Hearing this, Baldy Li looked behind him and waved off the people around them as if she had been speaking to someone else. Then he volunteered his protective services to Lin Hong, who by this point was furious to the point of tears. He asked, "Where are you headed? I'll escort you."
Lin Hong couldn't bear another moment of this and screamed loudly, "Go away! Jerk!"
Baldy Li again looked behind him, whereupon Lin Hong pointed directly at him. "I'm telling you to go away!"
Amid the laughter of the crowds, Baldy Li watched as Lin Hong walked off. Smacking his lips regretfully, he told the onlookers, "She's still mad at me."
Then he shook his head and sighed ruefully. "I shouldn't have taken that wrong turn in life."
Reports of Baldy Li's various misdeeds trickled down to Li Lan's ears, causing her to bow her head even farther. She had borne her first husband's scandal, and now she had to bear her son's notoriety. She, whose face had once been bathed in tears daily, now had no more left to shed. But she didn't say a word to Baldy Li about his doings, because she knew that she had no control over him. Often she would be awakened in the middle of the night by her migraines and would lie there, wondering what was to become of Baldy Li. She spent one sleepless night after another asking in distress, "Dear God, why did I have to give birth to such a demon?"
As Li Lans spirit collapsed, her health also faltered. Her migraines became more and more severe, and then her kidneys started failing. While Baldy Li was enjoying his meals of house-special noodles and fattening himself up, Li Lan was no longer going to work, having taken a long sick leave to rest at home. Her complexion had become waxy and sallow, and when she went for her daily shots at the clinic, the doctors and nurses could smell the sour, foul odor emanating from her even through their surgical masks. They turned their heads away as they spoke with her or gave her shots. Her illness eventually worsened to the point where she tried to check into the hospital. They told her, "Go wash your hair before checking in."
Li Lan hung her head in shame the entire way home and spent the next couple of days holed up in misery. During that time she thought of nothing but Song Fanping, his smile and his words; she felt that washing her hair would be a betrayal of him, the love of her life. Ultimately she concluded that she did not have much longer to live and would soon be going to the netherworld to be reunited with Song Fanping, and perhaps even he might be bothered by the foulness of her hair. So one Sunday afternoon she placed a set of clean clothes in a basket and pulled Baldy Li aside just as he was leaving the house. After hesitating for a moment, she said, "I don't think I will be getting better, so I'd like to clean myself before dying."
This was the first time since his Peeping Tom incident that Li Lan asked Baldy Li to accompany her in public. Though her son had shamed her as much as her first husband had, and though she could never forgive her first husband even after he had lost his life, her son was different. After all, they were of the same flesh.
As Li Lan and Baldy Li walked down the street toward the bathhouse, she suddenly noticed that he was taller than she, which brought a smile to her face and she held his arm a little more tightly. By then, even the act of walking left her exhausted, and every twenty or so yards she had to find a tree to lean against. As they walked Baldy Li waved and greeted all those who knew him, then explained to her who they were. Li Lan was shocked to discover that this fifteen-year-old son of hers seemed to know far more people than she ever had.
It was about a third of a mile from their home to the bathhouse, but it took Li Lan more than an hour to cover the distance. Each time she rested against a tree, Baldy Li would wait patiently to one side, describing to her what was going on in town. All of this was news to Li Lan, and she suddenly regarded Baldy Li with a newfound respect. She briefly felt happy but then thought to herself, If only Baldy Li were as upright a young man as Song Gang, then he really could make a good life for himself. Then she reminded herself, My son is a demon.
After arriving at the front door of the bathhouse, Li Lan leaned against the wall and rested a bit more. She took Baldy Li's hand and asked him not to leave but to wait for her outside. Baldy Li nodded as he watched his mother walk in. She walked as if she were an old lady, but her hair, which had not been washed for seven years, was black and shiny.
Baldy Li stood outside the bathhouse for what seemed like an eternity. First his legs ached, then even his toes. He saw a stream of people exiting the bathhouse, their cheeks ruddy and their hair wet. Some of them remembered to taunt him as Little Buttpeeper, while others addressed him as King of Butts. Baldy Li didn't even deign to look the former in the eye but greeted the latter with warm smiles, since these were noodle clients, and Baldy Li believed that customers always came first.
Blacksmith Tong also emerged from the bathhouse. When he saw Baldy Li standing there, he cursed him, "Little Bastard Buttpeeper." He also pointed at the bathhouse, saying, "Why don't you go peep in there? There are so many butts you wouldn't know where to begin."
Baldy Li sniffed. "What would you know? When there are so many butts, how could you concentrate? You don't even know where to focus."
He held up five fingers and, with an authoritative air, lectured Blacksmith Tong: "You can't look at more than five butts at once, and at a bare minimum you need at least two. This is because with any more than five you would get confused, but with only one you wouldn't have anything to compare it to."
Hearing this, Blacksmith Tong seemed to have an epiphany. With a worshipful tone he said to Baldy Li, "You Little Bastard Buttpeeper— you've really got talent. I'll have to treat you to house-special noodles sometime."
Baldy Li put up his hand modestly and corrected Blacksmith Tong, "Please call me King of Butts."
This time Blacksmith Tong went along with the correction and affirmed, "You really are the King of Butts."
So Liu Town's King of Butts, Baldy Li, waited outside the bathhouse for his mother for more than three hours. He alternated between wild impatience and anxious concern, wondering, Did she pass out in there? After three hours had passed, a woman with a head full of gray hair walked out slowly behind a group of young women. Baldy Li was so busy checking out the wet-haired young women that he didn't even notice the elderly woman coming toward him. The gray-haired woman paused in front of him and said, "Baldy Li."
Baldy Li was stunned and simply couldn't believe that this woman was his mother. When Li Lan went in, her hair was still black, but now she stood before him with it completely gray. In memory of Song Fan-ping, she had not washed her hair for seven years, and with this washing she had washed all the black right out.
For the first time Baldy Li realized that his mother had aged and now looked like a granny. She gripped his arm and laboriously made her way home. When acquaintances along the way caught sight of Li Lan, they would invariably be stunned, examining her up close and gasping, "Li Lan? Are you Li Lan?"
Li Lan nodded. Exhausted, she answered, "Yes, it's me."
CHAPTER 25
UIPON RETURNING HOME, Li Lan examined herself carefully in the mirror. She too was shocked by the suddenness of her aging and was struck by a sense of foreboding, a feeling that, after checking into the hospital, she would never return home. Though she had washed all the foulness from her hair, she didn't immediately go to the hospital but instead stayed home for a few more days. During that time, she would either lie in bed or sit at the table, gazing at Baldy Li with concern and sighing, saying, "What will become of you?"