Page 163 - I Live in the Slums: Stories (The Margellos World Republic of Letters)

her in low tones. Too bad she didn’t understand.
At the corner of the wall was a little metal bucket with dried lotus seeds
inside. Next to the bucket was a small bench. Zhou Yizhen’s heart leapt happily!
She sat down at once and started cracking open the lotus seeds. Though she
hadn’t done this for more than twenty years, she still knew how to do it! And she
could do it almost without looking. It was as though she wasn’t cracking lotus
seeds, but picking mushrooms in the forest. She joyfully discovered one after
another. As she did this, she didn’t think back to her work in the plant when she
was young. Quite the opposite: what she recalled were the good things that she

usually didn’t think of. For example . . . Ah, she was suffocating from
happiness! She wouldn’t die of happiness, would she?
“Zhou Yizhen, are you fishing?”
Zhu Mei’s voice came from the door. Why didn’t she enter? Was she playing
hide-and-seek? Zhou Yizhen put the knife down and went to look.
No one was in the courtyard. Where was Zhu Mei hiding? Zhou Yizhen
walked lightly under the date tree, intense emotions rising from within. This
courtyard had five other homes; the lights were on in each one, but the doors
were shut tight. Zhou Yizhen recalled that it was never like this in the past; back
then, the neighbors felt close to each other, and doors always stood open. Did all
these homes have new owners?
Without thinking, she walked out of the courtyard and came to the lane. So
strange: at night, the lane didn’t look at all dilapidated, as it did in the daytime.

Instead, it was clean and tidy, and full of life. Although you couldn’t see anyone,
the street was giving off light, as though some liveliness were left over from the
daytime. The entrances of all of the courtyard houses stood wide open, letting
her thoughts run wild.
Zhou Yizhen caught a glimpse of a woman’s silhouette entering a courtyard
house in front of her. Ah, was it Zhu Mei? She shouted, “Zhu Mei!”
Zhu Mei dashed up to Zhou Yizhen.
“You’ve come out, too,” she said with a smile. “Sure, why wouldn’t you? At
night, it’s a Shangri-la here. Do you know who I was looking for inside? My
lover. He’s only twenty-eight—a guy who fears nothing!”
Zhou Yizhen heard the lewdness in Zhu Mei’s tone. Ordinarily she wouldn’t
be able to stand it. But in this kind of moonlight, this kind of atmosphere, she
felt that everything was reasonable. The fifty-year-old Zhu Mei should love a
twenty-eight-year-old. If she, Zhou Yizhen, were a young man, she would want
to fall in love with Zhu Mei: Zhu Mei was a rare treasure.
“Oh, so that’s it. I’ve disturbed you. Don’t pay any attention to me. I’m

leaving,” she said.
“No, don’t go!” Zhu Mei raised her hand and said decisively, “Since you’ve