Chapter 87

Lin Yuewei shot up out of bed. “What?!”

For a moment, she almost wondered if she’d lost her memory, or if she’d simply been too busy and forgotten this part of it.

Gu Yanqiu said, “You didn’t lose your memory; I just never figured out how to tell you.”

It had been not long after Mr. Liu found the hometown of Gu Yanqiu’s mother, Shen Huaiyu, in Yangqing Village; that was during the period when Lin Yuewei was in closed training. Gu Yanqiu had gone to N City to see her, and the day after she returned, she received Mr. Liu’s call.

Mr. Liu was used to all kinds of bizarre cases, and with the times changing so much, he was no longer surprised by something like Shen Huaiyu’s situation.

Mr. Liu said, “I’ve found it, and I’ve also tracked down several elders who were in Yangqing Village back then; one of them is even a relative of the Shen family. Do you want to come by at a time you choose, and I’ll explain everything in detail, or should I give you a brief rundown over the phone first?”

Gu Yanqiu was silent for a long time. That familiar unease seized her again. She said, “Send me the address. I’ll go this weekend.”

Gu Yanqiu wasn’t afraid of much, but she hated being left with only part of the picture. Since she couldn’t fly there immediately, she pushed back the moment she’d learn the truth by a few days.

“That weekend?” Lin Yuewei recalled the messages Gu Yanqiu had sent her those days. Her head had been full of acting, so she couldn’t remember. She scrolled back through their chat logs; aside from a few good mornings and good nights, it was just asking whether she’d eaten. Nothing was any different from any other day.

Lin Yuewei said unhappily, “If you knew something, why didn’t you tell me?”

Gu Yanqiu said, “It was pretty much what I expected, but for you, it might be an incredibly unbelievable result.”

“What unbelievable result? Tell me.”

After more than a week to ease into it, Gu Yanqiu had already mostly digested it, so she told Lin Yuewei everything Mr. Liu had found, along with some of the conclusions she herself had once suspected.

Gu Yanqiu said, “Do you remember that day Gu Feiquan came to me about a collaboration, and before we went to the movies that night, you blurted something out?”

“I remember.”

What Lin Yuewei had said was: Have you ever considered the possibility that your mother knew about He Songjun and her son while she was still alive, and that there was some kind of connection between them?

Lin Yuewei narrowed her eyes. “So that line…”

Gu Yanqiu said, “I thought it made a lot of sense, so when I got home that night, I didn’t sleep at all. Based on that possibility, I worked backward through a whole chain of outcomes. I found that once you accept that premise, a lot of things stop being so complicated. Why was my father so anxious to marry He Songjun? Could it have been my mother’s dying wish? Gu Feiquan told me that once, he saw my father crying in the middle of the night in front of my mother’s belongings. I don’t think he loved He Songjun. Even if it was guilt, my father was a businessman, and a successful one at that, with both status and wealth. If you set aside the fact that I’m his daughter and look at it from an outsider’s perspective, everything he did was stupid. There’s only one word for it: unnecessary. There was no need to go that far; no need to make himself so reprehensible.

“I followed that thread and worked backward. Then why would my mother want him to marry He Songjun? First, he really did owe He Songjun; second, my mother didn’t love my father, didn’t care, or else she loved him too much, enough not to care that he had another woman, and even to let him make up for his past wrongs by remarrying someone else soon after she died.”

Lin Yuewei: “……”

Gu Yanqiu asked, “Which of those two possibilities do you think is more likely?”

Lin Yuewei didn’t dare say it aloud, but she already had her answer.

The first seemed more likely. The second—if you truly loved someone, you would never do something like that, unless Shen Huaiyu was some self-sacrificing saint. If she really were a saint, why didn’t she step aside from the position of Mrs. Gu the moment she learned He Songjun existed, instead of waiting until after her death? Gu Huai immediately remarrying someone else also indirectly showed just how strong Shen Huaiyu’s dying wish must have been.

Lin Yuewei didn’t know whether such a person even existed in this world. In any case, she certainly wasn’t one. If she found out Gu Yanqiu had a mistress, she’d slap her first, then make her leave with nothing and get as far away as possible—preferably poor and miserable for the rest of her life.

