Chapter 53: Who sent my longing to Du Heng? (II)

Song Shijiu was a bit dizzy; before her was the silk painting-like lips of Li Shiyi, and in her breaths, it seemed like there was still the tenderness of lips and teeth; as she remembered the aftertaste of Li Shiyi’s kiss, she placed her bracelet against her slim neck. Just then, when she’d risen, she’d just had a bit of dizziness, yet Li Shiyi, without allowing explanation, had knocked her horizontal and embraced her, still carrying her as they left the temple; her hands were probably very sore, yet she still wasn’t willing to let her go, only crouching down and making her lay against her back, keeping silent the entire way as she carried her on her back down the mountain. She felt that Li Shiyi had a degree of hard to part with tenderness towards her; in the past, this tenderness had been sealed by dignified excuses; just now, Li Shiyi was in a helpless state of agitation, and gradually wrapped her up.

Song Shijiu tilted her head, contentedly leaning it against her shoulder, and with a voice as gentle as if speaking in sleep, said, “So, we’re going back?”

“We’re going back,” Li Shiyi said. She sighed a faint, inaudible sigh, causing Song Shijiu’s sensitive brows to furrow. So, having engaged in intimate matters with Li Shiyi was truly not as happy as she’d imagined because of the hard to bear uncommunicativeness between them; the one that Li Shiyi carried was her, but it was as if she were bearing a weight of responsibility towards a secret of interwoven love and desire, causing her to stick out her neck and take steady steps, making her press her lips together until they were white.

Arriving at the foot of the mountain, Song Shijiu raised her head to gaze at the star-filled sky, the tips of her feet wanting to swing as was her habit, but, fearing that it would strain Li Shiyi, she stopped her motions, and, biting her lower lip, said softly, “Yun Niang’s story, was it true?”

Li Shiyi had originally not meant to speak, but feeling the lively atmosphere of her mood, said in a mild voice, “I don’t know.”

Song Shijiu gazed at the stars, and said next to Li Shiyi’s ear, “E Shou, ah, E Shou, I miss you.”

The outside of Li Shiyi’s ear flushed faintly, and she didn’t speak to Song Shijiu anymore; Song Shijiu laid against her back, closing her small, fan-like eyelashes. E Shou, ah, E Shou, I miss you; please separate the truth and the lies of Yun Niang’s story, judge the sincerity of when she kissed me.

From that day forth, Li Shiyi followed Song Shijiu closely and kept watch over her; in the early morning, she knocked on the door and woke her, and in the night, she recited a couple lines of poetry before bed, and for each meal, paired meat and vegetables, even personally going to the kitchen to boil porridge, and, seeing that Song Shijiu ate it, would bring over a few bowls of black medicine decoction. Song Shijiu stretched out her neck and held the bowl, cautiously and solemnly asked what it was. She would only indifferently say that they were medicines for clearing internal heat and detoxification, spreading out a handkerchief on the table, within which were several small, sweet and fragrant and alluring sugar preserves. She didn’t know whether it was because of those sugar preserves, or because of Li Shiyi’s sweetness like the sugar preserves, but Song Shijiu drank very happily, wishing she could have another couple bowls.

Tu Laoyao crouched against the foot of the wall looking at the two of them, yet couldn’t make out anything significant, and wanted to discuss it with A Yin, yet he saw crossing her arms and leaning against the swing, in a rare occasion not responding to his words.

Two weeks passed like this, and aside from Song Shijiu’s cheeks filling a bit, there weren’t any other symptoms, and with some worry, she stroked her own waist, which had expanded half a finger, and finally asked Li Shiyi the words she’d been hiding for so long when Li Shiyi passed her a pan-fried shengjian bun, “What is it that you think I need?” Her eyes were always glossy and bright, her pupils very large, but only enough to admit one person. These words, accompanying her expression, which was attentive, yet not well versed in the matters of the world, caused Li Shiyi’s chopsticks to pause in her hand, the pair of chopsticks only moving after ten or so seconds, and she lowered her head, not making a sound.

