The Ten Yuan Brand

In the Beijing summer, under the vicious sun, the asphalt roads softened, making you worry about peeling off a layer of tar with your soles. Even on a day like this, in a nook near Xizhimen, a small lunchbox stall always stood its ground, unwavering.

The cook was a woman in her forties, whom the neighbors called "Quick-Hand Liu Jie." She was nimble and frank, but her brows were perpetually locked in a kind of persistent weariness, as if she had been wrestling with life, that stubborn mule, for half her existence. Her lunchboxes, ten yuan each, came with two meat dishes, two vegetable dishes, and unlimited rice. In this pricey city, they were practically a godsend for office workers and manual laborers.

Wang Xiaoshuan was one of the faithful recipients of this blessing. He worked as a minor clerk in a nearby office building, muddling through life neither well nor poorly. Every noon, like clockwork, he would stroll over to Liu Jie's place to sort out lunch. He sought the value, the convenience, and that honest-to-goodness home-style flavor.

This particular noon was absurdly hot, and Wang Xiaoshuan felt agitated along with it. Holding his phone, scrolling through endless short videos, he absent-mindedly picked at the food in his lunchbox. The braised pork was a bit greasy, the stir-fried green beans a bit old; he grumbled inwardly, and his chopsticks slowed. In the end, nearly half the box remained, mostly rice stained with greasy sauce. Feeling he really couldn't eat anymore, he got up, box in hand, and headed towards the greasy, stained trash bin nearby.

"Hey! Wait a minute!"

A clear, slightly fiery female voice lashed out like a whip at Wang Xiaoshuan's back. He froze, turned around, and saw it was Quick-Hand Liu Jie, a large ladle in one hand, the other on her hip, sweat trickling down her face, slightly yellowed by cooking fumes.

"That food, you finished?" Liu Jie's eyes were wide, fixed on the lunchbox in Wang Xiaoshuan's hand.

Wang Xiaoshuan was a bit stunned, answering subconsciously, "Huh? Fin... finished."

"Finished with so much left?" Liu Jie strode over in a few steps, pointing at the box. "This perfectly good white rice, these vegetables, you think they just blow in with the wind? Wasting as much as you ate! This little bit of food, how many people dream of it! People like you, never come back again!"

Her voice wasn't loud, but it had a piercing quality, drilling into Wang Xiaoshuan's ears like an awl. The few people around, previously engrossed in their meals, looked up, their gazes converging on his face. Wang Xiaoshuan's face flushed instantly, turning a deep purplish-red, like freshly cooked liver. He wanted to explain, to say he didn't mean it, that the heat had killed his appetite, but the words caught in his throat, blocked by something, unable to escape.

He looked at Liu Jie's face, distorted with anger, at the curious, contemptuous, or indifferent eyes of the people around him. His heart felt like an overturned bottle of five flavors – shame, grievance, anger, and a strange thread of fear, all jumbled together. Almost fleeing, he tossed the lunchbox into the bin, lowered his head, and quickly walked away from this corner that left him utterly mortified.

"Never come back again!"

Those five words, like a curse, burrowed into Wang Xiaoshuan's mind, buzzing relentlessly.

For the first few days, out of spite, he forced himself to walk two extra blocks to eat expensive and mediocre fast food from chain restaurants. But something always felt off, like something was missing. Eating a nicely packaged burger, he would remember the smoky aroma of Liu Jie's stir-fries; sipping an iced cola, he would recall the free, faintly sweet mung bean soup at her stall.

What unsettled him more was the realization that he truly seemed unable to go back to Liu Jie's stall. It wasn't that he didn't want to, but every time he reached that intersection, his feet felt leaden, refusing to take the final step. Once, he resolved to apologize to Liu Jie, even just to buy a meal and eat it properly. But as he reached the alley entrance, he saw her busy, head down, her gaze occasionally sweeping the street, sharp as a hawk's. Wang Xiaoshuan's heart clenched violently, cold sweat breaking out instantly, as if he had a guilty conscience, a criminal being watched by the aggrieved party. He fled in disarray.

Gradually, the whole affair began to feel absurd. He started having nightmares, dreaming he was standing before Liu Jie, holding the half-eaten lunchbox. Her face loomed enormous, eyes spitting fire, repeating endlessly: "Never come back again! Never!" He tried to run, but his feet were nailed to the ground. People formed a circle around him, pointing, their faces blurred, but their laughter sharp and clear.

He developed insomnia and lost his appetite. Mistakes plagued his work. Colleagues noticed something was wrong, asking what was the matter, but he just shook his head, unable to explain. He couldn't tell anyone he was trapped by a ten yuan lunchbox and the phrase "Never come back again." It sounded so ridiculous, so trivial. Yet this insignificant "crime" felt like some Kafkaesque trial – no judge, no court, yet omnipresent, suffocating him.

He even began to wonder if he truly had committed some heinous sin. Wasting food was wrong, certainly, but did it warrant a sentence of "lifelong banishment"? Or was it about more than just wasted food? Was it his casual disregard for life, for the fruits of others' labor, that had touched something deeper? Was it Liu Jie's furious roar, filled with what felt like class hatred, that had ignited some latent anxiety and unease about his own state of life buried deep within him? He didn't know.

The autumn wind arrived, bringing cooler weather. Wang Xiaoshuan occasionally passed the alley entrance and would instinctively glance inside. Liu Jie's stall was still there, bustling with people, steaming. She seemed to have completely forgotten him, still deftly wielding her large ladle, providing cheap and substantial sustenance to the city's hustling inhabitants.

Wang Xiaoshuan stood at the alley entrance, watching the rising white steam, smelling the familiar aroma of food, his heart feeling hollow. He felt like an exiled spirit, forever unable to return to the corner that had once offered him moments of solace. That phrase, "Never come back again," was like an invisible wall, and also like a heavy brand, seared deep into his heart, reminding him of that hot afternoon, of the absurd yet intensely real predicament brought about by a ten yuan lunchbox. He stood there for a long time, until the setting sun stretched his shadow long and thin, casting it like a giant question mark onto this grey, dusty world. He thought silently, perhaps some people, some places, are just like that – once you miss your chance, or rather, once you are "sentenced," you really can never go back again.