Chapter 20 6.

6. During the winter vacation and Chinese New Year, several relatives bought new houses in high-rise apartments.I don’t know when it started, but the water in the Suzhou Creek suddenly became less viscous and no longer gave off a pungent stench. The shantytowns beside the river were gradually demolished on a large scale, and there were no small potholes at night without street lights. The road and low-flying bats.Of course, Sansan had long since stopped sitting on the back seat of her mother's bicycle to attend those make-up classes, her ass was so bumped that it almost split into two pieces.Now high-rise buildings spring up like mushrooms on both sides of the Suzhou Creek one after another.The saplings in the green belt were just planted, the soil was soft, and the thin trunks were wrapped in straw ropes to keep them warm. They looked empty and dilapidated, as if it was hard to imagine how the trees would be shaded after a few years.Mom soon took a fancy to a two-bedroom apartment under construction nearby.In the afternoon when the red firecracker debris had not been completely cleaned up and the smell of sulfur was still in the air, the two of them rode their bicycles one after the other to see the house.Those houses are still surrounded by scaffolding, and the outer walls of gray reinforced concrete are occasionally exposed.They walked around the construction site, and mother's hair hadn't been permed in a barber shop for a long time, and it was blown by the wind like a withered vegetable drooping on her head.The two of them chained their bikes together and walked to the embankment.The garbage pier on the opposite side of the river has not had time to be dismantled, and the flat garbage boat is moored close to the river.

My mother said: "They said that these piers will be demolished when the house is handed over, and a garden will be built opposite. In two years, the river will be cleaner, and maybe you can fish in it." Three three nodded.She stared blankly at the dark green river flowing silently, and couldn't remember where she, Astro Boy and Lin Yueyuan walked along the Suzhou Creek that summer.Where is the bridge covered with slippery moss? "In the future, there will be a large balcony facing south. It will be much more convenient to dry the quilt. Your father can also plant some roses on the balcony." Mom continued, holding her arm, her eyes shining with joy Come.

The two of them hadn't been this close for a long time.At the beginning, Sansan's arms were a little stiff, but they softened quickly.She was cold and speechless.The house will be handed over after two years.Two years was too long for her.Who knows where it will be in two years? Who knows what kind of person it will be in two years? Who knows if it will expire after two years?For her, it doesn't matter where she lives.She found sadly that everything was strange except Wanhangdu Road.Those new, hard gray houses all looked alike, and they were so impassive and majestic in groups that they could drown and crush all the old days.Which of these would she live in?Those empty windows are facing the turning mouth of Suzhou Creek, the illusion is really confusing and beautiful.

The huge billboard reads: Brilliant River View, Shanghai Paris. When Astro Boy saw the river view again, he threw his bicycle on the ground and ran away.When he ran far away, Sansan felt that the attached parts of his body were peeling off silently, and fell to the ground.He's still the same as he was when he was twelve years old.He staggered as he ran, as if he hadn't really run for a long time, and would fall to the ground at any moment.But maybe this is because he is no longer wearing the toe-toeed Huili brand sneakers, he is wearing a pair of old leather shoes he did not know where to pick up, but even so, he still ran forward vigorously, as if he was not at all I don't believe this is the river I knew so well when I was a child.What about the rubbish, those dark green water hyacinths, those greasy moss growing on the bridge piers?You have to run, you have to run out!

"Hey, you run forward. I won't wait for you to come back anymore, I'm leaving." Sansan shouted at him from behind. But apparently he couldn't hear him at all and he didn't care, and suddenly he didn't care so much if anyone was still waiting for him.This is not their Suzhou Creek, he saw it but he didn't believe it.He wanted to turn his face away and sneer at him. It was disgusting, obviously they were all cheated but there was no way to condemn and no way to retaliate.The bricks he threw with his fists smashed into the air. When he stopped, he stood next to a ginkgo sapling that had just been planted, his clothes were all open, and he turned his head and shouted to her: "Xu Sansan, they all expect me to die inside. They all think that one day I will die." Get back in there."

