Ask Jin Renshun's short story Adillia by the Water.

Text/Jin Renshun

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Every time I go on a blind date, sit opposite a strange man, talk about anger, work, hobbies, and even whether I like Chili peppers, I will probably pull Lang Lang out to have a chat.

I have a friend named Su Lang, who is usually called Lang Lang. She smokes (I would say so if the other person was smoking). But she doesn't smoke clouds. She smokes ladies' cigarettes and buys them from duty-free shops. There is mint in it, Lang Lang said (I hesitated, if the other person looks likable, I will finish the second sentence, otherwise, I will smile), and kissing with such smoke will not be annoying. Lang Lang wears this hairstyle (if a woman happens to pass by and the boy sitting opposite me looks at her, I will use this message to hook his eyes back to my face). This hairstyle is beyond the care of ordinary people. Washing and pressing once is time-consuming and expensive. Of course, there is no problem with a woman like Lang Lang. Her boyfriends are all rich. Lang Lang said that men should not be too poor. If they are too poor, they will be sour and poor and the most difficult to get along with. Lang Lang can also play the piano. Recently, almost all the places where I meet men are set in cafes. A place like this is like a robber. You won't stop until you take people's words away. Fortunately, there is almost a piano in such a place. She studied for five or six years when she was a child and could play some simple songs. She used to play in Guidu Hotel for several years. I earned a lot of money playing the piano and a tip, but it was enough to buy some clothes. She spends money lavishly. Lang Lang is always joking with me. She said that my advantage is conservative, but my disadvantage is too conservative (do men mean flirting when they ask women some details about their boyfriends in the past? )。 Lang Lang and I are good friends, but our ideas are very different. Her boyfriend became faster than the weather.

When I chat with people, Lang Lang is a gold mine. When men hear my story about Lang Lang, those flying eyes will tighten their wings and stay on me honestly. After they listened to me for a while, their expressions changed. Their faint smiles became the main content I remembered in the future. Only a daredevil asked me, now call your friend. I didn't say anything. When this man named Chen Mingliang came in just now, he followed his introducer and put his hand on his waist, as if pointing a gun at his lower back. He is the seventh person I met. He is a physical education teacher in normal university, but his expression seems to be a doctor's guidance. The introducer introduced us to each other. He put his hands in his pockets and nodded at me.

We left after the introducer introduced us, leaving the two of us. He sat in a chair relaxed, and his long legs stretched out to the sides of the chair where I was sitting, which reminded me of a pair of scissors. His words are short sentences, as if they had been deleted. We sat in a window seat, and the claws of the sun came at him through the glass, scratching as if it were the only thing that made him feel comfortable at that time. The way he drinks coffee is also different. He doesn't hold the handle of the cup, nor does he poke the spoon with his blue finger, but drinks water from the cup with his hands. We were silent for about five minutes. In order to kill time after drinking a cup of coffee, I told him about Lang Lang. I said that I have a friend who can tell fortune with tea. She can tell the personality characteristics of many people who meet for the first time, as well as the general fate. Chen Mingliang didn't move, but he looked up at me and said suspiciously, "I don't believe it." I said I didn't believe it either, but many people did. I watched her tell some people's fortune, and I thought she was just pretending to be mysterious. But later, many people who were calculated by her came back to find her with family and friends. They said she was very accurate.

After subtle changes, Chen Mingliang's expression finally stopped at a sarcastic sneer. "I don't believe it unless you get her here now and show her to me on the spot."

"Do you think Lang Lang is a waiter? Coming right away? "

"Dare not come?" Chen Mingliang sneer at 1. "Women are afraid to be serious."

"Not afraid to come." I corrected him calmly. "There is nothing to be afraid of."

"Then let her come." Chen Mingliang seemed reasonable and stared at me derisively. "I know a lot about women."

I smiled.

"Dare not?" Chen Mingliang put his head close to me. His expression is completely different from that just now, just like a cat just woke up after taking a nap in the sun. He took out his mobile phone and photographed it in front of me. "Call your friend now."

"She won't come. I can't come if I want to, she is out of town. "

Chen Mingliang squinted at me, as if I had melted into the lies in my mouth.

"Women are good at lying." Chen Mingliang said bitterly.

"What you think is your freedom." I finished a cup of coffee and waved to the waiter. "Pay the bill."

When I took my wallet out of my backpack, Chen Mingliang reached out and slapped it on my hand, knocking my wallet into my backpack.

"I bought it." He said. "I am a man."