Gu Yanqiu said calmly, “I think it was the first one. My mother didn’t love my father.”

Lin Yuewei didn’t feel qualified to comment on family matters, so she only gave a soft “Mm” to show she was still listening and that Gu Yanqiu should continue.

Gu Yanqiu said, “There are three pieces of evidence, but none of them are conclusive; most of it is conjecture. First, what I just told you: she was very likely the one who pushed my father to marry He Songjun. Second, based on Gu Feiquan’s account, he saw my mother when he was a student, so there’s a high chance my mother knew him, and naturally she may have known about He Songjun and her son long ago. Third, my impression of my mother over all these years: she was a very… to put it in modern terms, Buddhist person. Not fake Buddhism, the kind that ‘doesn’t get anything anyway so might as well let it be,’ but truly someone who didn’t care about anything. A person living in this world should, at least to some degree, have desires; I do, and you do too.”

A pure little foal suddenly twisted its ankle in Lin Yuewei’s mind; she shifted position and straightened her wandering thoughts.

Gu Yanqiu said, “But she didn’t. I never saw her become emotionally agitated over that matter. When Dad’s company made its first big pile of money, or when financing succeeded, or when I got into a good school—things like that—my dad was over the moon, while my mother… it’s not that she was indifferent, she would also be happy for us, but it felt like I and my father were one family, and she was another; even her happiness stayed at a distance.

“She had no private life of her own, no family, no friends. She wasn’t like your mother, who had girlfriends to keep in touch with, was affectionate with her husband, and would even occasionally go on a honeymoon. My father took her out to play before; I heard him invite her several times, but she usually only agreed once out of ten times. Do you think that’s love?

“Also, if one of these guesses were a coincidence, could so many coincidences still be coincidences? At the very least, there’s a seventy or eighty percent chance this conclusion is true.”

A question rose in Lin Yuewei’s mind. She was still wondering whether to ask it when Gu Yanqiu thought of it too.

“If she didn’t love my father, then who did she love?”

“She might not have loved anyone.”

“She really didn’t love anyone.”

“What?” Lin Yuewei was startled by her offhand tone. That was her mother, wasn’t it? Why had she suddenly become so disrespectful?

“The dead are like a lamp going out. Besides, talking about whether she loved anyone or not is too illusory, isn’t it?” Gu Yanqiu seemed to have tacked on the sentence at the end.

“…Yes.” Lin Yuewei thought there should still be something else.

Before she could work it out, Gu Yanqiu said, “Do you remember my grandmother? The last time she fell out of her wheelchair.”

“I remember.”

“Do you remember what we were doing then?”

“What were we doing?”

“Think back.”

Lin Yuewei narrowed her eyes and recalled it. At the time, Gu Yanqiu had gone into the inner room to look for the photo album; she had stayed outside to keep the old lady company. Then Gu Yanqiu came out, and just as she was walking over to her, before she’d even managed to say more than a couple of words, Old Lady Gao fell nearby.

“Doing what…” Lin Yuewei murmured. The scene flashed through her mind again and again, then suddenly inspiration struck. “Could it be because of the two of us?”

“I can’t think of any other reason.”

“Why?”

“I was wondering whether she mistook us for someone else, or if she’d once seen this exact scene happen before her eyes and it left a deep psychological shadow.” Gu Yanqiu said, “Also, you said that after my grandmother fell, she muttered a few broken words.”

“‘Not, in, dad.’ Those three.”

“The only thing we can basically be sure of is that the ‘dad’ should refer to my grandfather, who has already passed away. The third word is hard to guess, but once you think in that direction, the first two become obvious.”

Lin Yuewei had a flash of understanding and said calmly, “Can’t be together.”

“Same as what I thought.”

“In Gao County, Cheng Yong said he saw my mother go looking for my grandmother, but my grandmother drove her out; there were tear tracks on her face. The director at the nursing home said my mother would visit my grandmother once every half year. When things were good, they were very good, but most of the time she would anger the old lady, who would lash out with her hands at the slightest provocation. I could never understand what kind of deep hatred could turn mother and daughter into enemies. In a woman’s mind, who are the most important people?”