“Desire for good food? The Four Books and the Five Classics? Exercising my body?” Song Shijiu held the bowl in her hands, walking back and forth as she asked her.

Li Shiyi once more swept her gaze over her, a customary inhibiting motion. But the outer portion of her ears were that clear pink, as if the juice of a flower had dyed white jade, causing one a hard to inhibit interest in probing for a cause. Song Shijiu sat at the side of the table, holding her chin, her fingers tracing a circle around the edge of the bowl, her voice like an insect’s, “So, what are the requirements, then?”

Aftert a few more days, Song Shijiu gradually comprehended her own needs; she realised that she herself always couldn’t help but place her gaze on Li Shiyi’s pretty lips; since she’d experienced the taste of those lists, it was as if she suffered from a heavy amount of gu^[1] venom, causing one to want a second, a third, to play together with her ear to ear and temple to temple, want to curl around her and be delicate and fragrant, want to hear her gasping breaths in intertwining in intimacy overstepping the bounds of propriety.

She didn’t know whether this was a need or not, only that it flourished more and more, causing her to pause for longer and longer in dizziness. But she didn’t fully understand; Li Shiyi had kissed her, which should be preparation forr taking her in a bridal sedan as a wife, but Li Shiyi, on the contrary, gradually became lazy in the midsts of her obedient waiting, no longer providing food as diligently, and the coaxing of poem verses for sleep became shorter and shorter, and even when they were together, the looks she gave to the books were longer than the ones she paused on her body.

She couldn’t…not much want to take her in marriage, could she?

Song Shijiu bit her lower lip, pondering until her heart became alarmed, her body leaping. In the midsts of her thoughts on tenterhooks, she drew close to Li Shiyi, who was flipping through a book, one hand supporting her face, quietly turning over, pausing by her face, blinking her eyes, pushing her peach blossom bright and tender lips forward, and then once more drawing them back hurriedly. Li Shiyi turned a blind eye to her.

Song Shijiu stood up, turning a circle in the room, overcome with boredom; she approached once more when Li Shiyi was washing her writing brushes, tilting her face to stretch out half her cheek against her shoulder, pausing her lips exploratorily by her ear.

Li Shiyi tilted her head, taking out her other brush.

In the night, the group ate fruit under the foreign-style umbrella in the garden; A Yin and A Luo went into the house to wash grapes, Tu Laoyao shook a palm-leaf fan and bit into watermelon; Song Shijiu availed herself of his lowered guard, and, with dazzling eyes, moved her face to two cun’s width away from Li Shiyi’s profile; she didn’t have the chance to get any closer when Li Shiyi raised her hand, precisely covering up her restless lips. Between her fingers, the scent of orchids lingered at the tip of her nose, the hollow of her palm cool and soft, unexpectedly causing Song Shijiu to tuck her lips in, her fluid glance unnaturally flitting, like stars dancing chaotically.

There was the sound of arrivals from the courtyard’s gate; Tu Laoyao, hearing it, looked over, along with A Yin and A Luo, who were carrying grapes, their gazes flowing together on Li Shiyi’s palm. Song Shijiu’s earlobes, in a flash, became as red as a drop of blood; Li Shiyi unexpectedly was languid as usual, and dropped her hand, leaning forward to take a slice of watermelon. Tu Laoyao drew back the corners of his mouth, clucking a couple times, and spat out watermelon seeds, his judgemental gaze unable to resist circling over the two of them, Li and Song, forming a hole.

The Western clock sounded eleven times, and all of the people brought along a dissipating, clear and sweet fragrance; Song Shijiu had eaten to bursting, and unhurriedly walked at the very rear to aid with digestion; she’d only just put her hand on the handrail, just about to take a step forward, when her wrist was caught by someone, and was taken into the shadow behind the stairs. Catching the scent of a familiar fragrance, she restrained the cry in alarm that hadn’t been let out of her mouth, and she narrowed her eyes, and in the darkness, caught sight of the clear, tender and beautiful outline before her, and called out to her, “A Yin?”

