Peaches and Plums Don’t Speak – Chapter 103
by Little PandaA Village Night (Part 1)
The cool train car, the faint rumble of motion, and the sound of a child in the neighboring seat. In her grogginess, Anzhi tilted her head and slipped off the shoulder of the person beside her.
A hand reached over to support her head. Anzhi took the opportunity to lean against her shoulder, looking out the window at the endless expanse of green. In the distance were pale mountains and grid-like fields.
Anzhi blinked slowly.
“Did you have a dream?” Yan Xi asked softly.
During the summer vacation after her second year of university, Anzhi celebrated her eighteenth birthday. And she made a decision: to return to her birthplace, where she had lived for over five years.
Yan Xi adjusted her schedule to take a week off to accompany her.
They took the high-speed train. On the way, Anzhi fell asleep. In a haze, her limbs seemed to have shrunk back into a tiny form, sitting in a seat that felt overly large to her. And beside her was Tao Zhenzhen, resting with her eyes closed behind sunglasses.
Her mind was in a daze, and she suddenly became terrified. It was as if thirteen years of growth had vanished in an instant, and she had never met Yan Xi.
It wasn’t until Yan Xi’s hand came over, until she opened her mouth to ask her, that Anzhi’s heart slowly settled down. She instinctively leaned close to Yan Xi and shook her head. “No.”
Yan Xi smiled at her and patted her, telling her to go back to sleep.
When the high-speed train arrived at the station, they took a taxi to the town.
In the countryside in July, the summer was deepening. Far from the hustle and bustle of the city, large expanses of fields lay beneath the continuous, rolling mountains.
The village was not desolate. For transportation, people mostly used electric scooters and bicycles, and there were also private cars. It was just that the buildings varied wildly—some tall, some short, clearly self-built with no uniformity. There was also the requisite Ancestral Hall found in every village. Beside the Ancestral Hall stood a very old tree with a very thick trunk, upon which many red cloth strips were tied.
Before coming, Anzhi had asked Tao Zhenzhen for the address and the phone number of a relative. They hadn’t been back in all these years, and the house had been entrusted to someone else for cleaning.
Yan Xi, who had grown up in a modernized metropolis and had at most only visited the countryside during university social practice or internships, felt a sense of novelty toward this kind of southern small town. Especially since this was the place where Anzhi was born, she also felt a natural sense of intimacy toward it.
Anzhi had thought she wouldn’t remember much of her life here. But as they got out of the car and walked along the small riverbank, those memories naturally surfaced in her mind.
Her grandfather riding a bicycle to take her fishing, flying kites, and holding her hand to go pray at the Ancestral Hall.
She even remembered a mahogany door right in the center of the Ancestral Hall. Legend had it that during the Guangxu1 years of the Qing Dynasty, the village had produced a Jinshi2, and the door was placed in the Ancestral Hall. According to the elders, as long as one stepped over it, they would pass every exam3 and even achieve high rankings. However, only boys were allowed to cross it; girls were not permitted.
“There’s such a thing?” Yan Xi raised an eyebrow.
Anzhi smiled. She remembered her first time at the Ancestral Hall—she was three or four years old. Looking up, the door had seemed so tall. A large flower made of red cloth was tied to the top of the door. Seeing the other little boys go to cross it, she had wanted to go too, but the adults told her she couldn’t.
She didn’t understand. Blinking her dark, gleaming eyes, she nodded obediently, but then took small steps forward. She was only so tall back then, wearing a little skirt, and hugged the edge of the door with arms like tender lotus roots. Her look of “if you don’t let me cross, I’ll hold on and won’t let go” amused all the surrounding adults.
“And what happened then?” Yan Xi laughed, able to imagine her as a child with puffed-up fair and tender cheeks, looking adorably serious.
Later, Anzhi naturally crossed it. Her grandfather had smilingly agreed.
They talked as they walked. Perhaps they were too eye-catching; Yan Xi wore a long dress and a large sun hat, looking just like a model who had stepped out of a magazine.
Anzhi’s relative, a person she had to call Relative Aunt, had her eyes light up when she saw Yan Xi. She looked her up and down. “You look just like that person on TV… Oh my, you’re really too beautiful.”
Yan Xi smiled. “You’ve mistaken me for someone else.” The accent of the southern small town was soft and fine; it really was the place where Anzhi had grown up.
“Really? Oh my, it’s really too similar.” Relative Aunt turned her eyes to Anzhi. “I didn’t even dare to recognize you, meimei.”
The village called little girls meimei, and little boys didi4.
Anzhi’s grandfather’s ashes had already been placed in a nunnery in the mountains, but an incense burner was set up in the Ancestral Hall. Relative Aunt led them to the Ancestral Hall and had Anzhi offer incense to her grandfather.
“Sigh, your mother has only come back once. During the holidays and festivals, there’s been no one to offer incense to your grandfather. Now that you’re here, it’s good.”
Anzhi pursed her lips, holding the incense as she knelt down.
“Death is like a lamp going out.” The saying of a “soul in heaven” may or may not be true, but as descendants, they still hoped to have a place where they could entrust their grief.
Anzhi offered the incense and kowtowed three times, her eyes already red.
At this time, Yan Xi also knelt down beside her. Anzhi stared at her blankly. Yan Xi copied her actions, offering incense, and then kowtowing. She reached out to pull her up, giving her a gentle, comforting smile.
Later, when Anzhi took some joss paper5 outside to burn, Yan Xi asked Anzhi’s Relative Aunt: “Are there any other memorial activities? Do we need to burn joss paper or other things for the deceased?”