He spoke so provocatively and provocatively.This is him, Astro Boy!The little boy sitting in the last row of the classroom staring at everyone, everyone is his enemy.She was fascinated by this feeling, watching those strange things shed from him, as if he was still the Astro Boy who rang the doorbell of someone else's house in Yan's house and led her to run away. How will she recall the last time when she was sloppy and frightening with Astro Boy in the future? It was the first day of the last semester of high school. Sansan knew that Astro Boy would come to see her, so she ran to the bathroom before she walked out of the school gate, took off the school uniform she was wearing under the ski jacket in front of the mirror, and stuffed it into the bathroom. In the schoolbag, by the way, I also tore off the school badge that had peeled off the paint.She wished she didn't look like a fucking high school top student.She's not, she's not one of them.In fact, she had already memorized the phone number a hundred times, and several times she had already dialed but hung up in fear when she heard the polite and impatient voice of the paging lady.What is she doing, what the hell is she doing?Her heart was beating wildly when she hung up the phone.Why is there a feeling of joy that makes me want to scream from the bottom of my heart?This joy made her wake up suddenly in the early morning, and this joy caused her to be absent-minded throughout the day's placement test, wishing she could throw away the ballpoint pen and calculator and walk away.The dead parts came to life slowly, and she was ashamed and proud to feel it.She was afraid that the joy of waking up from sleep would continue. She always woke up and read the number again on the crumpled paper at the bottom of the pencil case.Her hand holding the pen would suddenly tremble.The long, damned winter is coming to an end, and what about the damned looming spring?Astro Boy stood at the school gate with his hands in his pockets, but he seemed so out of place with the little hooligans around him.His coat was blown completely open by the wind, and his nose was red from the cold, but he didn't seem to be cold at all.Even without Nikes and an Adidas zip-up, just pushing a battered Phoenix bike, his stubbornness is still striking.As a child he laughed very little, so he didn't appear to be rough and cynical like those little hooligans, just like a serious teenager.

"Come on, follow me to a place." He stepped on the bicycle without any explanation. The bicycle chain creaked loudly.It seemed to him that the evenings of sitting on the damp quilt in the attic of Yan's house playing "Contra" were just yesterday.He tried his best to pretend that most of the days had been compressed so that he couldn't see them. He was an adult but only his twelve-year-old heart was beating.Sansan hurriedly stepped on the pedal to keep up with him.He rode very fast, running red lights at all intersections without police, and the rubber tires made crazy noises when he braked suddenly, and he didn't even look back to see if Sansan behind was keeping up.As for her, she tried her best to follow behind his ass.The child looking for death, the desperate little beast, those taxi drivers rolled down their windows and yelled, and Astro Boy brushed past those crowded intersections effortlessly several times.Sansan could hear her breathing getting heavier and heavier.They crossed the Suzhou Creek along the bridge, and the evening garbage boat passed under them quietly, clinging to the river.There were many times when those mopeds and cars were blaring their horns desperately, Sansan felt like she was dying, her calf was numb, and she stepped on the pedals as if she was stepping on cotton, but she still followed closely behind him Pass those intersections.She couldn't see everything around her, only the back figure with the clothes open, as if she had lost her soul.Why can't she find her own soul once Astro Boy appears?She felt like she was dying and yet was so happy, she was exhausted and her vision was blurry but she wanted to scream.

The dead things are slowly coming to life. Astro Boy slammed on the brakes at the gate of a new residential village.He didn't get off the bicycle, but stood on tiptoe leaning his body, staring firmly and bewilderedly at the wall covered with withered creepers.This is an old new village for residents. In the evening, old men gather around the stone benches under the holly trees to play chess, and there are a few greasy roast ducks hanging on the cooked vegetable stalls.Primary school students wearing red scarves walked past in groups, their voices were loud and disturbing.It hasn't rained for a long time, the sky is a taut pale,

