, and everyone looks alike result.Their facial makeup is always modified according to the same pattern in order to last through the ages, and they always use shallow techniques to rejuvenate their image and make it younger.This is, of course, a wish shared by all human beings.This similarity in appearance, this well-dressed image will definitely put a beautiful coat on the memory they left in the family history, and at the same time show the particularity and authenticity of this souvenir.The more similar the faces, the more evidence that they were not members of the same family.In addition, all the men wear the same turban, and the women all wear the same bun tied at the back of their heads, their hair is tied tightly together, and both men and women wear the same high-collared robes.They all have the same expression, but I can still tell them apart.Mom looked exactly like them in the picture of her in the red gown.Some people think it is a solemn expression, while others think it is ordinary and without personality.

The two of them never talked about the future life event.Because the matter was settled, there was no hope of getting his father to agree to let him marry her.A father can be said to have a heart of stone, and he has no mercy for his son.The father was not kind to anyone.Among all the Chinese immigrants doing business here, this Chinese man with a platform with blue glazed tiles is the most powerful and wealthy.His assets spread as far as Sa Dec, as far as the Embankment, the Chinese capital of French Indochina.The young man on the embankment knew that the father and the girl had made the same decision, and the overall situation was fixed and irreversible.They were at least beginning to understand that just the woman's departure would separate them both, and that would be a good chance to end their relationship.They also understood that the white girl had never insisted on marrying him, that she could marry anyone, that she should be abandoned, forgotten, returned to the white man, and returned to her brother.

Ever since he was obsessed with her body, the girl no longer bothered about being thin, and, strangely, her mother no longer worried about her as in the past, it seemed that she also found that this body finally made sense , as acceptable as others.And he, the embankment's lover, thought that the white girl's development had been affected by the excessive heat.He himself was born and raised in this hot environment.He discovers that he has similarities with her too.He said that all these years she had lived under these terrible conditions had turned her into an Indochinese girl.He also said that she, like them, has slender wrists, thick and slender hair, giving people a feeling of strength and strength, especially this skin, which is washed out of the local rainwater specially reserved for women and children. .He said that compared with local women, French women's skin is harder, even rough.He also said that the meager food in the tropics, either fish or fruit, was part of the reason for the difference.In addition, the cotton and silk clothes that people wear here are always wide and bulky, not clinging to the body, so that the body is free and naked.

The embankment's lover is intoxicated by the white girl's love.Every night he took pleasure in her, wasting his time, wasting his life.He hardly talks anymore.Maybe no one will understand his thoughts, this kind of thoughts that he can't even explain clearly. He looked at her.Even with his eyes closed he was still looking at her.He breathed on her face.He closed his eyes and breathed in her exhalation, the hot air from her mouth.He is increasingly unable to distinguish the boundaries of this body. This is a different body. It is not fully formed. It is still growing in the room. It exists not only in the places he can see, but also in other places. This body stretches towards the play of death, beyond his sight. It is gentle and flexible, addicted to pleasure, like a mature man body.It's not naughty, it's obedient, and it's surprisingly quick-witted.

I watched how he treated me, how he played with me, and I never expected him to do this, even exceeding my expectations, but it was completely in line with the needs of my natural body.In this way, I became a child in his hands.For me, he also became another image.I began to realize that his skin, his whole body, also had an indescribable comfort, beyond himself.The shadow of another man may also appear in this room, this is the shadow of the young murderer, but things have not developed to this point at that time, so no image will appear before my eyes.The shadow of another young man would also appear in the room, but this shadow I knew, and sometimes it appeared in my joy.I have spoken to him, to this lover of the embankment, to the indescribable comfort of his torso, and the audacity he has displayed in the forest, in the panther-infested estuary.No matter what I say can cater to his desire, and make him possess me even more.I became his child.Every night, he just followed his children to have fun.But sometimes he would suddenly be afraid, he worried about her body, as if he had realized that she was dying, and suddenly remembered that he would lose her sooner or later.Her substance was so thin that sometimes it frightened him suddenly.He was also worried about her headaches, which often left her looking haggard, pale and lifeless, with a wet strip over her eyes.He was also worried that she would feel world-weary, and when she was depressed, she would think of her mother, thinking that she could not change the status quo, could not let her live a happy life before she closed her eyes, and could not kill those The person who caused this kind of disaster, at this time, she will suddenly howl and cry bitterly.He pressed his face to hers, wiping her tears, and he hugged her tightly, her tears and her anger fueling him with a wild lust.