I didn't argue with him. Out of politeness, I waited for a while and walked out the door with him.

"Goodbye." I stood in front of the cafe and said goodbye to my grumpy PE teacher.

He took out his cigarette, lit it, took a sip, spat in the direction of a hotel and asked me, "How about a room?"

I didn't expect him to have this skill. "What do you mean?"

He smiled at me. "What's the point?"

I wasn't really angry with him, but I slapped him in the face. Then I turned and left.

After a while, shouts came from behind me, "So you are pure?" Are you a virgin? "

I stopped and slowly turned to look at him. "How do you know I'm not pure? I am not a virgin? "

Chen Mingliang stood at the door of the cafe, and his last expression made me very happy.

Three days later, I got a call from an introducer. She asked me what my impression of Chen Mingliang was.

I say that's it.

She said Chen Mingliang had a good impression of you.

Is it? I didn't expect this. I stopped the driver in front of a bookstore, paid the fare and told the introducer that I had to go into the bookstore. It's inconvenient to make a phone call in the bookstore. Let's talk about it another day.

As if wanting more, the introducer asked me which bookstore I was in.

I said my name, said goodbye to her and turned off my cell phone.

When I came out with a Bao Shu, Chen Mingliang was waiting at the door with some newspapers. He grinned when he saw me. "Have you finished buying the book?"

I didn't say anything.

Chen Mingliang is naturally invited rehmannia carrying my bag, "so heavy? When will you finish reading so many books? "

"What's it to you?"

"Look at you, why are you so unfriendly?" Chen Mingliang said with a smile.

"What do you want me to do? Still want to open a house? "

"Look at you, why are you talking like this?"

"What do you mean?"

"Look at you ..." Chen Mingliang's smile on his face was wrinkled. He cleared his throat and was silent.

"Are you finished?" I took the bag back from his hand and walked forward.

"Hey ..." Chen Mingliang chased me. "Let's find a place to have a cup of coffee and talk casually."

I ignored him and walked straight ahead.

"Don't you have a friend who can tell fortune with tea? How is she? " Chen Mingliang walked unhurriedly. He pushed me three steps at a time.

I stopped. "Do you still want me to introduce my friend to you?"

"No ... of course it's not important to get to know each other ... hey, don't get me wrong. You look at me as if I were hurting you. " Chen Mingliang inarticulate, "that day ... I was in a bad mood and talked nonsense. Besides, didn't you give me a slap in the face? I thought we were even. "

"Who is even with you?" I didn't stretch for a while and smiled.

"It's interesting to laugh. Well, when you smile, the sun shines. " Chen Mingliang also smiled.

We stood in the street for a while.

"I'll treat you to coffee." Chen Mingliang pointed to a cafe across the street.

I hesitated. "Last time you bought me a drink, this time it's my treat."

"You can invite me, but I'll pay for it." Chen Mingliang took the book from me again.

The coffee shop has just opened, and the smell of paint has not disappeared after renovation. I stayed with Chen Mingliang for a while, and then came. "What should I do?" He asked me.

I looked around and pointed to a tall building in front of me. "Go to your capital. There is a coffee stall on the second floor. "

When we walked to Guidu Hotel, the vine leaves wrapped around the iron fence beside the sidewalk began to turn red, which looked like a kind of rust.

"How many times have you kissed?" Chen Mingliang asked.

"I can't remember. What about you? "

"Like you, this time my family arranged it for me." Chen Mingliang said, "I once had a girlfriend. I have been together for several years and just broke up some time ago. "

"Why?"

Chen Mingliang hesitated.

"Don't be reluctant if you don't want to say it."

"It's no big deal. She dumped me. " Chen Mingliang smiled, "besides me, she has a boyfriend. I scolded her for stepping on two boats. She said she was a boat and we were just paddles. She rowed with two paddles for a while and chose one of them. "

I smiled.

"Is it funny?" Chen Mingliang gave me a look. "I was shaking with anger. We dated for five years, and I'm just an oarsman? But I can't beat her. She teaches Chinese. I slapped her in the face. I said you took me as an oar for so long, and it was nothing if I slapped you. She was in tears. I said, did you let go? Go ahead, have fun. Fortunately, I am an oarsman. If I take a dagger, you will die now. "

I looked at Chen Mingliang. "Evil is born with courage?"

"Scare not yet? How else can I get out of this sulking in my chest? "

We walked to the gate of Guidu Hotel. In front of the revolving door, I took a step back and watched Chen Mingliang be attracted by a few pages. He found that I didn't go in and came out again.