"Why do we come here?" Sansan asked, following Astro Boy to lean the bicycle against the corner. "Wait and you'll see. Wait, wait, wait." "Have we traveled a long way, can we go home before dark?" "Do you still have to go home and report before dark, honor student?" There was a sting in his tone. If in the past he blocked her at the toilet door and dragged her back to tease her during the exam, now he tried every means to ridicule and mock her.Those intentional words seemed to be pounding on her body with countless small fists, as if he was condemning her, but why did she feel ashamed and ashamed?She was downcast because even though she tore off the school badge, she clearly looked like a person from two worlds with him.Trivial and subtle strangeness emerges from time to time.There were times when they both looked furtively at each other, as if trying to figure out who the person was, but then scurried away when they noticed each other.Such caution is disgusting and frightening.I never knew which window came out of Jacky Cheung's song on the radio: "The sunset is drunk and the sunset is drunk, no one can hide it." Astro Boy hummed softly in Cantonese.Sansan turned her head and saw the Adam's apple on his side rolling up and down like a small walnut, the hair on his forehead was thick, the face was covered with a layer of fine fluff, and the eye sockets were moistened by the bitter winter wind.I don't know why she still remembers the scene of that day, with the music on the radio, it's like two people are acting in a movie, and many years later, she can't help but cry when she thinks of Astro Boy that day.He had never looked so peaceful, almost radiant.But even when the cold season came to an end, the sky was still getting dark in a hurry, as if the only time that really belonged to the two of them was the short dusk.It’s always like this, those dusks where it’s impossible to have fun, “Contra” has no time to kill until the end, “Stepping on Mushrooms” has no time to get the reward gold coins, “Snowman” has no time to kill all the mischievous penguins, and night falls up.The time they can forget everything and focus on having fun may be only one hour, from the hour from after school until it gets dark, sometimes shorter, only forty-five minutes.So they try to run as fast as possible, spread out and run, so that the time on the road is compressed to the shortest possible time.The heart is empty and the body is also empty. There is always this sad and lonely feeling after those rave parties. She has known it since she was a child.

"Shhh." Astro Boy suddenly grabbed Sansan's hand tightly, so tight that it hurt Sansan's tiny bones. Sansan followed Astro Boy's gaze blankly.The feeling of being unable to breathe grabbed her throat again.She gasped and couldn't tell whether it was fear or pain.The pain of the rapid beating of the heart was too much for her to bear. Who is he who is he who is he who is he who is he? The tall, thin boy wrapped in a down jacket waited until the motorcycle was completely turned off before taking the helmet off his head.They all watched with bated breath as he took the helmet off his head.For a moment, Sansan felt in a trance that she saw Lin Yueyuan.She didn't know what Lin Yueyuan looked like now, but the intense pain made her dizzy.She hated herself for always holding such expectations, hated it.