He held her like holding his baby.He used the child's body as a plaything, turned her around, he used the child's body to cover his face, his mouth, his eyes.And she, she continued to let him play around.And all of a sudden, she begged him, she didn't say what she begged him to do, but he, he told her to be quiet, he yelled that he didn't want her anymore, he didn't want to make fun of her anymore , But now they are together again, imprisoned in uneasiness, and like this, they are indulging in uneasiness, tears, disappointment and happiness all day long. They were silent all night.In the big black car that took her back to boarding school, she rested her head on his shoulder.He hugged her tightly.He told her that the French steamer would soon be in port and would take her and separate them.Along the way, they were silent, and sometimes he asked the driver to drive the car to the river for a drive.Exhausted, she leaned against him and fell asleep.It was his kiss that woke her from her coma.

The lights in the hallway are blue.People can also smell a smell of burning incense, and people always burn incense at dusk.The heat was sluggish, all the windows were open, and there was not even a breath of air.I took off my shoes so as not to walk loudly, but I was relieved to know that the housemaid would not be up, since the boarding school now allowed me to come back at any time during the night.I immediately went to see Elena's bed, always a little uneasy, always worried that she would escape the boarding school during the day.she is there.Elena slept soundly.I remember it as a stubborn, even hostile slumber.A stubborn drowsiness.Her bare arms curled her head in a relaxed way.She also slept in a different position from the other girls, her legs were bent, her face could not be seen, and her pillow had been slid out of the way.I guessed that she must have been waiting for me to come back just now, and then she got angry because of waiting impatiently, so she reluctantly fell asleep like this.She must have cried just now, and then fell into the abyss of despair.I really want to wake her up so we can have a little whisper together.Because now I have nothing to say to the man on the embankment, and he doesn't talk to me anymore, and I need to hear what Hélène is asking me.She always has an incomparable kindness towards those who don't obey her.Too bad I couldn't bear to wake her up.I woke her up in the middle of the night like this once, and she couldn't get back to sleep.She got up and went out for a walk, and she did, and she ran down the stairs, through the corridor into the empty yard, and she called me as she ran, and she was so happy that no one could stop her her, and when you don't let her walk, you'll know that's what she's been waiting for.I hesitated for a while, but I still didn't think it would work, so I finally didn't wake her up.The heat inside the mosquito net was unbearable, and every time it was pulled down, it was unbearable.But I know, I just came back from the outside, I just came back from the river, and the night by the river is always cool.I'm used to it, and I lay there motionless, waiting for the heat to die down.The heat finally passed.But I've never been able to fall asleep right away, though I've never been so tired in my life.I thought about the man on the embankment.At this very moment, maybe he was drinking quietly with his driver in the nightclub next to the "Spring Water Restaurant". Whenever they were together, they always drank rice wine.Maybe he has already returned home at this moment, and has fallen asleep in his room with the light on, never saying a word to anyone.That night, I couldn't bear the thought of the man on the embankment.And I can't bear to think of Elena either.It was as if they already had a good life between them, and this life came from outside their own bodies.I seem to feel that compared with her, I am far less happy than her.Mom said: This girl will never be satisfied.I feel like my life has started playing tricks on me.I felt that I had understood this, and I had a vague idea of ​​suicide.I can't get this thought out of my life.I think I have developed a vague notion of celibacy.I also found that since I bid farewell to my childhood, since I left this "hunter" family, I am no longer alone.I will write a book and say it.This is my vision for the future, a grand picture of life unfolding in the vast desert.

I can't remember exactly how the telegram from Saigon was written.In the end, did the telegram say that my little brother had passed away, or did it say: my little brother has been recalled by God.I seem to remember that it said that the little brother was recalled by God.But one thing I remember clearly: she did not send the telegram.The little brother is dead.At first I was puzzled, but then all of a sudden, a twinge of pain came from everywhere, from the bottom of the world, and it almost swallowed me up, swept me away, I was no more, only Full of sorrow.I don't understand what this pain is all about, is it the grief that has taken over me because I lost a baby a few months ago, or is it a new pain?Now I understand that it is a new kind of pain, because my dead child died when he was born. I have never seen this newborn baby, and I have not committed suicide because of the pain I had before.