A Yin let go of the hand that was gripping Song Shijiu, her other hand pinching a cigarette, and raised her hand to grasp her waist, even the small motion filled with grace, and she used her fingertips to drag in a mouthful, not speaking vaguely around the topic with Song Shijiu. “These few days, what happened?” Since that day that Li Shiyi had kept her in the dark, she had had some premonitions, only clinging to it and wanting an answer.

A Yin was always charming, her attitude languid; Song Shijiu had rarely encountered this impatient and eager appearance of hers, and it caused her, for a short while, to be a bit lost for words; instinctively, she replied, “These few days?”

A Yin lowered her cigarette, resting her hand against her thigh, raising her knee slightly, and gazed into Song Shijiu’s eyes, and asked once more, “That day, what did you and Li Shiyi go do?” Her thumb unconsciously stroked the mouth of the cigarette, and it was a clear and easy to see nervous motion.

Song Shijiu drew her spirit back, not knowing exactly how to tell the matter of Li Shiyi to A Yin, but she saw this serious appearance of A Yin’s, and was determined to repeat the matter, only omitting the key points of it. She thought for a moment, then said softly, “Shiyi and I went to Mount She, looking for a critical item; there were some unforeseen events during it, and without taking care, I was hit on the face with that thing, and she…”

A Yin pressed her, “She what?”

Song Shijiu lowered her head. “She kissed me.”

Silence; silence for an incredibly long time, silent enough that the burning cigarette burnt A Yin’s fingers, and only then did she awaken, her spirit returning to normal, but she didn’t throw away the cigarette only disregarded its burn, only after pressing her lips together for a good while did she open her mouth, with the soft sound of the cork of a wine bottle. Expressionlessly, she asked Song Shijiu, “Was it the Teng serpent?”

The second hand of th clock ticked, like an untiring traveller; Li Shiyi gazed at it, feeling it was in fact like a mule on a grindstone; feeling as if it were unceasingly rushing forward without pausing, but in the eyes of others, confined to the dot in the centre forever and eternity, repeating and foolishly doing useless work.

She drew her gaze back from the clock, just about to go shower, but suddenly heard the sound of the lock moving, and A Yin pushed the door open and entered, her clothes a loose and casual sleep gown, her hair dripping wet, her face and neck crimson from the steam of evaporating water. She pressed her heels down, closing the door with a bang, and before Li Shiyi’s probing expression, sat at the side of the desk, originally only gazing blankly at the books that she’d arranged carefully, and then after a while, stretched out her hand to stroke the matchbox on the right side of the table, grasping it stiffly in her hand.

In the past, she’d always been unable to repress her speech; Li Shiyi was the one who understood her the most, and therefore, clearly understood her state of mind wasn’t right, yet still rather patiently waited for her to open her mouth. Thinking of this, A Yin suddenly smiled, the ridicule in her heart increasing a layer. What was humorous was that she was still following Li Shiyi’s thoughts, and she opened her mouth first, and said, “You went looking for the Teng serpent.”

She had used the entirety of a bath’s time to calm down, and when the words came out of her mouth, she still felt that the tip of her tongue was numb, the unruly tips of her hair dripping, just like she couldn’t control her rampaging state of mind.

Li Shiyi’s mask-like facial features finally loosened at these few words; A Yin looked at her out of the corner of her eyes, as if victory had torn through Li Shiyi’s indifference, yet when the faint helplessness showed in her expression, her heart hurt to such an extent as to be unable to increase further. A Yin let out a deep breath, exerting herself such that her ribs all hurt; she stood up, starting and stopping as she walked to Li Shiyi, gazing steadily at her, and in the sound of her footsteps, there was an experience as if an enumeration of the two’s shared history, and she flipped and flipped through it, recited and recited it, not knowing how she should define her own preposterous yet humorous lifetime. She had always carried herself with confident ease and disinhibition, with sacrifice and affectation, yet apparently the person before her had always been clear on it. Clear that she’d been spurred on like rubbish by the Teng serpent, that her life in the red-light district had been without the freedom to act involuntarily. She had listened as if nothing had happened to her say “ideal”, say “patrons”, say “peaches and plums under the heavens”; what sort of mood was she meant to see her in, then? Pity? Regret? Guilt?