"Repeater." She exclaimed in a low voice, sad and disappointed. The boy tucked his motorcycle helmet under his arm.His cheeks were flushed by the wind, and the cell phone in his waist was still ringing desperately.He hurriedly took out his mobile phone from his trouser pocket, and walked into the corridor in three steps and two steps, as if eager to leave the cold behind.Neither of them had seen his face clearly, but there was no need to.He was almost twice as tall as he was when he was a child, and his hair was long and tied in a scrawled braid at the back of his head.He has also grown up and changed beyond recognition, but he is a repeater, he is the rotten person rolling and screaming hysterically on the ground!They all recognized him the moment he took the helmet off.In fact, the repeater at that time was just planning to be a model, and I sometimes saw him in some small commercials while sitting at the dinner table watching the news.Sansan always wanted to point it out to his parents: "That person went to the same elementary school as me." "Which one?" By the time they stopped their chopsticks and turned their heads, he had already hurried past.Sansan remembered that there was an advertisement for washing powder, and many people lined up waving clean white sheets. The repeater was standing on the left side of the first row. Because he was tall and his movements were stiff, he was particularly eye-catching.She remembered a female voice in the jingle singing, "Oh, white and white. Oh, white and white." "Let go." When Sansan pulled out her fingers from Astro Boy's hand, her skin was already white from the pinch. "That's the bastard." "Why are you looking for him?" Astro Boy stuck his hands firmly into his pockets.If there happened to be a pencil sharpener stuck in his pocket, Sansan had no doubts that he would rush into the corridor immediately and stick the pencil sharpener into the repeater's arm.He'd do it, his eyes and his trembling knees were telling him he wanted to rush down the hallway and kill the repeater right away.Sansan is too familiar with this kind of breath, but it was summer at that time, and the typhoon would wash away the city and the sky at any time, but now winter is still lingering on, freezing those enthusiasm, bad luck, and murderous aura to death.The pink scar on Astro Boy's face gleamed, but he just stuck his hands in his pockets. "He put me in the juvenile detention center. When I came out, everything changed. My dad threw away my things, my clothes, my game console, and those game cards. It's like I'm never going to come out of there again. They seem to be ready for me to die. Sometimes I feel guilty because I'm back. If I can't come back, I don't want to come back, forever Just stay there. But now I've messed up all their plans. My dad got married again, so I even have a sister now, ugly and dumb, who sleeps in the room where I'm supposed to be. I just Sleeping on the couch in the living room, she was terrified of me. She and her mother looked at me like I was a murderer. I heard her mother whispering to her in the bathroom, shit, she thought Her daughter is a flower. Shit flower. But what do you know Xu Sansan? I don't care about this, I will leave them one day. I have a plan, I will leave them all." He was so serious when he spoke , as if he had thought of everything. "What plan, what are you going to do?" "Shh, this isn't a joke, but should I trust you again?" Yeah, it's hard for her to keep a secret unless she's kept in the dark.When she was harboring a secret, she looked so distracted, with blinking eyes, so thorny and terrified that anyone could easily see her lies.He shouldn't have told her anything, he shouldn't have come to her at all.Originally, they could all become real adults numbly and sloppily, but he came to her.Even if he didn't, she would call that number one day.No one likes to be alone, and everyone hopes that they will not always cry and fall asleep alone, and every time they have a burning secret, they can't wait to tell someone.They always run into each other.They had cycled so far and he had brought her here, he had drawn her into the plan.What if she were to quit?What if she were to run away?What if she broke those vows again?Hanging on the hook for a hundred years will not change, but she is a girl who talks like fart... Forget it, she doesn't want to know this, don't drag her into this business again.She has regretted it, and she wants to cover her ears. Are we going to turn over old accounts now? It was that twelve-year-old summer full of intrigues and traps again, and they tried their best to avoid talking about that summer, wasn't it?At that time, shantytowns were still like moss in those sunny and humid corners of Shanghai, tall buildings were still wrapped in ugly scaffolding, and cranes hovered overhead all day long.They are used to the rampage of cement mixer trucks on the road in the middle of the night, and there are always disturbing sounds of pile drivers outside the windows during exams.Yes, those buildings that have just been built, like the place where Sansan lives on North Shaanxi Road, were brand new at that time, the cobblestones next to the green belt had just been paved, and the corridors still smelled of paint and white water.Now as long as you sniff your nose, you can still smell the brand-new smell that haunted the whole city at that time, the smell of fresh cement and lime powder in the air.At that time, it was very popular among middle school students in those garbage schools to run into the newly built buildings in groups after school.Those buildings are empty and unattended, and there are always footprints, ball marks and swearing everywhere on the simply plastered walls.This is their paradise.They rode bicycles and laughed and played in the bare corridors, and then climbed to the water tank on the roof and unbuttoned their pants to pee on the bustling road below.Sometimes there are lazy security guards with chunky flashlights to intimidate and chase them away, but what does it matter?They don't have to worry about having nowhere to play.Those buildings are constantly being built, and some people are driving trucks and happily living in them soon, painting off the dirty ball marks and pasting up wallpaper, while some houses are half-built and left in those empty places silently. Rotten, and weeds grow all around.They can change places with a single shot, and the reason why they are so enthusiastic is because of the fire hydrant heads installed in the corridor.Those aluminum fire hydrant heads can be taken to the scrap yard to be weighed and sold for money.In the evening, they would always rush to sell a stolen item or two on their bicycles before the recycling station closed.At that time, a large number of fire-fighting facilities were destroyed, glass was smashed, and the metal pipes of the sewer pipes were also dismantled and sold.They acted in groups, some were in charge of watching the wind and some were in charge of dismantling. The money could be exchanged for a duplicating machine, which