Four in the morning in New York, like an ink-soaked sponge, damp, cold, and heavy. The halos of streetlights diffused in the thin mist, barely outlining a long, winding queue snaking alongside Fifth Avenue. It wasn't a line for relief supplies, nor for some celebrity autograph session, but to snag a "Hummingbird" brand camera from faraway China.
Beijing, this massive crucible that consumes dreams while forging others, often stages real stories stranger than fiction, seemingly out of the blue. Lin Wei is one of the seemingly glamorous characters in this play.
When I got the call, I was debating whether to eat dinner at the malatang joint downstairs, the one likely using gutter oil, or go home and boil myself a bland bowl of instant noodles. On the other end, my mother's voice sounded like it had been sanded down – rough, dry, carrying an unnatural calm. She said, "Your brother... he's gone."
Wang Fang felt that the past dozen years or so were like a compressed biscuit, all the flavor, nutrition, and expectation tightly pressed upon her son Xiao Jun's soon-to-be-revealed Gaokao score. To be precise, they were pressed upon the two words: "Peking University."
我们镇上，有个叫王二的。这名字，普普通通，像路边随便一棵不大起眼的榆树。王二的人，也跟名字差不多，中等个子，面皮白净，平日里话不多，见了人微微点个头，笑一笑，露出一口整齐的白牙。他在镇农技站上班，管些花花草草，看看虫子，日子过得不咸不淡。
Lao Ma felt he was getting a bit out of touch. Retired at home, brewing a pot of strong tea, flipping through the newspaper, taking a stroll – life was supposed to be quite pleasant. But he couldn't ignore his precious granddaughter, Xiao Hua'er, who just started primary school this year. This Xiao Hua'er, though small, had a lively mind, always muttering about something called "Labubu"—a foreign name that sounded like a tongue-twister to Lao Ma.
When K woke up, he felt something wasn't quite right, but he couldn't put his finger on it. The sky outside the window was the usual dreary grey, like the expressionless facades of the buildings he passed on his way to work every day. He reached for the phone on his nightstand, an action as natural as brushing his teeth each morning. Today, however, the phone felt somehow different. Beneath the cold glass screen, something seemed to be vibrating faintly, continuously—not like a notification, but more like... breathing?
10:37 AM, Wednesday. Sunlight attempted to penetrate the thick glass curtain wall of the office building, ultimately dissolving into a uniform, characterless light that spread across the grey carpet of the 'Quantum Leap Solutions Inc.' open-plan office. The air was filled with the smell of caffeine, printer toner, and an indescribable metallic tang called 'efficiency'. I, codenamed K, like a silent screw embedded in a corner of this vast machine, my fingers moving across the keyboard as if performing some ancient, unquestionable ritual.
Then, Tanaka collapsed.
Old Wang felt he needed some noise, the deafening kind. Not the eternal hum of printers and keyboards weaving together in the office, nor the lukewarm background noise of his wife's chatter mixed with TV commercials at home. He needed the kind of colossal sound that could shake the soul from the body, a rock concert—the louder, the better.
South Town's mornings are damp. Especially in April, when the willows by the river have just sprouted tender, goose-yellow buds, the mist hangs like a thin veil on the treetops and drifts into the windows facing the river.