Chapter 5: Integrity
Xiahou Ming returned home in a daze.
She locked herself in the small room.
Outside the window, the lights of the small town lit up one by one, casting mottled shadows on the yellowed newspaper walls.
Everything that happened in the classroom in the evening kept replaying in her mind like a black and white movie full of noise.
That girl’s face.
That girl’s voice.
That girl’s smile.
There was also the recorder belonging to Ling Yicai that she threw at her feet.
She took the white plastic tube out of her schoolbag.
It no longer had the scent of anyone on it, only the dust from the classroom floor.
She wiped it clean with her sleeve and tucked it into the deepest corner under the bed.
She lay on the bed and covered her eyes with her arms.
In the darkness, she began to force herself to calm down.
No, at the end of the day, it was just a guy that no one cared about.
She began to recall what that girl looked like: thin, pale, always sitting in the corner, like a plant that couldn’t stand the light.
That’s right… there’s nothing to worry about…
She said to herself.
No one would believe her.
A marginalized person, a weirdo, who would believe her words?
Tomorrow, if I did nothing, this ridiculous “game” would disintegrate like a fart.
This thought, like a cheap sedative, calmed Xiahou Ming’s pounding heart a little.
She even began to feel angry and ashamed of her own evening behavior.
I was actually scared by that guy?
Ridiculous.
She sat up and clenched her fists.
This body was still weak, but she felt that the “guts” that belonged to the old Xiahou Ming, who controlled everything in the classroom, had returned a little.
Just then, there was a knock on the door.
“Xiaoya?” came her mother’s voice, with a cautious tenderness, “Come out for dinner.”
Xiahou Ming felt a tightness in his chest.
The bit of courage that had just ignited in him was instantly extinguished.
She hesitated for a long time before opening the door.
On the table were two dishes and a soup: a plate of stir-fried vegetables, the leaves a little yellow; a plate of pickled cucumbers, leftover from breakfast; and a bowl of watery egg drop soup, with very little egg droplets.
Her mother sat opposite her, looking at her with a delighted and critical look.
“Xiaoya, do you like today’s food?” She picked up a piece of vegetables with chopsticks and handed it to her “daughter”.
Xiahou Ming didn’t say anything, just buried his head in the rice in the bowl.
The rice was hard and must have been left over from the previous night.
“Have you made any new friends at school?” her mother asked, not caring whether she answered or not.
“Girls should chat with their classmates more often, and not be like before, always alone.”
Before?
Which before?
Xiahou Ming almost shouted this out loud.
“Xiaoya, why are you still wearing boys’ clothes?” She finally got to the point and frowned.
“It doesn’t look good at all.”
I’m not Xiaoya!
Xiahou Ming roared in her heart, but said nothing.
She knew that arguing was useless.
Arguing with her mother was like fighting with a ball of cotton; it would only make her feel weaker.
After dinner, she wanted to retreat to her room immediately.
But her mother stopped her.
“Xiaoya, come here, mommy will show you something good.”
She took Xiahou Ming’s hand and walked to her room.
She took something out of an old locked wooden box that smelled of mothballs.
It’s a dress.
The style is very old, made of that kind of Dacron fabric, printed with small outdated floral patterns, but it can be seen that it has been well preserved.
“This was my mother’s favorite when she was young.”
Mother’s face was filled with a happy glow, immersed in memories.
She stroked her skirt as if it were a rare treasure.
“Back then, Mom was an announcer at the factory.
Every time she wore this skirt to broadcast, the young men would lean against the windows to watch.
Now, it’s too small for Mom.
Xiaoya, try it on.
It’s sure to look great.”
She looked at Xiahou Ming with an irresistible look that was a mixture of maternal love and morbidity.
“I don’t want it.” Xiahou Ming finally couldn’t bear it anymore.
She shook off her mother’s hand and said, “I said I’m not Xiaoya!
I’m your son!
Xiahou Ming!”
The smile on the mother’s face disappeared in an instant.
Instead, there was a hurt expression that looked like it was about to cry.
“Why are you saying that again…
You child, how can you be so ignorant?” Her tears flowed down, and her voice began to tremble.
“Have those bad guys come looking for you again?
Tell me, I’ll go to the temple tomorrow to get you a talisman…”
It’s the same thing again.
Xiahou Ming felt a wave of exhaustion running through her bones.
She knew that what was coming would be endless crying, begging, and perhaps even a seizure.
In the end, she compromised.
Just like the countless times in the past when I compromised to make my mother take her medicine on time.
She took the funny dress and went into her room.
The cool fabric of the skirt clung to her skin, and the waist was constricted uncomfortably.
The hem of the skirt brushed against her calves, giving her goosebumps and a strange, unfamiliar feeling.
She looked in the mirror.
The girl wearing an old-fashioned floral dress and with a numb expression.
She felt that the person in the mirror was laughing at her.
She stretched out her hand and tried to touch the mirror, but the cold feeling at her fingertips made her shiver.
Mother pushed open the door and walked in with a comb in her hand.
She walked behind Xiahou Ming and began to help her comb her messy long hair in a clumsy but loving way.
“My Xiaoya is so beautiful.” She said dreamily.
Xiahou Ming looked in the mirror.
Looking at the unfamiliar “her” in the mirror who is “loved” by her mother.
Looking at the mother’s face, which looked old due to mental illness, but was filled with a strange glow because of the return of her “daughter”.
She thought of the empty rice jar.
She remembered the prescription the doctor wrote her, which she needed to renew next week.
All her previous self-comfort and that ridiculous bit of backbone were completely crushed by reality at this moment.
Do you believe what that weirdo said?
Or not?
Does it matter?
She thought to herself.
If I get kicked out of school, who will pay for my medicine next week?
Who will pay for next month’s meals?
Me?
With a hand that can’t even unscrew a bottle cap?
No.
A thought, like a poisonous snake, once again coiled in her mind.
She couldn’t be kicked out of school, she needed this place.
She needed to get money from those who were weaker than her.
She began to plan specifically in her mind, and the faces of those “fat sheep” in the class who wore electronic watches and ran small shops at home appeared one by one.
The alleys after school, the empty toilets… the places she was familiar with.
She instantly felt that she had found her direction again.
As for that weirdo and her ridiculous “game”?
Fck it.
Xiahou Ming looked at himself in the mirror wearing a funny dress, and a flame from the past was rekindled in his eyes.