Since he had nothing special to do, he got up and stood beside her to help with the vegetables. She smacked the back of his hand, hard enough to make it sting. “Go wash your hands,” she said sternly. “This is my job, not yours.”
That stopped Guo Zuo, but only for as long as it took him to catch her meaning; he washed his hands. When she was finished, she washed up, walked over to him, and put out her hand.
“What’s this for?” he asked.
“Slap it.”
Guo Zuo bit his lip. “Why?”
“I slapped yours a minute ago, so now you slap me back.”
That made him smile broadly. “Forget it,” he said.
“No.”
“I said forget it.” He drew the words out.
Yuxiu stepped closer and said, “No.”
Her tone was sly and capricious, and he wasn’t sure how to deal with her. That excited him. Now he had only one option—do as she said. This was beginning to look like playing house, except that it was a flirtatious game. After he slapped her hand, Yuxiu took the cigarette out of his other hand, put it up to her lips, and breathed in a mouthful of smoke. Then she shut her eyes and mouth to send two identical streams of smoke slowly out of her nose. The smoke lingered in the air as she returned the cigarette, opened her eyes, and said, “Did I look like a secret agent?”
He found that strange. “Why would you want to be a secret agent?”
“Because they can be so alluring,” she said in a hushed voice that carried a touch of mystery. “Who wouldn’t want to be someone that gorgeous?” She was not joking, and danger now seemed to lurk somewhere between them.
Guo Zuo reacted nervously, but was more aroused than ever. He tried to sound serious, but did not do a very good job. Somewhat paternally, he said, “Keep talk like that in the house.”
Yuxiu laughed. “I don’t need you to tell me that,” she said. Then she said charmingly, “For your ears only.” Her conspiratorial tone implied a special bond, a closeness and mutual understanding between them.
Her eyes widened. “You won’t tell your father what I just said, will you?” she asked nervously.
His smile failed to allay her fears. She wanted a promise.
“Let’s take a vow,” she said, holding out her thumb to seal the deal. “A hundred years of silence.” She linked his pinkie with hers. One hundred years sounded too long, so she changed the vow: “Let’s say ‘fifty years of silence.’” This had the appearance of a pledge of faithfulness, which obviously pleased them both. Their thumbs separated, but the feeling persisted and led to melancholy, followed by a barrage of disconnected thoughts.
Guo Zuo was obviously a happy man. Spending time with a girl like Yuxiu was a first for him. She was even happier than he was, since talking openly and freely with a young man was new to her as well. Given Guo Zuo’s age, a girl like Yuxiu was expected to avoid such situations. But no such expectations accrued to an aunt. What was she expected to avoid? Nothing.
Yuxiu, wittingly or not, began treating Guo Zuo not as a nephew, but as an elder brother, which then made her a little sister, an intoxicating thought. Aunt served as an effective cover. It not only protected elder brother, but even more importantly, it protected little sister as well. It was something special—indescribable and strange, but firmly implanted in their hearts.
A once solemn and respectably sedate home came alive—but, of course, only secretly, almost underground, in dark corners and in the hearts of certain family members. Yuxiu discovered early on that Guo Zuo had plenty to say whenever it was just the two of them, and sometimes his face lit up when he was talking. But when Guo Jiaxing and Yumi returned home, he clammed up. Like his father, his demeanor connoted procedure, policy, organization, discipline, and the spirit of formal meetings.
The only sound at the dinner table was Yumi’s voice urging Guo Zuo to eat or the clacking of her chopsticks when she placed food in his bowl. For Yuxiu, this seemingly subtle difference was both obvious and heartening. It was as if she and Guo Zuo had reached a tacit understanding. The silence around the dinner table held special meaning for her, bringing with it an anxiety that created a strange sense of happiness amid extraordinary bewilderment; although she did not realize it, the silence had developed into a shared secret known only to heaven and earth. People find secrets moving, for they have the power to inspire and achieve a tear-inducing tenderness. Secrets slowly seep into the deepest recesses of themselves and then spread outward. When they reach their outer limits, they quietly split apart and move in directions that cannot be put in order, like spilled water that cannot be recovered.
Yuxiu had a feeling that there was something odd about her, something baffling. Guo Jiaxing and Yumi would no sooner be out the door than she and Guo Zuo would come to life. The oddest thing about it was her preposterous actions. When Guo Jiaxing and Yumi were on their way to the office, she retreated to the kitchen to change clothes and attend to her hair, combing out her short braids and plaiting them with great care until not a strand was out of place. After neatly securing them with butterfly clips, she moistened them with water till they were a deep black and slippery smooth. Finally, she made sure that her bangs were neatly trimmed so that they fell loosely over her forehead like thin tassels. Her grooming completed, she sat at the mirror and inspected herself closely, not returning to the living room until she was satisfied that everything was perfect and that she was as pretty as she could be. Then, taking a seat, she wordlessly removed the dead leaves from the vegetables for the noon meal—all of this under the scrutiny of Guo Zuo, who sat opposite and slightly to one side of her.
The tension in the room was palpable. Silence reigned. The air felt viscous, as if it were trying hard to circulate but not succeeding. But, as they say, there’s tension and there’s tension. Sometimes it has the quality of deathly silence, at other times it is full of life and replete with the power to stir things up. It is easy to shatter, and extra care is needed to stabilize it. He did not speak. Neither did she.
Actually, she did speak. A girl’s hair speaks for her quite eloquently, strand by strand. Can there be a single strand that does not tell of what is in her heart? When Yuxiu combed her hair, confusion filled her head with hesitation, warnings, and embarrassing self-reproach. She knew she was flirting with mischief, that seduction was afoot, and she steadfastly commanded herself to stop, just as Yumi would have done. But something deep down inside would not let her. Though she could not know it, she was experiencing the first awakenings of love. With the coming of spring, light rains fall, and the heart begins to bud. Leaves appear recklessly. Though weak and easily battered by the wind, every plant is born with a stubborn streak, and even if it is pinned beneath a stone, it will squirm until its head emerges and finds a way out, little by little.
Hot though the days were, every once in a while Guo Jiaxing still sat down to drink with members of the leadership. He was not much of a drinker and preferred not to do this. But Director Wang, his superior, liked to drink and chose to hold meetings in the evening, which invariably turned into banquets. Truth be told, Director Wang’s capacity for alcohol was limited, so he never drank too much. But that did not lessen the delight for someone who loved a party as much as he did, which is why the various leaders spent so much after-hours time together.