Bro | Chapter 42

When Song Xiaobao saw Wei Qian, it was like a mouse seeing a cat. A kind of despair, as if her final hour had come, appeared on her face.

Grandma Song picked up a sheet of paper from the ground, sprang three feet into the air, and launched herself right in front of Wei Qian, shouting at the top of her lungs, “Look at this! This is outrageous! What kind of person is this? Huh? Is this the kind of shameless trash your school turns out? You tell me who this is, I’m going to find him!”

Wei Qian took it and gave it a rough read-through. At once, he did not know whether to laugh or cry.

What Grandma Song had handed over was, beyond any doubt, a love letter.

As for how illiterate Grandma Song had figured that out, the blame belonged to the maker of the love letter. With boundless creativity, he had filled a sheet of thirty-two-mo paper from top to bottom, making it look exactly like the kind of “little newspaper” model elementary school teachers often had children put together.

At the very top was an enormous title: “To Song Xiaobao.” Around it, bizarrely, was a clumsy hand-drawn border like winding vines, and it had even been colored in with watercolor markers in different shades. Wei Qian had no idea whether this person had been trying to create the effect of a ring of neon lights.

In the lower left corner there was a giant peach-shaped heart pierced through by an arrow, and on the right were two little stick figures, one male and one female…

Grandma Song pointed at those two little figures and stomped in place like an enraged old hen. “They’re even kissing!”

Compared with its cumbersome form, the contents of the love letter were very concise and easy to understand. The body of the letter was only a single line:

Song Lili, you’re a great beauty. I like you very much.

It made the whole cause and effect perfectly clear, frank and without the slightest coyness.

At the end, as if to show off a bit of literary refinement, this young hero had also copied two lines of classical poetry of unknown origin outside the dazzling decorative border in crooked “artistic lettering.” He had copied them without understanding them, making the result utterly baffling to anyone who read it.

On the left it said, “Later, if you return once more, then at the place where we must not forget, take a cup of wine and pour it over the soil of my grave.” On the right it said, “Though heaven and earth may endure forever, this sorrow shall go on without end.”

Well then… this really had the rhythm of life-and-death parting.

Wei Qian knew he ought to keep a straight face, but he really could not help it. The corners of his mouth twitched for a long while, caught between suppressing it and laughing out loud, unable to find the right frequency. Judging by the visual effect, he felt his expression probably looked closer to a ferocious grin.

But immediately afterward, he inevitably remembered the magazine he had found in Xiao Yuan’s room, and at last he lost all mood to laugh at this love letter that was all “a young heart full of poetry.”

His expression finally turned into a bitter smile. Troubled, he glanced at Wei Zhiyuan and said to him, “Stop standing around watching the show. Go do whatever you’re supposed to be doing. As for you…”

He turned toward Grandma Song.

Grandma Song roared, “Going to school every day just for this! I think she ought to quit school as soon as possible!”

Wei Qian took a step back and sighed. “Can you settle down a little and stop yelling? You’re spraying my whole face.”

Grandma Song also realized that her artillery fire had veered off its target route, and immediately turned toward the neck-shrinking, shoulder-hunched Song Xiaobao and continued roaring, “No. Today you have to give me an explanation. Are you going to study or are you going to fool around with romance!”

Actually, Xiao Bao was genuinely innocent this time. She had no idea which master from the folk world this brain-damaged little-newspaper fanatic actually was. Her backpack had been on her back, and after school she had been jostled around in the crowd at school. If someone had stuffed something into her bag while she was not paying attention, how could she possibly have noticed?

Although her vanity and curiosity did make her heart ripple a little when she saw it, she thought that was only a perfectly normal level of surprise. It was absolutely not as serious as her grandmother was making it out to be.

Even though Grandma had beaten her with the knot end of a broom before, Xiao Bao still was not really afraid of the old lady. The one she was more afraid of was her eldest brother. Peeking at Wei Qian’s expression, she explained meekly, “I didn’t. I really don’t know who stuffed this into my bag.”

Grandma Song bit down on her conclusion and refused to let go. “This definitely isn’t the first time. No, I’m going to your school tomorrow to find your teachers.”

