Desperate romance

Author: Lin Wenxun
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-04-01
Features: At the age of twenty-two, I was imprisoned as a death row inmate on the plateau. If there was a bang on the plateau that winter, a gush of blood spurting onto the snow, blooming a ugly red flower, that would have been me, inexplicably. My fate, the great turning point of my life, was determined by the departure time of a dilapidated passenger bus. Life or death depended on whether it was a half-hour early or late. If the bus had departed on time, I would have been completely fine, forever leaving that turbulent Red Guard Long March, especially that embarrassing "love affair incident." Back to my old nest, perhaps living peacefully for the rest of my life, and the hardships that followed would no longer exist. But the bus was delayed that day. Just this half-hour difference was destined for me to go to hell. Even if I didn’t die, I would spend my life as a wild man. Looking back, the snow that began in the evening of the first day was the will of the heavens. Our Red Guard Long March team arrived in Baicheng, and for the next few days, it was sunny. The surrounding mountains were covered in snow, the ground frozen hard, with temperatures dropping to minus twenty degrees Celsius at night. But during the day, standing on the ancient city walls in the sun, even taking off my heavy cotton coat, I didn’t feel cold. By the afternoon, I had already made up my mind to go to the station to buy a ticket. In those years, there was only one bus a week to Chengdu from Baicheng, and the ticket cost twenty-two and eight yuan. Fortunately, I had good luck and managed to get one, with forty yuan in my pocket, enough for the ticket and two days of travel. The sky was still normal. Having made up my mind to leave, my mood improved by half. The good weather made it even better. Once I had the ticket in hand, I felt a bit euphoric, as if I had already returned to Chengdu, and began to think of my father and the little Yu, who had wandered unknown. Suddenly, I noticed that Dawa’s sister, Yangjin, had a resemblance to little Yu, so I detoured to say goodbye to them. They were naturally shocked, and I couldn’t explain the truth to them either. Seeing Yangjin’s tearful eyes, I quickly shoved my portable red book, the medal on my chest, and a pen into her hands, then hurried off. Yangjin was not little Yu after all. Where was little Yu now? How was she doing? Whether she was locked up with her father in Zhaojue Temple in northern Chengdu, I didn’t know. I still had to go back and look for her slowly. I had to admit that at this point, Yangjin, Qiuping, and the so-called fellow travelers I had been with for a month were no longer in my mind. Returning to the Red Guard Reception Station at Baicheng Middle School, I saw them bustling about, tense and anxious. They looked at me coldly without greeting me, and Qiuping still only buried her head, sometimes glaring fiercely at me with the corner of her eye. My heart felt cold and I was filled with no anger. I only kept my face cold. Huiwa and General hurriedly pulled me aside and whispered that the two leaders, Yang Dezong and Li Jinchuan, had decided not to leave Baicheng as planned the next day, but to advance into the grasslands to the north, staying for a few more days before leaving. What should we do? These two little Red Guards were my "close companions," and only they knew about my decision to return to Chengdu. At this moment, I was not at all troubled. I said, "If you still want to continue the Long March together, just go with them." I would be perfectly fine here alone for the night. Wait until the bus departs at 8 a.m. tomorrow morning.