Mystery woman

A woman in --

Needless to say, she was dancing. Where women are born dancers: with their fingers, their waists, their eyes.

Twenty-seven or eight years ago, when she started dancing, she was not on the Yangtze River. Now I don't want to jump, but I want to go there. She looked as if her soul had been stolen from her. Her eyes were glazed and she stared into the rushing water. It was a misty morning, and all the passengers had vanished, and the world had vanished, except for her shadowy figure, with a long white woolen scarf around her neck.

Grandma sat at the dinner table and talked about old memories like counting porridge grains in a bowl. The story stopped by chance because she wanted to correct her granddaughter's position of holding chopsticks: "Don't hold chopsticks too close! You'll be far away from home." She obeyed her grandmother and slipped her hand to the top of the chopstick while she was absorbed in the story.

My grandmother recalled intermittently that my great-grandmother was clever, and that among the many concubines, my great-grandfather had favored her alone, until, like all the other women, he was not favored. She rose before dawn, dressed, and passed like a breeze at the door where her husband lay. The first moment he woke up, he heard the sound of water and flowers and birds. He went to the window and saw that she was playing the piano. Night moon high hanging, lonely in her candle needlework, concentrate on embroider phoenix chaoyang figure, for his birthday, want to make him moved, and learn to dance butterfly dance, called kitchen niang development delicious, please plant flowers different trees. All her life she had been trying to please her husband, to monopolize his heart again.

When the man pulled further and further away, she became mad and set fire to the whole yard. The fire burned all night, no one could save, and the family was destroyed.

"And the result? "She could not help asking.

Grandmother sighed. "No one ever saw her again. Some say she drowned, some say she hanged herself."

Her grandmother looked at her face and said she took after her great-grandmother not only in appearance but also in temperament, such as growing up afraid of the smell of kitchen smoke, even to the point of being afraid. In desperation, the grandmother invited the Taoist priest to do, finally, the Taoist priest left a god of the kitchen, told her to kneel down every day.

So, she was born with God and God.

When you listen to this woman talk about these things, you find it more exciting than a playbook. She took the tarpaulin, you took the freighter, and you went to shore with her one after the other. Mountain people carrying her box, you take their own backpack, in front of two local men, carrying from the county to buy the department store supplies. Steep hillside, climb a section, she stopped a section, you have been in her vision. She finally just stood halfway up the mountain, looking at you face sweat stone stairs. The first woman you met when you started traveling, she thought it was her. She had red shoes on her feet and two long braids. "Twenty years old, and no one has ever kissed me. Time to laugh at me." She said that to you, and you held her. She pushes you away, backs away, walks slowly toward the door, and suddenly she turns her head, throws up her hand, and dances for you. The dance of women in the upper reaches of the Lancang River is particularly exaggerated in curve, especially showing a small waist and large breasts. She dances and sings, folk tunes you don't understand, but find it hard to get out once you get in, and you watch with fascination her unexaggerated wiggle. She gave herself to you that early February afternoon in spring, and you could not refuse the gift and feel ashamed of her.

Nice sunshine, just like old times. She drew a long breath, feeling that the light could clear her insides. As an adult, she was not afraid of the smell of smoke, as her grandmother had said. The fear had been forgotten. If afraid, she is afraid of you suddenly appear, although she thinks you day and night in front of her. It was impossible, and because it was impossible, she had to make the journey.

There are mountains beyond the mountains, and water under the mountains, and water connecting with water. She wanted to see what she really thought: "Am I worth living or should I end my life?"

She cried and told you her story: no one needed her, her family didn't drive her away, and she wanted to go so far away that she couldn't see the past.

She talked so much, from afternoon to evening, and from late night to early morning, that even when you entered her, she did not stop. The conversation you had with her that day was almost what all girls say when they become mature women. You love to hear it, but you dread to hear it.

The moment you decided to leave, she was silent, looking up at the glimmer of light in the window, the day almost brightened under her gaze. Sure enough, there was a voice on the gravel street. "I won't keep you," she said suddenly. "I'll send you on your way."

As she lets go of your hand, she adds, "Jealous. There's a spot waiting for you."

You get dressed, get out of bed, go to the mirror, and run your hands through your hair. The mirror reflected the trees outside the window, covered with snow. This may be the last snow this winter. "The snow turns the Windows into flowers. When the flowers die, they bloom again. But one's love is not so lucky."

The answer surprised both you and she. This is very unlike your usual behavior. To be honest, your face doesn't fit forty. it looks fiftysomething. She always liked older people. Your footprints made their way through the snow in front of the wooden door, and they stayed there, though the snow was still falling. And to this day, she's back in town, trying to talk to you, all these years too late, about one question: "Did you rewrite her life?" Wait, there's half a question, maybe not a question at all, "Do you remember when I said, 'You've been writing about women, but you haven't been thinking about women? '"