Peach blossoms, apricot blooms, and white plums—the spring flowers sway in the wind, filling the branches. The crabapples bloom freely.
It is February, the season when spring flowers cover the hills and fields, a passionate burst that has been brewing for a whole season. In a desolate field, a lone grave is buried beneath the sprawling spring flowers. There is no tombstone, yet it is not a lonely sight.
A man stands before the grave, gripping a horsewhip. He wears a deep black robe with a silver-white long gown, and a pinkish-red sachet hangs quietly at his waist, exuding a faint scent of dried roses. A tall white horse grazes nearby, and in the distance, outside a grove of apricot trees, a handsome young man stands holding another horse, waiting quietly. Occasionally, he casts an uneasy glance inward.
The man raises his hand, as if to touch something, but then stiffly lowers it again, his eyes revealing a complex, indescribable emotion, soon replaced by intense anger.
"Is death really that easy, woman?" He smiles and suddenly strikes the lone grave with his palm. In an instant, the flowers tremble, branches snap, and fallen petals flutter like butterflies.
The young man, seeing this from afar, rushes over in alarm. But in that brief moment, the man has already struck repeatedly, sending dirt flying and leveling most of the grave.
"Master…" The youth wants to stop him but does not dare.
The man ignores him, striking a few more times until he sees the beginning of the woman's decaying corpse. There is no coffin, not even a simple mat—just a tattered shirt, lying quietly in the dirt. Countless insects and ants crawl away from her body.
The man clenches his hand, but the strike he had been preparing can no longer be delivered.
"What happened?" He asks in a hoarse, unpleasant voice as he looks at the woman's unrecognizable face.
From the youth's angle, he can see the man's eyes, red either from anger or something else, causing the youth to shiver. Suppressing his inner cold, he hurriedly explains, "Master, this was Miss Mei Lin's wish before she passed. She said…" He glanced cautiously at his master and, seeing no sign of impatience, continued, "She said that rather than being confined to the small space of a coffin or a mat, it would be better to merge with the earth, nourishing the spring flowers so she could also bask in their glory."
No one spoke again. The slightly chilly wind, carrying the fragrance of flowers from the hills, gently brushed over the surface of the corpse, leaving not a hint of decay's stench.
"What else did she say?" After a long while, the man asked in a low voice, his hand by his side trembling slightly.
The youth did not notice, thinking carefully before shaking his head. "Master, nothing else."
The man's Adam's apple bobbed, and then he suddenly forced out a smile that looked more painful than crying. "Nothing…nothing else? Even at the end, you still wouldn’t…" not even think of him, not even to hate. He swallowed the rest of his words, letting them rot inside him, then suddenly lashed out with his horsewhip, dragging the corpse from the dirt pit.
"Master!" The youth cried out in shock, kneeling in front of the man, pleading, "Master, Master… even if Miss Mei Lin had her faults, the dead are like extinguished lamps. Please, allow her to be buried…”
The youth’s voice trailed off under the man’s bloodthirsty gaze. The long whip lashed out, striking the corpse hard.
"You wanted to nourish the spring flowers, but I won't allow it!"
Another whip cracked, tearing through the air with a dull thud, sending tattered cloth flying.
"You wanted to rest in peace, but I won’t allow it!"
With a poisonous vow laced with an almost imperceptible sob, a silver-white long gown fluttered down, covering the mud-stained, decaying body. The man suddenly bent down, picked up the corpse, and in a few swift leaps, mounted his horse. Then, he spurred his horse through the apricot grove, galloping madly towards the horizon where the clouds met the sky.
In February, peach blossoms reddened, apricot flowers whitened, rapeseed flowers bloomed everywhere, and willow leaves seemed cut from jade…
In a daze, he seemed to hear the woman singing softly by his ear, just like last year in that remote mountain village. He lay quietly in bed while she washed clothes in the courtyard, sunlight piercing through the tattered window paper, dancing like butterflies before his eyes.
1 Comments
My God what a beginning.
ReplyDelete