“Her husband and her children.”

“Yes; her husband and her children. My grandfather died, and no one knows how. Cheng Yong asked, but my grandmother kept silent about it. She was tight-lipped about her dead husband and never mentioned her daughter who had gone out to live elsewhere. What reason could there be? One day, after her daughter came home, the mother flew into a rage, refused to acknowledge her, and drove her out of the house. What reason do you think there might be?”

“Your grandfather’s death had something to do with your mother?” Lin Yuewei frowned. Aside from that, she couldn’t think of any other connection. Both were her closest loved ones; giving up either one would be unbearable. Refusing to acknowledge both of them—either the husband and daughter had stood on the same side and done something that enraged her, or one of them died because of the other, or a large part of it was because of the other. If it were the first possibility, the old lady would never have kept Gu Yanqiu’s grandfather’s portrait in the house and worshipped it every day.

Gu Yanqiu didn’t answer that question. Instead, she asked another: “What do you think could make a mother hold a grudge for more than twenty years, unable to let it go, reacting so strongly to even the slightest disturbance? Why was she so resolute when she said ‘can’t be together’? She moved to Gao County when she was already in her fifties; why would she take such a huge risk and leave her hometown at that age? From the life she later ended up living, her leaving home seems more like being forced out.”

Thinking back to Gu Yanqiu’s earlier remark that Old Lady Gao had reacted so strongly because she saw the two of them appear before her at the same time, then...

Lin Yuewei’s pupils suddenly contracted.

Could it be...

That pair of young girls from Gao County surfaced in her mind at the same moment.

—I have a girlfriend too, but my family doesn’t agree with us being together.

—It’s been two years since same-sex marriage was legalized, and they’re still stuck in old ways, saying that men and women together is only natural, but women with women is immoral and goes against human ethics. They say if you die like that, you won’t be able to face your ancestors.

Gu Yanqiu let out a long breath. “All of that was just my guess before.”

Lin Yuewei waited for what came next.

Gu Yanqiu said, “The things Mr. Liu found told me those weren’t guesses; they were facts. Apart from the matter of He Songjun and her son, which still hasn’t made progress, everything else is true.”

So Gu Yanqiu had gone to Yangqing Village back then—now it belonged to some prefecture-level city, and Yangqing Village was long gone. Times had changed, so it was very hard to investigate, but things that had happened always left traces.

Mr. Liu found one of Shen Huaiyu’s paternal uncles, who was also one of Old Lady Gao’s paternal cousins; in other words, Gu Yanqiu’s third great-uncle. Thirty years back, brothers in the countryside all lived in the same village; they heard each other’s dogs bark and roosters crow, and if anything happened at one household, the whole village knew.

The third great-uncle was over seventy now. He wore dentures, and because all his children were promising and had brought him to the city, he was living quite comfortably, full-faced and rosy-cheeked.

The first time he saw Gu Yanqiu, he stared at her for a long while before sighing and saying one word: “Like.”

He took a couple of draws on his old pipe and said again, “Really like.”

Gu Yanqiu said, “Third Great-Uncle.”

The third great-uncle answered with an “Ah,” then said, “You look just like your mother; the same kind of beauty.” His cloudy old eyes narrowed, and with a nostalgic look he recalled some old stories. “Back then, Xiaoyu—your mother—was known as the beauty of ten miles and eight villages. She was clearly a country girl, but whether it was her skin or her looks, she seemed like a city girl. When she was just thirteen or fourteen, suitors nearly wore out our doorstep.”

“My eldest brother, your grandfather, his name was Shen He. He grabbed a shoulder pole and drove all the suitors out. My sister-in-law stood at the door with her hands on her hips and cursed them out: ‘Are none of you ashamed? How many times do I have to say it? My girl is going to study and go to university; we’re not in a hurry for her to get married. All of you get lost.’”

Gu Yanqiu looked a little confused.

The third great-uncle explained, “You don’t know; this is just how it is around here. If you don’t make things clear and say them harshly, there’ll only be more trouble later. The two of them drove away one wave after another, but they were like cockroaches that wouldn’t die. Xiaoyu would go to school with a whole string of young men trailing behind her, claiming they were escorting her for protection; who didn’t know what was really on their minds?