Song Xiaobao said, “Oh, Grandma, if you do that, I won’t be able to show my face at school anymore!”

Grandma Song’s opening and closing mouth had much the same marvelous effect as an Amazon piranha’s steel teeth. She spoke so fast it was impossible to catch the movement of her lips. “And you think you still have face if you don’t study properly and go around dating? I’m telling you, Song Lili, back in the old days this would’ve been a problem of moral conduct, and moral conduct is a major matter, do you understand? Go around acting like a hooligan for no reason and the court could sentence you!”

Song Xiaobao got a little anxious. “I already told you, I didn’t!”

Grandma Song said, “Then how come he didn’t write it to somebody else and wrote it specially to you? You definitely have problems too!”

Faced with her unreasonable grandmother, Song Xiaobao could only start shouting back carelessly, “If a bastard sees a mung bean and likes what it sees, how would I know!”

Grandma Song sharply caught the flaw in her wording. “Oh, so you finally told the truth, have you? A bastard looking at a mung bean? So your eyes met, huh?”

Song Xiaobao: “…”

Whenever she spoke or wrote an essay, if she tried to quote an allusion, an idiom, or a stock saying, nine times out of ten it came out completely mismatched. She had never thought it was any big deal, and even used to joke that it was creative usage. This time, she had finally buried herself alive with that creativity.

Seeing that she still had no sign whatsoever of repentance, Grandma Song rolled up her sleeves, planning to stop talking and start hitting. Only then did Wei Qian unhurriedly step in to stop her. He said to Grandma, “Don’t you have to get up early tomorrow? Go to bed early. I’ll talk to her… All right, it’s not that serious. Don’t get so mad you give yourself high blood pressure. You, come with me.”

Thanks to Wei Zhiyuan, in Wei Qian’s eyes everything now seemed not quite so serious.

Song Xiaobao cast a hateful glance at the troublemaking little newspaper in her eldest brother’s hand and made up her mind. Once she found out who that idiot author was, she was definitely going to cut off all relations with him.

Xiao Bao walked into her eldest brother’s bedroom, which was like a dean of discipline’s office. The moment she shut the door, she began pouring out her grievances, rattling off the entire course of her day and giving a reasonable speculation about how that humiliating love letter had ended up being stuffed into her schoolbag. At the end, she pointed to the sky and swore to declare her position. “I really am not in an early romance. I really don’t know what this is about. Grandma’s just wronging me!”

After saying that, she nervously observed her eldest brother’s reaction. “…Ge?”

Wei Qian had been keeping his head lowered the whole time, seeming as if he were listening to her. But with her understanding of him, Xiao Bao knew there was no way he could be that patient. If he stayed silent for that long, then most likely he had drifted off in thought.

Her call brought Wei Qian back to himself. He suddenly lifted his head and, completely out of left field, blurted out, “The one who wrote this to you, was it a guy?”

Xiao Bao thought she had heard wrong. She could not help stretching her neck a little and asked blankly, “Huh?”

Wei Qian said, “Was it written by a male classmate?”

Xiao Bao felt like she had somehow switched into the wrong channel. Bewildered, she said, “Th-that, it should be, right? Otherwise what?”

Wei Qian discovered with sorrow that he truly did not feel even the slightest anger. He even vaguely felt a bizarre sort of consolation, a strange sense of relief that said, Thank heaven, as long as it’s a guy, that’s fine.

He rubbed his fingertips together. He wanted a cigarette again. Weakly, he waved Song Xiaobao away. “All right, I get it. Go on. If there wasn’t anything, then there wasn’t anything. I believe you this time. Don’t let there be a next time.”

Just like that, Song Xiaobao was released under a general amnesty. As she was leaving, she noticed that Wei Qian had taken out his cigarette pack again. After hesitating a moment, she could not help adding one more sentence. “Ge, the doctor told you to smoke less. He also said your lungs are already smoked into husband-and-wife lung slices.”

Wei Qian said irritably, “Hurry up and get lost. If you lot would just cause me a little less trouble, that’d let me live two years longer better than anything else.”