“Ah! Right, meimei’s mother also gave me some money, asking me to handle it for her every Qingming Festival6. Sigh.”
“Is that so,” Yan Xi was thoughtful, then said to Relative Aunt: “Anzhi is eighteen now, and she also needs to show her respects to her grandfather. Could I ask you to handle it for her together in the future for Qingming, the New Year, and her grandfather’s birthday…”
“Ah…” Relative Aunt was taken aback, then smiled. “Meimei is still young. She won’t need to until she gets married.”
“Is that so?” Yan Xi smiled in embarrassment, but she was thinking further ahead. “Can I have your contact information? There might be things I’ll have to trouble you with in the future. But don’t worry, I will have the money prepared. This is my contact information. I’m from Beicheng…”
Seeing Yan Xi’s appearance, temperament, demeanor, and conversation—her way of speaking and acting made people feel incredibly comfortable—Relative Aunt couldn’t wait to befriend her, so how could she disagree? The strange thing was that, searching her memory, she didn’t remember the Tao family having such a figure.
Yan Xi smiled and answered, “I am her family.”
Coming out from paying respects at the Ancestral Hall, Anzhi finally arrived at her home.
Most buildings in the village were two or three stories tall, and there were even villas, but her home had only one story.
Because her grandfather had passed away, Tao Zhenzhen also had not come back to live.
The house was also very empty. According to village custom, after a family member passed away, none of their worldly possessions7 from when they were alive could be left behind.
The living room still had a TV, the bedroom had a bed, there was a water heater, and the kitchen had some simple cooking utensils.
The house had been cleaned, but it still carried the desolation of a place long uninhabited.
“Is it okay to stay here? It’s a bit simple and crude.” Anzhi was afraid Yan Xi wouldn’t be used to staying here.
Yan Xi rubbed her hair, pushing the suitcase into the house. After tidying up a bit, they went to the market to buy groceries.
Anzhi’s Relative Aunt told her that the village didn’t have a morning market, but an afternoon market. She had some impression of it. The wet market was very large, with a rough layout of sections but not particular about the details. There were vegetables, fish, meat, and fruit, as well as general stores and even small supermarkets. It was bustling with noise and excitement, full of the busy smoke and fire8 of everyday life.
Yan Xi noticed that they weren’t speaking Mandarin, but a local dialect. Anzhi already couldn’t speak it anymore.
The village was small, and everyone knew everyone. The moment the two of them appeared in the wet market, they drew many gazes.
Anzhi bought some rice, vegetables and fruit, and bought a fish. The fish-selling uncle cleanly sliced it up for her.
“There’s no delivery here. Everyone cooks for themselves,” Anzhi said to Yan Xi. “Let’s eat fish slice congee9 tonight.”
Returning home, it was already evening. The edge of the sky was a fiery red, possessing a boisterous kind of beauty.
The ankles by the hem of the skirt could even still feel the rolling hot summer heat from the ground.
Yan Xi held her camera, squinted, and took several pictures.
Putting down the lens, the little girl from the neighbor’s house was biting her fingers and staring at her. She smiled at her, and the little girl smiled too—a smile missing two front teeth—before she covered her mouth and ran away shyly.
After the congee was cooked, Anzhi scooped some into a large bowl, and also filled two small bowls. The house didn’t have air conditioning, and it was uncomfortably hot and stuffy. The hair on her forehead was completely soaked.
Just as she was thinking about what to do, Yan Xi carried a floor fan10 in. “Borrowed from the neighbors.”
Following behind was a seven- or eight-year-old little girl. Anzhi took a small bag of lychees and apples and handed it to her. She was too embarrassed to take it and ran away again. Anzhi followed behind her and gave the fruit to the parents.
Even with the fan, they still sweat a lot while drinking the congee. The milky-white fish meat and verdant green cilantro were extremely fresh and sweet. Yan Xi drank two bowls, and after finishing, she took the initiative to wash the dishes.
By the time the sun set and the night curtain fell, a clear breeze gently blew, completely dispelling the summer heat.
Coming out of the shower, Yan Xi held a towel, wiping her hair while facing the evening wind. Only then did she let out a comfortable sigh.
The countryside at night was completely silent, with only the chirping of some unknown insects. The cool breeze was refreshing, the twilight gathered from all directions, and the lights of every household shone through.
She pushed back her still-damp hair, moved a short plastic stool to sit at the door to cool off and let the wind dry her hair, and used 4G to go online.
After just staying there for a while, she understood why the villagers didn’t come out to cool off. In just an instant, both of her legs were covered in red, swollen bumps. These southern mosquitoes were truly venomous. It was incomparably itchy, and Yan Xi didn’t dare to scratch too fiercely. Enduring it, she scratched a few times, about to be brought to tears by the itchiness.
As soon as her foot stepped inside, a massive flying insect with wings swept past in her line of sight.
Yan Xi was stunned.
Was that… a cockroach?
Footnotes
- The reign of the Guangxu Emperor of the Qing Dynasty (1875-1908).
- A successful candidate in the highest imperial examinations.
- A superstitious belief attached to the ancestral hall's door.
- A village custom where villagers refer to little boys as little brother.
- Paper money burned as an offering to the deceased.
- A traditional Chinese festival for honoring ancestors.
- A village custom dictating that all personal belongings of the deceased must be cleared out.
- The bustling, lively atmosphere of everyday life.
- A dinner dish consisting of rice porridge cooked with fresh slices of fish.
- A portable electric fan.
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