“My eldest brother investigated every one of those boys, then went to their parents to educate them. If that didn’t work, he’d just pick up the shoulder pole and start hitting them, cursing as he went: ‘I’ll teach you to not know your place; I’ll teach you to not know your place, you rotten boy, stay away from my daughter.’ Later, he even made Xiaoyu her own bottle of chili spray, the kind you could spray. Whenever she saw some boy with bad intentions, she’d spray him.”

A trace of a smile appeared on Gu Yanqiu’s face. She knew nothing of her mother’s past or these relatives, but through the third great-uncle’s words a vivid scene formed in her mind.

Her mother really hadn’t had it easy growing up; her parents had worried themselves sick.

The third great-uncle smiled with narrowed eyes. “Xiaoyu was ruthless too. She kept that bottle of chili spray with her and sprayed whoever came near her, showing no mercy at all. And those were all half-grown boys; every household had work to do, didn’t they? The ones who loafed around all day would see that and know enough to back off. You can’t go through life without shame, can you?”

Lin Yuewei smiled along with him, but another thread of doubt rose in her heart: the Xiaoyu he described seemed vastly different from the Shen Huaiyu she knew, so was that because of what happened later?

“Xiaoyu lived up to expectations and got into university; she was the first high school graduate in our village, the first university student, and the first to get into a top university. Back then, university wasn’t nearly as easy to get into as it is now; anyone who got in had a hard time of it. Our whole village went from house to house hanging lanterns and decorating, and my eldest brother’s family even put on a huge banquet. It was a great joy for the entire village. We, especially my eldest brother and sister-in-law, thought good days were finally coming. The bachelors in the village would never come to ask for her hand again; she was a university student—how could any of them possibly deserve her? Just getting to look at her from afar was an honor.”

“But we never expected…” The third great-uncle smoked for a while, then lowered his voice and stopped.

Gu Yanqiu pressed her thumbs one by one against the joints of her other fingers, then picked up the water cup beside her and took a sip.

Smoke lingered around the third great-uncle’s lips as he let out a long sigh. “We never expected that such a smart, obedient child would turn out like that.”

“Turn out like what?”

The third great-uncle glanced at her, then around at the surroundings. As if remembering something, he shook his head and said, “I forgot; the times are different now.” Then his tone shifted abruptly. “But back in our day, it just wasn’t allowed. A girl with a girl, and they even wanted to get married—what kind of thing was that?”

Gu Yanqiu said, “What did you say?”

The third great-uncle said, “The summer after her first year of college, your mother brought home a female classmate. She was a proper city child, dressed so splendidly. Your eldest uncle and aunt slaughtered the only laying hen in the house and stewed it into soup to entertain her. If they’d known she was… was… the one who led Xiaoyu astray into becoming a pervert, they wouldn’t have given her even a grain of rice to eat, let alone chicken.”

He studied Gu Yanqiu again, both relieved and pained. “Luckily, she later came to her senses and got back on the right path; she even had you. Your eldest grandfather should be able to rest easy if he knew.”

“Third Great-Uncle, you’re off topic.”

“I’ll keep going.” The third great-uncle exhaled smoke, and the haze in the air grew thicker and thicker as he spoke slowly within it. “I only found out later. That summer, Xiaoyu’s female classmate stayed at her house for more than ten days, then went back to the city, and Xiaoyu went back with her. The day she left, I even tried to keep her a little longer, but she was very firm about it; her eyes seemed a little red, though I can’t remember clearly now. Maybe I remembered wrong.”

“At the time I didn’t think much of it, but during that winter break, Xiaoyu still didn’t come home. I asked your eldest uncle and aunt, and after they were silent for a while, they said she was working in the city over the New Year to earn money. These days, children outside are into that sort of thing; what was it called? Work-study. I didn’t know any better, so I just complained that even if she was study-minded, she couldn’t possibly not come home for the New Year. Your uncle and aunt said nothing.

