Bending down, she picked up the stone and returned it to me. Alive again, the stone was shaking. We walked toward the room.
“What is this?”
“It’s something my brothers and I found in the lower grotto. There are many of them. We cut it with a machine and burnished it into several round stones.”
“Since you gave it to me, does that mean I’m now one of you?”
“You’re really smart.”
“I’d like to see that grotto.”
“No one knows where it is. We fell into it from a high place. No one wants to fall a second time. Hurry up and put this on!” She handed me a large bamboo hat.
I had no sooner put the hat on than those damp things started falling from above. They became denser and denser, just like a downpour. I thought, this must be night-soil.
“Above us is a place for raising ducks. All the ducks are raised hanging in the air. It’s time for them to defecate now.”
“This layout of this building is really bizarre.”
As I was dragging her along to hide in the hallway, I noticed that her clothes were dry. Although I was surrounded by a stinky smell, I smelled a faint scent of cinnamon coming from her.
“You said earlier that it was clean here. You said it was like clouds floating in the sky. Why did you make this comparison? It’s nothing like that.”
“Everything I said is true.”
“If I come back, I won’t be able to find you. I don’t remember anything about how to get here,” I grumbled. “And I’m covered with shit. It’s so stinky; don’t you think I’m disgusting?”
She snickered again. I heard her. She said she would take me to “the place where she hides.”
“The place where she hides” wasn’t in her home, but in a large chicken coop outside the house. It had no door: she and I could both enter it by bending over. Probably several dozen mother hens were in there; illuminated by faint moonlight, the hens all looked seriously ill. Not at all surprised by our arrival, they quickly made room for us. Elena and I squatted on top of chicken shit; if it had been daytime, we would have looked very silly. In her fleece coat, she looked much like a little lamb. She told me, “They’ve arrived.” I asked her who; she said it was the clouds. I couldn’t get a good look at her, but I knew her eyes were closed. With her face upturned, she looked intoxicated with happiness. I tried to do exactly what she was doing, but to no avail. Just then, something happened: the stone in my pocket made a big commotion. When I took it out, it quivered violently.
“You need to pinch it tightly,” Elena said gently.
But after a while, it slipped out of my hand again. No sooner had it fallen down than the mother hens all went crazy and flew around in confusion. They even fiercely pecked my face a few times. My face was bleeding. If I hadn’t covered my eyes with my hands, they would have even pecked out my eyeballs. Annoyed, Elena dragged me out of the chicken coop, but she didn’t forget to pick up the stone. I heard her say: “You’re really mischievous. Stop for a moment, okay?” She put the stone — now calm again — back into my hand.
“Once a stone is picked up by someone in that kind of place, the stone is doomed to have no peace.”
She said that now there was no place we could stay. We could only take the desperate step of going to a place called “Stockaded Mountain Village.” We certainly couldn’t stay here: I heard her brothers in the dark room shouting her name with that strange pronunciation. They sounded like devils. She was holding my arm tightly, more or less dragging me between houses. The path was full of discarded wood and garbage cans. All of a sudden, she stopped in the middle of the road and said we had reached the stockaded mountain village. Next to us was a large heap of dark things: Elena said it was a bear. But that thing didn’t look at all like a bear: it was roughly as large as half a cabin.
“I love to lean against it and think of that matter. When I lean against it, this place becomes so open. There are only some clouds. From a distance, my parents and brothers call to me and I call to them. You may shake hands with it.”
Reluctantly, I extended my hand to the dark thing. Although I didn’t touch anything, when I pulled my hand back, I heard a light popping sound, as if there were suction there.
“You touched it, didn’t you? What do you think of it? This is our stockaded mountain village — its and mine. My family members can’t find this place. If they hadn’t driven me out, I wouldn’t have brought you here, either.” Her voice was filled with furtive joy.
Inspired by her words, I extended my hand to it time and again and listened repeatedly to the popping sound. I even walked into it, but there was nothing inside. Of course, there were some things, because I felt the buoyancy of the air, and indeed, my feet kept leaving the ground and falling to the ground again. Elena’s voice was now far away.
“Two flowers, three flowers. Ha. I see too many. ”
I wasn’t very accustomed to the buoyancy of the air. I kept wanting to grab something to steady myself. There was a lamp post. I would hang onto it. My movement caused me to fall head over heels, and it was hard to turn around. When I looked again, I couldn’t see any street light; there was just a faint streak of light, that’s all. Elena’s voice still reached me now and then.
“It’s high. Drop down. Go home!”
Was she telling me to go home? But I didn’t want to go back. The air all around had become so clear and fresh and cool, and it was emitting the fragrance of narcissi. If I were just a little patient and didn’t get flustered, I wouldn’t fall. And even if I fell, I wouldn’t die from it. I still wanted to stay a while longer and see if anything had changed here. I began making slow breast strokes, but they weren’t nearly as smooth as in the water. Any slight overexertion would send me tumbling over and over again. It would be much better if it were too dark to see anything: that way, I could follow my own inclinations. This half-light, half-dark atmosphere meant that I needed to be particularly cautious, because obstacles lay everywhere. It was impossible to decide whether you had to deal with them seriously. Most of the obstacles were illusory, like that lamp post.
After I entered Elena’s stockaded village, the stone in my pocket calmed down. When I brought it to my ear, I could still hear the buzzing sound; it was steady and joyful. For the moment, it seemed I had no way to leave her stockaded village. I tried to, but I just couldn’t. Anyhow, now I didn’t want to go, for this place was refreshing. Ah, if Elena were here, it would be wonderful! We could perform a moon-walking dance together, or we could embrace and kiss one another in the sweet-scented air current. I saw huge shadows edging toward me — three of them altogether. Maybe they were the cloud-like things she had talked of. They finally came over and wrapped me up in them. Actually it wasn’t frightening; it was just a little darker. This is what I thought at first. Later, when it grew darker and darker, and I heard the sound of grinding and sparks bursting forth all around me, I grew nervous.
“Elena! Elena!” I shouted.
“Go home. go home. ”
Her voice was splintered by the wind — a little here, a little there. I couldn’t distinguish what direction it was coming from. These three things were probably all grinding against each other, and I might become a sacrificial lamb. She told me to go home, but how could I break out of here? I closed my eyes and collected my thoughts and continued to swim in one direction. I warned myself to take it easy and not to be worried or rash. I remembered that in the beginning Elena hadn’t wanted me to intrude on her world: perhaps I was as curious about her as she was about me. Now I heard the sound of something detonating next to me: I was both excited and frightened. How long had I been swimming? Why hadn’t I already made my way out of the stockaded village? I’d better open my eyes.