Xingzhou City (15)
“Did you come all the way here without saying a word just to play ghost and scare me?”
Tan Guhong cast a cold glance at Luo Jingming and was about to walk over to turn on the light when, passing by him, he suddenly grabbed her by the wrist.
He pulled hard, and she fell straight into his arms.
She struggled to get up, but he restrained both her hands, and scorching kisses came down upon her in a torrent.
The number of times they had been intimate was long past counting, but this time was different from every other. Before, no matter how lost in passion he became, there had always been three parts tenderness and restraint in him. But at this very moment, he was forceful, domineering, determined to have his way, leaving no room for doubt, invading and taking without the slightest hesitation.
Amid the familiar scent of mint, an abrupt tang of scorched tobacco filled her nose. Rarely did he fail to remove his glasses, yet this time he had left them on. The cold metal frames scraped against her skin from time to time, raising shivers across her body.
All these unfamiliar sensations converged into an unprecedented sense of oppression. She could not move at all, held in his arms as he kissed her until her lips and tongue ached, her heart trembling.
For a moment, a trace of fear arose within her. The man before her was like a poppy, seductive and dazzling, drawing people into intoxication without a sound. Yet behind the temptation lay an abyss of immeasurable depth, a pitch-black hell. Once she fell in, there would be no escape.
Forcing herself to steady her mind, she caught his lower lip between hers and bit down.
His body shuddered, and a muffled sound came from his throat, seeming part pain and part restraint. The metallic sweetness of blood instantly spread through both their mouths.
At last, the kiss ended. They slowly drew apart, yet their gazes remained locked together. Their heavy breathing mingled in the darkness until neither could tell where one ended and the other began.
She had bitten his lip open, and vivid red blood slowly seeped out, but there was still a smile in his eyes.
“Second time, hmm? You really do like biting people, Miss.”
Memories of their intimacy in the past broke through the surface. Tan Guhong's heart faltered slightly. She drew several deep breaths before asking in return, “Who was it who said he'd quit smoking?”
He chuckled, crushed the cigarette in his hand into the ashtray beside them, and said unhurriedly, “Don't you always say I'm a liar? You believe what a liar says?”
Whether she believed him or not, hadn't they both still ended up here today?
“What are you doing here?”
“Unable to sleep alone, unable to sleep at night, so I came especially to find you.”
She gave a derisive laugh. “Are you short of bed companions?”
He paused, then answered unhurriedly, “We agreed on a buy-one-get-one-free deal. Once tonight is over, there won't be another chance.”
She stared steadily into his eyes in the darkness, trying to distinguish how much was false and how much was sincere through the night mingled with the haze of nicotine smoke, but in the end, she could not.
“What is this supposed to be?” She gave a soft laugh. “Goodbye sex?”
He held her and adjusted their positions until she was sitting on him. Unhurriedly, he used his teeth to undo the lace ties of her clothing, then kissed the wild goose tattoo on her skin, its wings seemingly about to take flight. His voice was low and muffled.
“Whatever you say it is, then that's what it is.”
Her face gradually flushed, yet her eyes grew colder and colder, while inside she felt utterly indifferent.
Fine, then. Between men and women, fleeting affairs and passing romances had never needed a reason. The real joke would be someone digging to the bottom of things, asking for wholehearted devotion.
If this was just a game, who said she couldn't play too?
Right here, on this sofa, in a very awkward position.
Perhaps there really was something different between a man and a woman after they had shared such physical intimacy. No matter how distant they might be with their words, the reactions of their bodies could not lie.
After that, all words became meaningless. Reason was cast far beyond the heavens, leaving only primitive instinct. He was a man, and she was a woman.
The two of them did not stop until dawn. By the end, it was no longer about pleasure.
She was exhausted and desperately sleepy. Impatiently, she pushed him away, saying she had to catch a flight in the morning, yet he still clung to her like a shadow. He kissed her, and a mouthful of warm liquid was passed into her mouth. She swallowed reflexively, then choked and began coughing.