Hold on… what exactly did he mean by “you lot”?

Song Xiaobao’s ears practically stood up. She felt as if she had just overheard some incredible inside scoop. Could it be that even her second brother, who was gentle, respectful, restrained, and yielding all year round, like the model example from an inspirational textbook, had also gotten into trouble?

The moment she thought of this, her spirits rose in an indescribable way. A certain gleeful pleasure in others’ misfortune swelled up inside her.

Ever since Song Xiaobao had run away from home that one time, her heart had only grown broader and broader… in brief, she had become more and more shameless. Seeing that her eldest brother had not pursued the matter, she very quickly bloomed again at the first bit of sunshine.

And once she bloomed, the words in her heart were like a bird’s intestines, none of them capable of staying inside for very long.

The next day happened to be Saturday. Following Xiong-saozi’s recommendation, Xiao Bao found a fairly professional dance teacher and started learning in a way that really looked the part. Since she had to catch the bus to the teacher’s place early in the morning, she rode partway there on Wei Zhiyuan’s bicycle to the bus stop.

On the road, Xiao Bao cheerfully sold out her beloved eldest brother.

Song Xiaobao said, “Er-ge, what kind of trouble have you gotten into lately? Come on, tell us so everyone can broaden their horizons together, okay?”

Wei Zhiyuan realized that his royal spy had come to report back. Without changing expression, he gave a perfunctory answer and shifted the subject. “What could I possibly have done? Didn’t Ge scold you last night?”

“Ahahaha, not at all.” Sitting on the back seat, Song Xiaobao swayed back and forth. “Last night I was scared so badly my legs were cramping, but in the end Ge was unbelievably easy to talk to.”

Then, without waiting for Wei Zhiyuan to ask, she volunteered the whole story from beginning to end.

At the end Song Xiaobao summarized, “Actually, I think Ge was a little off yesterday. His mind wasn’t at home. And afterward he asked me one especially hilarious question.”

Wei Zhiyuan said, “What did he ask you?”

Song Xiaobao said, “He asked whether the person who wrote me the love letter was a guy. If not a guy, then what would it be? Tell me, isn’t that the weirdest thing ever… Ow!”

Wei Zhiyuan’s handlebars gave a jerk, and the bicycle swerved straight into a pit by the roadside. Fortunately, his bike skills were excellent. He stuck out a foot, braced himself, and rode it back out, and somehow managed not to dump Song Xiaobao into it.

Song Xiaobao patted her chest and said with lingering fear, “That scared me to death, scared me to death. Er-ge, what are you doing?”

Wei Zhiyuan planted a foot to steady the bicycle and said simply, “We’re here. Your bus is coming. Go on.”

Song Xiaobao looked, and sure enough, the bus she needed had just arrived at the stop. She immediately had no time to pursue the matter. Grabbing her bag, she hopped off the bicycle and dashed over with her legs flying like a wild dog off the leash.

Wei Zhiyuan barely managed to keep himself from losing composure, but his palms were already soaked through with cold sweat.

He suddenly understood where his elder brother’s unusual behavior the day before had come from. And yet in a moment of triumph and carelessness, he had still taken the risk and stolen a kiss from him.

Then… had Ge noticed it at the time or not?

At the thought of the opening he had left behind, Wei Zhiyuan’s scalp went numb.

The problem was, how exactly had Ge found out?

That was not right.

In the days that followed, Wei Zhiyuan no longer dared to act rashly. It stayed that way until a week later, when notification came from Zhang Laoban’s side saying that the pre-sale permit could be obtained within a month.

The three parties of shareholders were soon going to hold a phased work summary. Wei Qian felt he had more or less recovered, so he rushed off out of town. Only then did Wei Zhiyuan find an opportunity.

In the dead of night, when everything was silent, Wei Zhiyuan secretly slipped into Wei Qian’s room alone and turned the place upside down from top to bottom. Finally, in the lowest drawer, he found that fatal magazine.

As one of the very few books he had once opened and flipped through, Wei Zhiyuan recognized it at a glance.