Now that the little brother is dead, everything will be buried with him. The little brother's dead body cannot feel the mood of future generations thinking about him.During his twenty-seven years of life he had concealed something haunting, but he had not been aware of it himself. I just made a mistake.The big mistake made in these few seconds affects everything in the world.The little brother will not die, but we will never see him again.While he was still alive, the immortal spirit died with him.This is also the case in today's world, which loses the concern of people and also the concern of people.People are completely wrong, and the fallacy affects everything in the world, and the shameless accumulation is beyond the heavens.

No one understands it as well as I do.Well, since I already have this understanding, and this understanding is so simple, the body of my little brother is my body, then I should die too.I am dead. People should be informed of these common senses in advance, so that they can understand that things that are immortal also perish.This has happened in the past, and it continues to happen.Let it be understood that the immortal does not stand out for its immortality, no, it never was, it is only absolute duality.It does not exist in the details of things, but only in principles.Some people can completely hide its existence, unless they don't know how to hide it.You know, it is only while it exists that life is immortal and immortality is possible.It is not a question of length of time, nor of death, and it would be wrong to say that immortality has neither beginning nor end.It should be said that it begins and ends with the demise of the spiritual being.Since it belongs to the spiritual category, it is similar to the pursuit of the wind.Look at the motionless grains of sand in the desert and the dead babies: immortality doesn't pass there, it just stops and goes around.