It was coffee.
He laughed softly beside her ear. “Since this is goodbye sex, shouldn't we stay awake and remember each other properly?”
……
The next morning, Tan Guhong's head was heavy and her whole body ached, but she still got up on time, picked up her luggage, and left the room.
Thanks to that mouthful of coffee, she had not slept all night, and she knew he had not slept either.
He had held her from behind, burying his head in the crook of her neck. The two of them understood each other without words, simply enduring it second by second until the world outside the window grew bright, morning light fell across the head of the bed, and the alarm clock rang deafeningly.
Actually, she had been waiting. She had been waiting all along, waiting for him to say something.
Anything would have been enough, except those flirtations about romance and desire, except those ambiguities that drew close and then pulled away, except those provocations that might have been false affection or genuine feeling.
An explanation, or perhaps an attempt to make her stay. She silently told herself that as long as he spoke, no matter how absurd, no matter how clumsy his words were, she would believe him.
But in the end, he said nothing, and she did not mention a single word either.
She truly cared about Polina's existence, but she had not lost her composure enough to impulsively believe that there was really something between the two of them.
The problem between her and him had never been Polina, nor Luo Zhanpeng. But what it actually was, even she could not explain.
She had always held the word “love” in contempt. Not only did she have no experience with relationships, she had barely watched a handful of romance films. The back-and-forth between men and women, the games they played against each other, she knew only what it looked like, not why it was that way. In the end, it was nothing more than two people clinging to their pride, neither willing to speak first.
As though whoever spoke first was the one who lost.
……
The moment the door to the room closed, Luo Jingming, lying on the bed, slowly opened his eyes. He stared blankly at the empty space beside him for a long while.
Out of the corner of his eye, he happened to notice something protruding from the bedside table. He rose in confusion to take a look. It turned out to be a stack of new banknotes. He counted them. Not too much, not too little, exactly eight hundred.
Suddenly, he remembered the joke the two of them had made back then on the cruise ship during the captain's dinner.
He could not help laughing. At first it was a soft chuckle, then it became loud laughter, and finally he fell back onto the bed, laughing until his whole body trembled.
After a long while, the laughter finally stopped.
He lay perfectly still, staring expressionlessly at the ceiling for a long time. Slowly, he raised his right hand and covered his face, hiding every emotion.
In the silent room, his soft murmur echoed:
“Whatever you want to know, I'll tell you everything……”
……
The flight Tan Guhong took from Singapore Changi Airport to Beijing Capital International Airport lasted fourteen hours, with a stopover and transfer at Phnom Penh International Airport in Cambodia along the way.
Coffee really was more effective for her than any miracle drug. During the journey, she tried to fall asleep but failed. Her body was utterly exhausted, yet her nerves remained highly agitated, leaving her miserable and irritable.
During the transfer in Phnom Penh, she could bear it no longer and ran into the airport restroom, splashing cold water over her face in an attempt to dispel the fogginess in her head.
The icy water washed over her face, and she instinctively shuddered, managing to wake herself up a little.
She raised her head and stared steadily at her reflection in the mirror. Cold water trickled down from her bangs and along her temples. Her mind was empty, and her heart seemed empty too.
The so-called getting drunk and enjoying each other's company, only to part once sober, was nothing more than an inability to endure loneliness.
In this life, caught between love and desire, everyone came and went alone, was born alone and died alone. Who among them was not lonely on this journey? She had indeed been alone all these years, but she had never been so lonely that she lost herself. Otherwise, she would have long since given up struggling, married, had children, and simply accepted whatever life brought her.
People said that those in the middle of things could not see clearly. Now that she looked back, what had the past few months even been? She had been like a childish woman who had never been in love, meeting a man who was smooth-talking and good-looking, losing her head, and falling straight in. They had tangled themselves together, only to end up parting ways completely.