No matter how hard Wei Zhiyuan wracked his brains, he could not understand how that thing had escaped his ethnic-cleansing-level carpet search back then. Even more incomprehensible was how it had been such a coincidence that the thing he himself had searched for several times in his own territory without finding had, just by that much bad luck, slammed straight into his brother’s hands.

Wei Zhiyuan put everything back exactly where it had been. At last a line flashed through his mind, one enough to describe his current state of mind perfectly:

Aiya, this is Heaven destroying Chu, not the fault of the war!

Wei Qian left again, and only came back once when it was time to hand in his thesis. He touched down in a hurry, finished turning in the thesis and handling the whole string of defense-related matters, and then ran off again.

And during that return, even though he was only back for two days, he had actually brought gifts for every single person.

It had to be known that the two characters “gift” had basically never existed in Wei Qian’s dictionary in the first place. So when Wei Zhiyuan accepted with both hands that basketball with the signature of some star player he had no interest in knowing, what he felt inside was pure astonishment.

But when Wei Zhiyuan tilted his head, he discovered that his elder brother was observing his reaction with a probing look. The teenager immediately put on a somewhat innocent smile as a reflex, soothing him, pretending that he was delighted and liked it very much.

At the same time, Wei Zhiyuan understood.

No one knew how exactly his elder brother had arrived at this conclusion, but he had concluded that Wei Zhiyuan had gone down the “crooked path” because he lacked love.

And the continuous series of open and hidden family conflicts seemed to have dealt Wei Qian quite a blow. He was trying to improve his image as the great dictator of the household.

When Xiao Bao bounced all over the house in the new clothes Wei Qian had brought back, Wei Zhiyuan watched with his own eyes as Wei Qian forcibly beat apart his own tightly furrowed brows, working hard to put on a kindly expression.

…Even though his understanding of “kindly” might have been a little off. No matter how one looked at that expression, it was more “smiling skin without smiling flesh,” as if at any moment he were about to get up and go back to his usual cold sarcasm.

Song Xiaobao was already used to her brother’s bad expression and cutting mockery. She had been waiting all along, but it never came. In the end, she became unaccustomed to that instead.

Before Wei Qian picked up his luggage and left once more, Xiao Bao went up to him and, almost asking to be scolded, said, “Ge, this time when you came back, how come you didn’t say anything to me?”

Wei Qian said, “What would I say to you? What did you do this time?”

Song Xiaobao answered so casually that the words slipped straight out of her mouth. “Oh, I was one point short of passing Chinese on my midterm, and for the parent signature I had Er-ge sign it for me.”

Wei Qian lifted his head and looked at her in vexation. Only then did Song Xiaobao realize what she had done, and in a panic she clapped a hand over her mouth.

As one might imagine, thanks to Song Xiaobao’s tireless sabotage, the ultimate fate of Wei Qian’s kindly mask was that not even the bones were left.

By the next time Wei Qian had some free time and came back, the season had already shifted again from high summer to the end of the year. Their short, fast-turnover housing project had been packaged by Zhang Laoban into something that looked extremely high-end. By the time all autumn had passed, the only work left was a bit of finishing-up. Once spring came next year, the construction could immediately be inspected and accepted, and sales had also practically reached their final phase.

They had put in thirty million. Later, Lao Xiong had gradually scraped together another ten million plus, for a total investment of more than forty million. Judging by the current situation, they were basically looking at more than doubling it.

Lao Xiong was so happy he looked like a gourd. With Wei Qian and San Pang in tow, he came back brimming with pride.

They had strained and stretched to jump for it, and in the end they really had crossed this threshold.

The day they came back, Lao Xiong held his chest high like he was returning home in glory. Full of emotion, he said to San Pang and Wei Qian, “You two brats really gave me face this time. From now on I’ll be able to hold my head up in front of your saozi! From now on… sigh, I won’t even ask her to be like a Japanese wife and prepare slippers for me every day and welcome the master home. At least give me a few smiling faces, that’s not too much, right? This is the kind of life a real man ought to live!”

San Pang and Wei Qian both turned their faces away at the same time. What kind of ambition was that?