To the younger brother there was something immaculate and evocative about him, his image pure and incomparable.The little brother sleeps under the Nine Springs, there is no need to speak out, he has nothing to complain about, whether it is elsewhere or right here, he has nothing to complain about.He was uneducated, he never learned anything.He is not good at rhetoric, and he can barely understand some books and write a few words. Sometimes people think that he doesn't even feel pain.He is a man who knows nothing but fear. This mad love I felt for my little brother remained a deep secret to me.I don't understand why I love him so much that I even want to die with him.In fact, when it happened, I had broken up with him for ten years, and during this period, I seldom missed him.It was as if I had always liked him, always liked him, and no new relationship could reach that level.I even forgot that he had been buried under the Nine Springs forever. We seldom talked together, seldom talked about our eldest brother, nor told about our misfortune, mother's misfortune and this kind of misfortune in the countryside.We like to talk about hunting, carbine, machines and cars.He once lost his temper when his car was wrecked, and he told me about it, describing the old cars he got later.Of course, we also talk about the dangers of hunting, being swallowed by a tiger if you are not careful, and drowning in a lake if you continue to swim in the rapids.He is my little brother who is two years older than me. The wind died down, a magical light appeared under the trees, and then it began to rain.The bewitched birds screamed hoarsely. They sharpened their beaks to resist the invasion of the cold wind by screaming desperately. They opened their mouths and screamed desperately, and the sound was deafening. Those large passenger ships sailed upstream along the Saigon River. They turned off their engines and were pulled by tugboats until they reached a tributary of the Mekong River called Saigon River.Passenger ships anchor here for a week.Whenever a ship enters the port and berths on the pier, it seems that France is right in front of you.People can go on a steamer to have a French meal and dance on it.But the food there was too expensive for Mama, and besides, she didn't need to go there, unless she went with the lover on the embankment, which was all right.It's a pity he didn't want to go there because he was afraid of being seen with a white girl so young.He did not say this, but the girl knew it perfectly.In that era, in fact, it was not so long ago, that is, fifty years ago, only ships could extend in all directions, allowing you to travel around the world.At that time, there were no roads and no railways on that vast continent.There are only some ancient roads in the hundreds of kilometers or thousands of kilometers.At that time, there were several passenger ships of the French cruise line, such as the "Posos", "D'Artagnon" and "Aramis", and it was the "Three Musketeers" that connected Indochina with the French mainland. . That sea voyage lasted twenty-four days.These ocean liners are a city in themselves, with streets, bars and cafes, libraries and drawing rooms, where there are also trysts, lovers, and even weddings and weddings.A society of accidental associations formed on the ship. These social interactions are indispensable, everyone knows and will not forget, so these temporary associations become more comfortable, more easy-going, and sometimes even become a kind of irritating. Unforgettable fun.Traveling by boat can be said to be the only trip in a woman's life, especially for many women.Of course, sometimes it is the same with some men.Traveling by ship to the colonies became a real adventure of their lives.For my mother, these sea trips, along with our childhood time, were what she called "the best things in her life". Another passenger ship sets sail.It's always the same every time I set sail.Each time always carries passengers on their first voyage to sea, and they are always separated from the earth in the same pain and despair.Still, that doesn't stop men from sailing, the Jews, thinkers, and tourists who rarely make a sea voyage, and women don't let their husbands leave their homes while they stay in them.It is this family lineage, the property of this hometown, that becomes the reason for the return of the prodigal son in the future.For centuries, sea voyages have been longer and more bleak than they are today.Travel time and geographical space often become a natural direct ratio.At that time, people were used to the slow speed of human beings on land and sea, used to these delays, waiting for the sea breeze to come, waiting for the sunny day to appear, and also used to shipwrecks, scorching sun, and the merciless god of death.The white girl's cruise was already one of the last ocean liners in the world, since the development of air routes had begun in her youth.Since then, air travel has slowly made humans abandon the long journey by sea. We still went to the single dormitory on the embankment every day.As usual, he bathed me with the cold water in the jar, and then carried me to the bed.He came to me and lay down too, but he was listless and thoughtless.Although the date of my return to my country was far away, since I decided to return, he could do nothing with my body anymore.I made this decision without telling him at the time, it was too abrupt for him.His body no longer liked the departing, rebellious, disloyal body.He said: I can no longer play with you, I thought it was okay, but now I can no longer.He said he was dead.He smiled apologetically as he spoke, and said that from now on he would lose this interest forever.I asked him if he would like that.He almost laughed and said: I don't know, maybe it's the way it is now.His tenderness was all in pain.But he never spoke of the pain, he never said a word about the pain.Sometimes his cheeks quivered, and he closed his eyes and gritted his teeth.But he was always silent before the figures that appeared behind his closed eyes.It seems that he likes this pain, just as he likes me, very strongly, even willing to die, and at this moment, he likes this pain more than me.He has sometimes told me that the reason he touches me is because he knows I have the same desire, and that he always wants to look at me when the pleasure is high.He looked at me and called me like he was his child.We once made up our minds not to see each other again, but it was easier said than done, because it was impossible. Every night, I saw him waiting for me at the school gate again, still sitting in his black car, She always turns her face away because of shyness. When the time to set sail was approaching, the ship whistled three times.The long, long sound of the siren was so deafening that the whole city could hear it. In an instant, the sky over the port was blackened by black smoke.At this time, the tugboat approached the passenger ship, and then led it along the central river.When the task is completed, the tugboat releases the mooring cables and returns to its own port.At this time, the passenger ship blew its whistle again to say goodbye, and the terrible roar sounded so mysterious and desolate that one could not help crying.Not only those passengers who traveled far away, not only those who left, but even those who came to watch the excitement, those who had nothing to worry about, would also cry when they heard the sound.Then, relying on its own power, the ship slowly moved on the river.People watched for a long time its tall figure moving towards the sea.Many still stayed on the pier watching it, continuing to wave their turbans, their handkerchiefs, saying goodbye to loved ones, but their movements grew slower and more discouraged.At last the sea drowned the figure of the steamer in its crooked place.On a clear day, one can see the ship slowly disappearing into the distant horizon. She, too, cried when the ship sounded its first farewell whistle, when the gangway was hoisted, and when the tugboat began to pull the liner off the land.But she didn't let people see her tears, because he was a Chinese, and besides, she shouldn't cry goodbye to such a lover.She didn't show any sadness to her mother or her little brother either. She acted nonchalantly, as if parting was a normal thing between them.His large sedan was still parked there, long and black, with a driver in white uniform sitting in front of it.His car was parked alone a little way from the French cruise line parking lot.She recognized him from those gestures.The person standing behind was him, his image was vaguely recognizable, he stood there in a daze, without making any movements.She knew he was looking at her, and she was looking at him.When she could no longer see him, she was still looking at the black car.In the end, even the car was out of sight.The port disappeared, and then the land disappeared. Passenger ships must pass through the China Sea, the Red Sea, the Indian Ocean and the Suez Canal.In the morning, the passengers wake up.The ship was moving forward, and although there was no tremor of movement, everyone knew that the ship was moving forward, in the vast and silent sea.The Indian Ocean must first be crossed.This is the remotest and widest sea, and it borders Antarctica, and the distance between these two stops is longest, from Ceylon to Somalia.Sometimes the sea is so calm, the sky is so clear and the weather is so sunny, it's enough to forget that you are sailing in the sea.Then the whole ship came alive, and all the saloons, passages, and portholes were thrown wide open.Passengers left their stuffy cabins to sleep on the deck.