“The following summer, she still didn’t come home. Your eldest uncle said she was still working; summer break was long, so she could earn more. I still didn’t suspect anything. Looking back now, I was so stupid. Your aunt’s eyes were so red she looked like she was about to cry, and I still didn’t think anything of it. Year three, year four—during the fourth year, she came back for New Year, but the atmosphere at your uncle’s house was strange. As soon as New Year’s Eve passed and it became the first day of the New Year, she left again.

“Only then did I sense something was wrong. I went to ask your uncle and aunt what was going on. Your uncle didn’t say a word; he’d never smoked before, but Xiaoyu’s schooling cost a lot, and every penny had to be scraped from between the teeth. That day he took my pipe, said nothing, and smoked a whole pouch. Your aunt broke down in fits and starts and told me what happened. It turned out the female classmate Xiaoyu had brought back that first summer wasn’t just a classmate; she was her girlfriend. Tell me, wasn’t that absurd?”

There was only one thought in Gu Yanqiu’s mind: as expected.

Not “how unexpected,” but “as expected.”

The third great-uncle went on, “Your eldest uncle flew into a rage, and father and daughter had a huge fight. He drove Xiaoyu out of the house. That’s why she only stayed at home for those ten-odd days that summer before leaving, and never came back after that. The winter break of her senior year, right before graduation, she returned—not because things had turned around, but because she planned to go to another, even farther city, Yanning, to stay together with her girlfriend, and came back to inform her parents.”

The third great-uncle gave a bitter laugh. “Who knows what got into that child. She became obstinate as a mule over that matter, and for the sake of some improper girlfriend, she even abandoned the parents who raised her for so many years and worked hard to send her to university. Ungrateful little wretch.”

“What happened after that?”

“I never saw her again.”

“Never again after that?”

“Never. Later I moved into the city, and the village was demolished to build an industrial park. She may have come back afterward, but she probably couldn’t find where home was anymore.”

Gu Yanqiu was silent for a moment, then asked, “How did my grandfather die?”

The third great-uncle took a hard drag on his cigarette. After a long while, he said hoarsely, “A car accident.”

“How did he get in a car accident?”

“It was a long time ago; decades, maybe. It was when your mother had been out of university for a year or two.” The third great-uncle narrowed his eyes, not wanting to revisit that memory from his long life. “The country was building water conservancy projects; the government allocated funds, and your eldest uncle was lucky. Their family’s fields were in a good location, so they got a great deal of benefit. Someone got jealous and wanted to switch land with him. But how could that be switched? Land is a farmer’s life. So he had some conflict with that family.”

“If I’d known something would happen to him, I would never have stopped him from going out for that drink.” The third great-uncle drew in a deep breath; his throat was dry, so he took another sip of water. His two old hands couldn’t stop trembling.

Gu Yanqiu waited a while before hearing him continue in a shaking voice:

“There was a young man in the east end of the village getting married; he was marrying a girl from the county, from a fairly well-off family. The banquet was held in the county seat at a big hotel, with more than ten tables, and more than half the village went. At the table, they had an argument with that family. It was a young man’s wedding banquet, so of course they couldn’t make trouble. Your eldest uncle and I both thought we should just let it go and not ruin the happy occasion. Who knew that family’s woman would start shouting that Shen He’s daughter, Shen Huaiyu, was a homosexual pervert. Your eldest uncle froze; I froze too. We didn’t know how she knew, or how she knew so much, how she knew that the other university student who had visited our village back then wasn’t just a regular classmate, but her girlfriend.”

The third great-uncle rubbed his hands together, seeming a little cold. Gu Yanqiu poured him a cup of hot water and placed it in his hands for warmth.

“In the end, the host family came forward and made that woman shut up. But since more than half the village had gone, the whole thing had been shouted so loudly that everyone knew about it. Who knew how it would be cleaned up afterward? Your eldest uncle just kept his head down and drank. In the end, he said he couldn’t eat anymore and would leave first, and I agreed, thinking we’d go back and discuss what to do.”

The third great-uncle held the cup and took a sip of hot water, slowly settling his trembling, his eyes fixed unblinking on the tabletop. “Who would’ve thought that night, once he left, he never made it back.”