Fuck guilt.

She scoffed, her head swaying, swaying until the beads of water were on the verge of falling, and with a hoarse voice, she asked her, “You understood everything; how come you never said so?” Didn’t want to say, too lazy to say, or had nothing to say? Herself maintaining ego and pride in her entire body, herself assuming that she had hidden it expertly; saying to Li Shiyi that it was her who was patronising those men, saying that no one had the good fortune to be able to control her, saying that she was still the first-class venerable Yin-da-nainai, and she’d leave behind poetry and passion and romance in her old age. At that time, she’d gazed at Li Shiyi, assuming she’d believed her, and therefore had believed herself as well. However, at this moment, Li Shiyi had lowered her eyes slightly, in contrast with her bared fangs and brandished claws creating a clumsy eyesore of a play.

“Speak, Li Shiyi,” she said, gazing at her, the final syllable seeming to carry an imperceptible appeal.

Li Shiyi finally raised her eyes, the creases of her eyebrows and eyelids divulging the fluctuations of her heart, but she still customarily pressed her lips together, as if only wanting to control and seal a single emotion in her mouth, so none could pry into the helplessness and weakness in her heart. A Yin advanced, the matchbox in her hand having been pinched askew, her fingertips twitching, wanting to recklessly abandon the crude box, and pursue the easily obtained rosy softness. But she had caused those two soft lips to press this tightly, that even a small motion would tug at the state of one’s heartstrings, all leaking out from the edges, as if saying to A Yin, don’t covet what you can’t have; if the door were closed tightly, even if a couple of red plums were to grow around the wall, it would only remind you of the radiant spring scenery within the courtyard, and moreover, it wouldn’t be any use.

But she’d had an entire love affair, holding back nothing to give it to another.

A Yin lowered her head, breathing through her nose, expression absent as she asked her, “What use does your looking for the Teng serpent have?”

Li Shiyi’s lips stammered, and she saw A Yin suddenly raise her head, staring at her. “You think that I took your place entering that tomb, that you owe me, and want to repay me, isn’t that it?”

Li Shiyi furrowed her brows and shook her head, but the range was excessively small, making it look like a confirmation of the opposite. A Yin’s ribs quivered uncontrolledly, scattering and smashing the sultry gaze of others, and she used effort to bite the inside of her lip, but couldn’t hold back her throat working as it choked with emotion. “You want to repay me?” As the last two characters emerged, the tears finally filled up; they had arrived too late, late enough that A Yin unwillingly narrowed her eyes, using her eyelashes to control them. She originally should have wiped her eyes, but she was so frenetic that she couldn’t help but wipe her mouth, the brightly-coloured rouge being wiped away, miserably being left on the side of her mouth, making her look in dire straits, like an orphan who’d been abandoned. She scoffed softly, turning her head, supporting herself on the edge of the table, and said in a low voice, “So, from cradle to grave, what you wanted to find was merely the Teng serpent. You wanted to compensate me, to repay me, so the two of us didn’t owe each other. You even…” She thought of the image of Li Shiyi covering Song Shijiu’s mouth, and thought of the image of Song Shijiu saying quietly that she’d kissed her. “You even don’t dare to be with Song Shijiu because you never finished settling accounts from before.”

It wasn’t like this, she understood, but she was incredibly afraid of Li Shiyi pitying her, hated incredibly Li Shiyi hiding from her the times she’d put herself into dangerous conditions; fear and hatred made her panic such that she couldn’t differentiate matters, caused her to speak incoherently out of want to demand Li Shiyi refute her. If she denied it, she would forgive her.