"What's the matter?"

"I suddenly don't want to drink coffee."

Chen Mingliang expression became cautious, "what's the matter? What did I say wrong again? "

I smiled.

"Don't laugh like that. I don't know how to smile like that. "

"... why did you come to me again? "

"... because you hit me. "

I looked at Chen Mingliang and smiled. "Do you need to be beaten?"

"That's right." He also smiled. "Do you think I am particularly cheap?"

For a time, Chen Mingliang and I often set the meeting place in Guidu, where the coffee tastes pure. But Chen Mingliang seems to like going to the French window. He always chooses a window seat. "I can't stand the lights in the cafe, just like the bedroom." Chen Mingliang was bathed in sunshine, and his brown face leaned back like a sunflower for a while and bent towards me. "What do you say?"

I just stir the coffee.

Chen Mingliang suddenly took off her glasses. "Without them, you look like a different person."

I held out my hand, and Chen Mingliang's arm immediately reached out of my reach.

"Give it back to me."

"You are very beautiful." Chen Mingliang said with a smile.

"I'll be angry if you don't give it to me again."

"You are sexy when you are angry ..." Chen Mingliang slowly returned my glasses.

"Do you always joke with girls like this?" I put on my glasses.

"What about you? Are you always so serious about men? "

"Almost."

"Because you are a virgin?" Chen Mingliang's eyes sparkled and he approached me. "Do you know what you are missing?"

I stared at him.

"Feminized." Chen Mingliang is very excited. "So you always give men a hard feeling."

"What's difficult?" I stared at Chen Mingliang. "Do you think I'm dead?"

"Didn't say you're dead. You read too much, you should be sensitive and insensitive, and you should not be sensitive and particularly sensitive. " Chen Mingliang, switch to the sofa next to me. "I mean, you should change your life."

"If you want to bring up the old saying, don't ask, or it will be too late." I smiled.

"You see you ..." Chen Mingliang smiled. "When it is transparent, it must be completely transparent, and when it is transparent, it must be completely opaque ..."

I waved him to shut up.

A girl with hair hanging down her waist came over. Her skin seems to be transparent, and her eyelids are covered with blue eye shadow with sequins. When she blinks, her eyes are crossed, and she has a charming energy. Without looking at anyone, she coldly went to the piano and sat down. Every time she plays the piano, she starts with Adillia by the Water.

"Lang Lang used to play the piano in a hotel."

Chen Mingliang leaned close to my ear and said, "I can also play ..."

I stared at my hands on my legs. This huge, colorful spider uses my thigh as a wooden bridge and swims back and forth. Then it stopped, as if lost.

There was silence for a while. Chen Mingliang sat opposite me, one leg supporting the other, and his hands were like two hugging spiders crawling on his knees. He was angry for a while and lit a cigarette.

"Lang Lang is playing the piano in the hotel," I think the words in his mouth are like the smoke in Chen Mingliang's mouth, and somehow they pop out. "Men often come to talk to her about the price, and she opens a room with them."

Chen Mingliang opened his mouth.

"To make money." I said.

"... how much is it? "

"One thousand at a time."

"She wants so much money? Buy clothes? "

"For her mother. Her mother is in prison. "

Chen Mingliang sat down on the sofa next to me again. "What's the matter?"

"Lang Lang's mother is a makeup artist." I smiled at Chen Mingliang, "but not for the living, but for the dead. When she married Lang Lang's father, she said she was a nurse. It took several years to be discovered. Lang Lang's father is a playwright and has no fame at all. He is too proud. He fights or scolds at home, drinks outside every day, and talks to whoever he catches. Lang Lang's mother wants to divorce him, and he won't leave. Anyway, it's getting worse and worse. Lang Lang's mother has to wear gloves all day at home in summer, which can't satisfy Lang Lang's father. He told people that his wife's dead hand would be cut off one day. No one took what he said after drinking seriously, but once he drank too much, he really got into a fight. As a result, Lang Lang's mother accidentally cut Lang's father's wrist, which may have happened to cut a vein or something. There was too much blood and it didn't come back later. Lang Lang's mother was sentenced to 20 years for manslaughter, and Lang Lang wanted her mother to get out of prison early. "

"What happened later?" After a while, Chen Mingliang asked.

"Huh?"

"Did Lang Lang get her mother out?"

