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."
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.
In the autumn of Beiping, the sky was so high, so blue. Sunlight spilled onto the grey roof tiles, warm and lazy, carrying a hint of languor. But inside Lao Liu's heart, it felt like a lead weight was pressing down, heavy, not relaxed at all.
Now, what do you make of this?
Li Hui sat behind the large desk, the hazy silhouette of this southern city visible outside her window. The steel and concrete jungle shimmered faintly in the unique misty dampness of the plum rain season. The case files spread across her desk emitted a mixed scent of paper and ink, a smell she had grown accustomed to over the past fifteen years. She was now Lawyer Li, known for her calm demeanor and rigorous logic, particularly adept at handling "minor cases" involving procedural justice. No one knew that the starting point of her chosen path stemmed from an acceptance letter that had never reached her hands.
Our place here used to have a nickname, the "Unofficial Reserve Base for the World's Toy Factory." Later, officials thought it lacked elegance and changed it in documents to the "Red Star Industrial Demonstration Zone." But privately, especially when spitting foam at the dinner table while reminiscing about the glorious past, everyone still habitually called it "Rust Town." The name fits, carrying a sense of helplessness and滄桑 (vicissitudes/weathered look) like oxidized metal. Rust Town, well, as the name implies, now only rust remains. It wasn't always like this. Back then, the town was like a hyperactive spinning top, buzzing non-stop day and night, specializing in manufacturing happiness for those blond-haired, blue-eyed kids across the ocean – plastic ones, plush ones, battery-operated ones that could sing and dance, you name it.
During that period, the world caught a fever, a fever for buying and selling. Exactly when it started, nobody could say, just like nobody can pinpoint how love or the flu suddenly arrives. Anyway, overnight, it seemed everyone had become a shrewd merchant, or at least a fervent customer. The air was no longer filled with factory fumes or the scent of lilacs in the park, but a strange odor blending the stench of money, new plastic packaging, and adrenaline. Multiple countries globally were buying, buying, buying, and selling, selling, selling in China. It sounded like an economic news headline, but in reality, it felt more like a collective sleepwalk sweeping over everything.
I, Wang Er, a fellow who considered himself still retaining a shred of conscious awareness, was muddling through life at a unit called the 'Office for the Promotion of Universal Circulation'. The name sounded impressive, but really, it was just about stamping things. Before, we stamped imported and exported salted fish, stamped thermoses bound for Siberia. Not anymore. Now, we stamp everything, as long as it can be priced. Just yesterday, I stamped an export permit for a batch of 'Bulk-Purchased Melancholy (70% new, slight existentialist tint)'. The buyer was supposedly an art collective from some Nordic country; they felt their local melancholy was too pure, lacking a certain Eastern flavor.
Old Wang stood at the entrance of the "Good Neighbor" supermarket, staring at the huge red characters "Clearance Sale" pasted on the glass door. He felt like a sodden wad of old cotton stuffed in his chest, heavy and suffocating. This supermarket, which he had run for fifteen years, ultimately couldn't withstand the impact of the flashy, 24-hour new-style chain convenience store across the street. Like a leaking old boat, it was gurgling its way to the bottom.
Wang Er from the street corner is dead.
Old Wang walked along this road every afternoon. There was nothing special about this road, much like countless others in the city, lined with buildings of moderate height housing various shops. People came and went; traffic flowed endlessly. When the sun was out, the mottled shadows of the plane trees would dapple the sidewalk, giving him an illusion of peace. Today, the sun wasn't particularly bright. The sky was somewhat overcast, and a heavy humidity hung in the air, hinting at a possible rain.