But Li Shiyi hadn’t; when A Yin had mentioned Song Shijiu, her eyebrows had risen, and then sunk into a silence like stagnant water. A Yin raised her head, sneering two incredibly ridiculing laughs, yet her voice was as tender as a lover’s murmuring. “But Li Shiyi, you owe me; is it just this little thing?” She tilted her face, gazing at her, her tearful eyes indistinct. “That year when you were fifteen, you broke your leg, and I carried you down from a snowy mountain, carrying you the entire time, and when you were better, but I caught rheumatism, and even after two or three years of treatment, I wasn’t completely better. That year when you were seventeen, you were poisoned, and I decocted medicine for you for six days and nights, crying and scolding you, and stole your damned life back from fate. That day you woke, I was dizzy with fever, and tumbled off the bed, and to this day, there’s still a fingernail-sized hollow on the back of my head. And, and…” She was so choked with emotion it was hard to form phrases, and the tears she cried streamed down without falling; she raised her hand to bite the crook of her index finger, unable to control the surge of grievance, and she gazed at Li Shiyi, saying regretfully, “Each and every one of these, I was happy to do; it’s none of your business! What I gave you, don’t you even dare think of paying it back! If you,” she sobbed, “if you were to repay it, you would have to give me back the past ten years!”

Li Shiyi gazed at her; this woman who had been by her side from the time she was young, at this moment, because of her had tear-filled lashes; the fine silk gown that she wore, the expensive scent of Western fragrance in the water dripping from her hair, the glossy, smooth fingernails, even the nail polish was from the from the fashionable Western bottle. But when she looked at her most magnificent was always when she thought of the flower-patterned dress she’d worn at that time, the young girl with combed plaits, lazily turning over from that side of the bed, cuddled up against her like a spoiled child, saying, “Shiyi, Shiyi, help me carry a bucket of water again for me today, won’t you?”

She’d always said yes.

But what made her feel upset was that she’d said one thousand, ten thousand yeses, yet she couldn’t always say yes to her.

These past few days, she had often thought why she herself had kissed Song Shijiu, made her a completely insignificant promise, yet at the time, she hadn’t to A Yin. She’d been willing to use her life to repay her own responsibility, yet wouldn’t wasn’t willing to give the same kiss to A Yin she’d given to Song Shijiu. Until this moment, with A Yin falling apart before her, she finally had no choice but to admit, even if it was her habit to take responsibility herself, she also sometimes felt powerless, and it was hard to carry the burden, so much so that there were moments when she wanted to abandon it all.

“Then how am I meant to repay you?” she asked quietly, gazing at A Yin, dripping with water.

A Yin was startled, staring at Li Shiyi, finding it hard to believe; caught off guard, she felt Li Shiyi’s retreat, but she couldn’t let her retreat, or else she was afraid that not even biding them together could tie them together. A Yin sniffed, her nose flushed, and she grit her teeth, gazing at her. “You know, don’t you?”

Li Shiyi was dazed, and she slowly nodded, pressing the corners of her mouth together, then letting them go, immediately raising her right hand, brushing her own collar, candidly and hurriedly opening her buttons from the top to the bottom. Her actions of undressing with her head down still were leisurely and beautiful, no different from what A Yin had seen in her dreams.

Yet A Yin laughed, her tear-hazy eyes sweeping over Li Shiyi’s face. “How could there be someone as heartless as you?” she asked softly.

-

< LAST | HOME | NEXT >

-

Translator's notes:

[1]: 蛊 (gu), also known as jincan, a type of mythological, poisonous spirit created through sealing multiple venomous creatures inside a container until all but one devoured the others, concentrating the poison, which was then fed upon by larva, with the last surviving larva holding a complex poison; the resulting gu would be used to manipulate sexual partners, create malignant diseases, and cause death.