"Come out. But after a while she went back. She is not used to being outside. She thinks prison is very good. There is a glove knitting factory in the prison. Her mother went back to be a technician. "

The weather is getting colder every day. On the day of the first cold snap, Chen Mingliang came to my school and took me to eat hot pot. We met three of his friends in a hot pot restaurant. They are all beautiful young men with their own beautiful girlfriends. There is a big hot pot in the middle of the table. Like a planet, there are plates full of food everywhere Chen Mingliang solemnly told his friend that I would use tea to tell my fortune. Our galaxy immediately sounded the sound of touching porcelain, and then a cup of tea reached under my nose.

"I can't tell fortune." I glanced at Chen Mingliang. "I can see love at most."

"Just let you see love." Chen Mingliang said with a smile. "What we care about most is love."

"Yes, yes, yes." They echoed in succession.

I glanced at the tea in the cup, and then looked up at the girl with the cup. Her hair is long and she always has a smile on her face.

"You are a very clever woman," I turned my eyes to tea again. "You are also very resourceful and good at grasping men's psychology. You don't have to show your face, but it's easier to get the upper hand. You can let men run around you, but at some point, there will be problems. He may suddenly wake up and slowly get rid of your control. "

Her smile is like a layer of oil, which condenses on her face. She put the teacup back in front of her eyes. "It seems that I have to get married early."

"It's no use. A sense of form cannot change fate. "

Her smile was completely gone, and her face was pale, like frozen pork suet. "What is fate? Broken tea table block? "

"Sometimes it's just a few pieces of broken tea." Chen Mingliang kicked me under the table, and I turned to look at him. "Why did you kick me?"

"You see you ..." Chen Mingliang blushed.

"Didn't you let me see it?" I smiled calmly at the girl. "I was just kidding you. Don't take it seriously. "

"Nothing." She smiled.

We put the tea aside and began to drink. After a few drinks, the smile returned to the face of Rapunzel next to her. She and Chen Mingliang were drinking. They touched a glass in front of my eyes and drank it. Her boyfriend tried several times, but she wouldn't listen.

"Come on, Chen Mingliang, have another drink."

"No, I give up, okay?"

"No, if you don't fucking drink today, you won't have a ball." With a wave of her hand, she knocked off the teacup, and the white porcelain cup broke into several pieces, and the tea spilled all over the floor.

"Will you stop fooling around?" Her boyfriend is angry.

"I didn't mean to ... what are you staring at?"

"Pay the bill." Her boyfriend beckoned for the waiter.

"I haven't had enough ... Chen Mingliang, let's go to the bar and continue drinking."

"I can't drink, really can't drink."

"You really have no fucking balls."

"Yes, I don't have the guts." Chen Mingliang smiled and said, "I don't have the guts, do I?"

Chen Mingliang and I got into a taxi, and he told the driver to go to Guidu. I turned to look at him. "Don't you go home to sleep? Drink so much wine ... "

"We need to talk." Chen Mingliang said. "Otherwise I can't sleep well."

We went to Guidu, and he went directly to the front desk and opened a room.

"What do you mean?"

"Talk, just talk. Just the two of us, talk about what we want to say. " Chen Mingliang stared at me unblinkingly, waving his hands before my eyes. "I promise I won't touch a finger."

Nice room. Chen Mingliang went to take a shower after taking the door. I turned on all the lights in the room and made two cups of instant coffee.

After Chen Mingliang came out of the bathroom, we sat in chairs and each had a cup of coffee.

"Where is Lang Lang now?" Chen Mingliang asked me.

"I don't know." I said. "Why do you think of her again?"

"Her story seems endless. What happened to her later? " Chen Mingliang asked me. His body smells moist and warm in the sweater he just put on. He even brushed his teeth.

"When Lang Lang played the piano, he met someone. He heard his friends talking about Lang Lang's special status. At first, he did not believe it. He said that a girl who looks purer than morning dew can do it. People say you don't believe me, why don't you try? He tried. It turns out that he is a naive man in a certain aspect of society. They spent the night. They broke hands at dawn. Lang Lang went on doing his own thing, and the man went on living his own life. Half a year later, he divorced, and two years later, he fell in love with another girl. A year later, they decided to get married. In the meantime, he went to a university to hold an academic conference. There he met a female graduate student. Many things on her are different from before, even her name has changed, but he recognized her at a glance. "

I finished my coffee, took off my coat and said to Chen Mingliang, "I'm going to take a bath."

While I was taking a bath, Chen Mingliang pushed the door and came in. I was taken aback. It's the first time I saw such a gentle and sad expression on a young man's face.

"I know everything." Chen Mingliang said.

I sighed. "You idiot."

In 2002, the author (2 issues)