could be pinned on the waistband of their trousers to show off in the school. In fact, many people know that Astro Boy did not succeed that day.He rode his bicycle alone to the small high-rise where the scaffolding had just been removed, and he still carried a very strong woven bag.He was not with any companions because he had no companions at all.The boys in the school were afraid of his withdrawn and irritable, or simply thought he was a little out of his mind.If he had a companion that day, he wouldn't be blocked on the roof by the police who had been staring at this empty building for several days.He stands on the tank. "I stood there not because I was scared anymore, but because I was wondering whether I should jump directly from here or not." But this is not the classroom window on the second floor of the elementary school. There are no impatiens and holly trees underneath, but a dusty concrete road. And at this moment, he actually saw a group of punks fleeing in a hurry on the construction site behind. There are figures of repeat students inside. "I saw him at a glance. He looked so innocent. The group of them went to the building before me that day. When I went there, they had already installed the fire hydrant heads on several floors, but they Hopefuls, they dropped their stuff on the ground and left, and it's all on my head. I can't see people's faces, but I remember the repeater, and the ass he was when he ran away. Damn it , why did you pick a day to go there!" "Why do you want to steal those things? You don't spend much money at all." Sansan always wanted to ask Astro Boy like this. "Because it's not interesting." "We're not interested, so what?" "My mother married a fat man in the United States that year and was going to the United States. I asked her to take me with me, but the fat man refused. He refused to pay for my plane ticket, so I thought that if I had the money, I would go to the United States. If I bought a plane ticket, I could go with my mother. At that time, I always thought that if I stayed alone with my father in the attic of Yan’s house, one day I would be beaten to death by him, or I would beat him to death .I'm afraid of that." His eyes sparkled when he said it, and his tone was slow and strange, making Sansan think that he might really be about to cry.They stopped talking, their bloated clothes rubbed against each other occasionally, and the air was damp.The forecast said warm air the next day so it was going to rain.At the police station, Atong resisted desperately and refused to admit that he had stolen the fire hydrant heads. He stood in the corner and bit his lips like a trapped animal, angry and desperate.Then his father came.That was the only time he saw his father who was always drunk and doing nothing, and he actually felt faintly happy as if he had grasped a life-saving straw.But Dad didn't listen to anything he said and kicked him hard in the stomach.His face hit the wall, and half of his front teeth fell out.At that time, I didn't feel any pain at all, but I just felt that there was a big mouthful of saliva in my mouth, and when I spit it on the ground with a bah sound, I saw that all the spit out was blood. "He didn't listen to anything I said at all. He never believed me at all. Do you know that feeling? No matter what you try, no one will believe you." Astro Boy said excitedly, There was no wind, but he was trembling, "At that time, I thought that as long as I could leave that villain man, I could go anywhere, and it didn't matter if I went to the juvenile prison, as long as I never saw him again, I could do whatever I wanted." Sansan knows, she knows that this kind of effort is all in vain and no one will care about the feeling of believing it.Those grown-ups would never hear their cries for help, and just let them fend for themselves in their childhood.They're stuck there completely unknown.Others have moved forward, and they seem to be staying in other people's grassy memories. "Do you want revenge on repeat students?" "I can't forgive him. It's not the same as being beaten by him when I was a child." So did Sansan forgive Astro Boy?Whether she hated him or didn't hate him anymore, she couldn't tell now.But in this short period of time, she didn't think about those bad things in school anymore, and she didn't think about the dodgy eyes of her parents at the dinner table when they wanted to ask her about her future plans.She didn't know what she was going to do in the future, and her idle heart was really ashamed to be known by them.No one knew that Astro Boy was back, even his parents didn't find any clues from her.She still goes home on time every day, sometimes after dark because she has to attend the so-called math cram school in the school.Her grades are like a dying fish that cannot turn over.She always stays in her room, turns the volume of the radio to the minimum, and has a collection of math problems in front of her all day long, or she is just reciting the entries in the history book, and silently recites a lot of small print in the notes. Over and over again, there are so many mock test papers that it seems like unused straw paper.She is eager to get rid of all this, but she still can't find the direction of the future like a headless chicken. No one knew that the Astro Boy was back.She was maddened to be alone with this fiery secret.Sometimes Astro Boy does not show up at the school gate for several days in a row, and sometimes she has just arrived at school in the morning but has already seen the presents stuffed in the table.She has successively received a Sony brand CD player, a pink-cased Motorola brand digital pager, and a pair of Nike brand sneakers with snow-white laces.She bought the sneakers one size too small, and she couldn't wear them, so she wrapped them in old newspapers and hid them in a storage box under the bed until she was thrown away by her mother along with other sundries when she moved again. The CD player has followed her for the longest time.She insisted on using this machine throughout college, and then everyone else started using those fashionable digital players, but she was always a stuffy girl who hated the trendy, and she always carried the machine in her school bag with all kinds of The rolled-up novel book was repeatedly rubbed, and the varnish on the edge was peeled off.One record she often put in her schoolbag that year was "To the Faithful Past" by the Cranberries.Later, the Walkman really didn't work, and I had to tap hard with my fingers or it didn't even work.As for the Motorola pager, it was always hidden in the small pocket of the schoolbag.Sansan never told anyone this number, only Astro Boy knew it, so every time she thought that it might vibrate suddenly, Sansan was frightened out of her wits, but it never rang again.Every time Sansan secretly took it out of her schoolbag and looked at the flashing letters on the LCD screen, she secretly wondered why its battery hadn't run out.She never took it out until its battery was really exhausted and the LCD screen was inexplicably cracked.