Lao Xiong said, “All right, that’s enough. This whole life of ours, charging about like troops on campaign, has finally made a start. Everybody’s worked hard lately, so go home and rest up for a few days. Weekend, it’s agreed, come out and celebrate! Oh right, Qian’er, dress a little nicer when you come. Your saozi’s still been thinking about introducing you to someone.”

San Pang’s eyes lit up. “Xiong-ge, what about me?”

Lao Xiong patted his belly. “I’ll introduce you to an advertiser and have you film a special-effects slimming-pill commercial. Forty million! For only forty million! Losing ten jin is no dream! And if you don’t lose it, no refunds…”

When Wei Qian got home, it was just the afternoon. Grandma Song came out to greet him. “You’re back! What do you want to eat? Grandma will make it for you.”

Wei Qian had only just set his things down and had not yet had time to speak when he saw the door to Wei Zhiyuan’s room open. His younger brother, who had become more and more worrisome and at the same time more and more striking, gave him a warm smile. “Ge.”

Wei Qian froze for a moment, then reacted. “Hey, why are you at home? Didn’t you go to school?”

Grandma Song started shouting excitedly, “He won several prizes in a competition! Aiya, I don’t understand what prizes exactly, but anyway it must definitely be first place, right, Xiao Yuan? He’s just like you, doesn’t even have to take the college entrance exam. Ai, the blue smoke rising from the graves would go up thirty li for this!”

“Then it’d turn into a forest fire.” Wei Qian turned to Wei Zhiyuan. “When did this happen? Why didn’t you tell me?”

Grandma Song started clamoring again. “This kid said you were busy and wouldn’t let us bother you over such a small matter… Ai, tell me, is this a small matter? Back in our hometown this would call for a banquet!”

Wei Zhiyuan bent down to help Wei Qian carry the suitcase into the room and said lightly, “It really wasn’t anything.”

Now he was even staying calm in honor and disgrace. A wave of sorrow that children grew up beyond their fathers’ control stirred in Wei Qian’s heart. What made him feel even sadder was that this child Xiao Yuan was simply perfect in every way, except…

Speaking of which, has that problem of his gotten better yet or not?

While Wei Zhiyuan was helping him sort out his things, Wei Qian casually probed him with a sentence. “You’ve graduated high school now too, so from here on out you count as an adult. Whatever you want to do, I won’t keep nagging and trying to control you anymore… Mm, getting a girlfriend would be fine too.”

Wei Zhiyuan had just reached toward a scattered stack of paper documents. The moment he heard that, his hand dropped from midair and landed directly on the back of Wei Qian’s hand. “Ge, I’m not planning to find a girlfriend.”

Wei Qian’s heart tightened.

Wei Zhiyuan raised his eyes and looked at him. His gaze was deep, as if a whole world of shifting depths were hidden inside it. But after a moment of silence, he still withdrew his hand. At the same time, he gave a thoroughly healthy and upward-looking reason. “Studying and getting more professional practice should be more important, right? Time is so precious. I don’t want to start dating this early.”

Wei Qian nodded, not in very high spirits. With a faint pain in his stomach, he thought: Still not better. What a headache.

At the same time, Wei Zhiyuan lowered his eyes and thought with some melancholy: Even touching his hand like this doesn’t get the slightest reaction. Has he really not thought in that direction at all? What a headache.

That evening, the moment Xiao Bao got back, she noisily demanded a gift from her brother.

Wei Qian gave a self-mocking smile. “Well now, give one once, and by the second time you already know to ask for it yourself. I tossed it on your bed. Go look for yourself.”

Song Xiaobao was overjoyed.

Grandma Song could not help asking, “Why are you so late today? Did you eat?”

“I ate. I ate with Lulu-jie. Oh, and I also saw Xiong-ge. I don’t know what was wrong with him, but when he got home today he was sticking his stomach out and curling his mouth, just like some rich old landlord. Then Lulu-jie flicked her hand and said to him, ‘Go cook,’ and Xiong-ge transformed into a hired farmhand in one second, slinking off to wash vegetables and make dinner.”

“Lulu-jie” was Xiong-saozi. Xiong-saozi’s given name was Chen Lu, so fresh and delicate that hearing it made one think of a little flower just starting to bloom in the first ray of morning light.