How embarrassing.
She gave a self-mocking smile.
Just where had things begun to spiral out of control?
Was it the slow dancing in the gardens at Marina Bay, the sky full of stars on Paradise Island in the Maldives, or the setting sun over the Ferris wheel in Liverpool? Or perhaps earlier still, the moment they could not restrain themselves beneath the aurora in Iceland, or the passionate tango on the captain's dinner. Even earlier than that, on the night of the earthquake in that equatorial country, when he carried her the long eight kilometers home?
At the very beginning, she had simply been too careless, too confident.
Perhaps two strangers should never have traveled together so easily in the first place. Watching the stars, snow, and moon along the way, seeing mountains and rivers, heaven and earth, and all the people of the world, sharing food, clothing, shelter, transportation, and all the ordinary warmth of human life, they had accidentally tangled their lives together.
But fortunately, she was long past the age when heartbreak was bigger than the sky. Even if they broke up, the sky would not come crashing down.
Sleep well, wake well. Tomorrow would be another new day.
“Ah!”
Suddenly, a cry rang out from inside the restroom, pulling Tan Guhong back from her wandering thoughts into reality.
She froze for a moment, then instinctively looked over.
“Help, help, is anyone there……? Somebody, please save me!”
It was Chinese.
Tan Guhong suddenly remembered the Asian-looking pregnant woman who had entered behind her just moments ago. Her heart tightened. She hastily wiped her face and went over to check.
Among the row of stalls, the door of the second-to-last one stood wide open, and a pool of blood was slowly flowing out from beneath it.
Tan Guhong hurried over and saw that it was indeed the pregnant woman from earlier, who had fallen beside the toilet.
The pregnant woman clutched her stomach, sweat pouring from her forehead from the pain. When she saw someone approaching, she hurriedly cried for help.
“Please, please, save me. Save my baby!”
“Don't worry. I'll save you!”
Tan Guhong grabbed the woman's arm and tried to help her up.
“Can you stand?”
“N-no, I can't. It hurts so much. My stomach hurts so badly……”
“Are you with anyone?”
“No. M-my husband couldn't come to pick me up today……”
Tan Guhong could not lift her by herself, and the restroom was deserted. She had no choice but to turn and run outside to find someone.
She shouted for help in English. The cleaning lady outside the restroom and two security guards not far away immediately came running over. Following Tan Guhong's directions, they lifted the pregnant woman and carried her outside.
Tan Guhong was about to leave, but the pregnant woman anxiously grabbed her hand and pleaded, “Don't go. Please, I'm so scared. I don't speak English. I can't understand what they're saying.”
Tan Guhong glanced down at her watch. There was still some time before her flight departed, so she decided to see the pregnant woman onto the ambulance before leaving.
The group exited through an airport emergency passage and headed straight for an ambulance parked outside. The rear doors opened, and several medical workers bundled up from head to toe climbed out and came forward to receive the pregnant woman from the security guards' arms.
Suddenly, Tan Guhong sensed that something was wrong. No one had called for emergency assistance from beginning to end, so why had the ambulance arrived so quickly?
Her steps slowed.
The pregnant woman noticed her reaction and immediately dug her fingernails hard into Tan Guhong's arm, shouting:
“Move!”
In an instant, the medical workers, security guards, and cleaning lady all lunged at Tan Guhong. She reacted swiftly, striking back.
Unfortunately, they not only outnumbered her, but every one of them was a trained fighter. Tan Guhong barely managed to fend them off from one side to the other, and after a few exchanges, she was gradually running out of strength.
Suddenly, an iron rod slammed viciously into the back of her knee from behind. She let out a muffled groan and dropped to one knee. Someone behind her pounced forward and pressed a towel, already soaked in ether, tightly over her nose and mouth.
Tan Guhong struggled a few times before her vision gradually blurred. Darkness swallowed her sight, and just like that, she lost consciousness.