Unfortunately… names could be deceiving.

“Lulu-jie is really great, but today she said to me, ‘Xiao Bao, you’re seventeen, I’m thirty-four, old enough to have two of you. Stop using that slick little mouth of yours to call me jie. Just call me godmother instead’… Aiya! This is really pretty, thanks, Ge. Then I told her, ‘Hahahaha, Jie, stop joking around. Wouldn’t that mess up the generations? You’d be indirectly taking advantage of my Ge!’”

As this girl talked, she was taking off her coat, changing her shoes, and then running to her room to look at the gift. After making a big fuss over it, she picked up the thread of her own conversation again. The entire chain of movements and background sound effects flowed together in one go. After Grandma Song, she had become the family’s second great chatterbox. Basically nobody else had any room to cut in. By herself she could put on a one-woman monologue drama of love and hate.

At first, listening to it felt rather intimate. But later on, Wei Qian longed to sew that endlessly chattering mouth of hers shut.

In the blink of an eye, the weekend arrived. Wei Qian first accompanied his chattering, parrot-like little sister to buy a new pair of dance shoes, then took his love-starved younger brother to the neighborhood activity center for a one-on-one basketball game. Later, though, it clearly turned into Wei Zhiyuan accompanying him just for fun instead. Wei Qian’s skills were truly awful. He had hardly ever played with boys his own age, and during his school years, his contact with basketball had been limited to just a handful of PE classes.

Of all sports, the only one he was fairly proficient in was rough-and-ready fighting picked up outside the formal system. But now that he wore a suit and sat in an office all day, he suspected that in a few years even that one thing he was good at would go to waste.

Of course, that was not important. What was important was that Wei Qian hoped to spend more time with Wei Zhiyuan and understand a little better what exactly he was thinking.

After spending such a full day, Wei Qian went that evening to the celebration banquet Lao Xiong had arranged.

Xiong-saozi did not come. She had apparently had something come up at the last minute, so naturally the matter of introducing him to someone also came to nothing. For reasons he himself did not understand, Wei Qian let out a sigh of relief.

He suspected Lao Xiong had gotten too full of himself after going home and been thoroughly dealt with by his wife. He looked especially haggard, even with puffy eyelids.

From beginning to end, only San Pang was clowning around and livening things up. Lao Xiong’s mood was low the whole time, and in the end he even got drunk.

When Lao Xiong got drunk, he did not make a scene. Without saying a word, he just sat there in a sulk by himself, as though his ears had stopped working. No matter who talked to him, he ignored them.

When it was time to break up, San Pang finally pushed him. “Xiong-ge, want me to hail a cab and send you back? Drunk like this, will saozi even let you through the door? Why not just find a hotel and make do for the night?”

With that shove from San Pang, Lao Xiong toppled the other way and crashed into Wei Qian.

Wei Qian froze. The next moment, Lao Xiong suddenly grabbed up the hem of Wei Qian’s clothes and pulled it over his own face, then without any warning burst into loud howling sobs.

He cried as though his liver and intestines were breaking. By the end even his voice had gone completely hoarse, and what came out was almost an indescribable, unbearable howl and cry of pain vented from the deepest part of his soul, hardly even human in sound.

Both Wei Qian and San Pang were frightened and rigid.

Only after he had cried himself into exhausted sleep did the two of them carry Lao Xiong together to a hotel and put him up there for the night. In the meantime they ran through countless possible tragedies, bankruptcy, terminal illness, both parents dead, being cuckolded, and so on.

The two of them spent the whole night uneasy, yet when this big fathead fish got up the next morning and they asked him about it, they discovered that he actually had no memory of any of it at all.

So it turned out that crying when he got drunk was just this guy’s own personal trademark. Having had their feelings wasted for nothing, San Pang and Wei Qian angrily joined forces to beat him up, then each went back to his own home.

Wei Qian had to go home and deal with Wei Zhiyuan.

He had decided that no matter how long the back-and-forth tug-of-war might take, he was going to wrench this kid back off the crooked road.

This was a battle.