On June 24th of the lunar calendar, it was Da Shu, the hottest day of the year.
The courtyard was full of trees, and insects hung like beads on strings. The sun was already up early in the morning. Shao Xue hastily stuffed breakfast into her mouth, then grabbed her backpack.
“Mum, I’m leaving!” She dashed out the door in a few steps, where Zheng Su Nian was waiting for her, one foot propped on his bicycle. Shao Xue hopped onto the back seat, and they sped off.
Yu Dong Ge called after her, “Aren’t you going to drink your soy milk?”
Shao Xue’s voice faded as she disappeared around the alley corner: “No—thanks—!”
Shao Hua was still leisurely eating breakfast inside, bewildered by his wife’s flustered attitude. Yu Dong Ge slammed the soy milk onto the table, grumbling in dissatisfaction, “All she does is run around during summer break. Just look at our daughter—already so close to Su Nian at such a young age.”
Shao Hua absentmindedly brushed her off, saying, “They’ve been childhood friends. What’s it to you, a middle-aged woman?”
Yu Dong Ge was enraged and immediately snatched away Shao Hua’s breakfast.
“Hey, wait a minute,” Shao Hua protested, wide-eyed and innocent, “I wasn’t finished eating.”
“I’d rather feed it to the dog than let you have it.”
With that, Yu Dong Ge put on her jacket and quickly rode her bike to work. Shao Hua sighed in despair, pitifully following behind her.
When Shao Xue and Zheng Su Nian arrived at McDonald’s, Zhang Qi was already eating. The story of Zhang Qi’s math competition win and guaranteed admission had spread across half of Dongcheng, so much so that strangers would approach his grandfather, offering cigarettes and saying, “Old Master Zhang, I hear your grandson’s really made something of himself!”
His grandfather, filled with pride, secretly gave Zhang Qi 500 yuan as a reward. Since Zhang Qi and Zheng Su Nian had already promised to help tutor Shao Xue over the break, the three of them decided to meet at McDonald’s. With just the price of some fries, they could sit there all afternoon.
But it was clear Zhang Qi wasn’t content with just ordering fries.
Zheng Su Nian asked, “Zhang Qi, how much of that 500 do you have left?”
“I’m not sure,” Zhang Qi replied, crunching on his chicken wings. “I’ll spend it while I have it.”
“You’re being hailed as the next Hua Luogeng out there. Shouldn’t you act a little more like a math genius?”
“What’s a math genius supposed to act like?” Zhang Qi burped. “Even math geniuses need to eat fried chicken wings!”
He flipped through the exercise book, pulling out a page and tossing it to Shao Xue. “Work on this for now. Let me know if you get stuck, and I’ll help.”
Zheng Su Nian, who would be starting his second year of high school in the fall, was also under pressure academically. He took out a physics test and worked for a while, but then heard Shao Xue muttering under her breath.
Unable to resist, he glanced over and saw her rolling her eyes as she mumbled, “2, 4, 8, 16,” trying to calculate something. After a moment, she seemed to lose track and started counting from the beginning again.
“Shao Xue,” he said, feeling a bit guilty, “the sixth power of two is just 8 times 8.”
Zhang Qi let out a quacking laugh.
But as they laughed, something felt off. The three of them turned to see a seven or eight-year-old boy crying his heart out near the counter. Shao Xue tapped her pen on the table, smiling sarcastically. “Zhang Qi, look what you’ve done—scared him to tears.”
An employee came over to ask the boy where his parents were, but the child cried even louder. People bustled around, yet no one could get through to him. After observing for a while, Shao Xue suddenly asked, “Is he even speaking Chinese?”
Her unconventional question made Zheng Su Nian and Zhang Qi take a closer look at the child. After listening for a bit, Zheng Su Nian hesitated and said, “Didn’t he just say ‘daddy’?”
Zhang Qi, ever quick to act, pulled out his limited English. “Come here, come here.”
The boy froze and stopped crying. Seeing some progress, Zhang Qi turned to Shao Xue and said, “Shao Xue, go talk to this little foreign friend and show off the charm of our international city!”
When the child saw that they weren’t offering any immediate help, his lip quivered, and he was about to cry again. Startled, Shao Xue hurried over. She hadn’t expected her first real encounter with a foreigner to be a six-year-old, but after some back-and-forth, she finally understood the situation. It turned out that the child had grown up abroad and had returned to China with his father, but they had gotten separated. Spotting the familiar McDonald’s logo, similar to the one back home, he’d wandered inside, hoping to find his dad. The three of them pieced together the story and led the boy to the nearest police station.
At the station, Officer Qi Ming Yang, who lived in the same hutong as Shao Xue, saw the trio and immediately burst out laughing.
“Well, well, isn’t this Zhang Qi? What did you do this time, here to turn yourself in?”
“Uncle Qi, I’m older now! You still remember those pranks I played when I was a kid? Turning myself in, seriously?”
“I’ve got a lasting impression of you. But what are you three doing with a kid?”
“That’s exactly it!” Zhang Qi clapped his hands together. “This kid got separated from his family, and the three of us worked tirelessly to reunite this lost child with you. And here you are, crushing my spirit right off the bat.”
Qi Ming Yang quickly realized the child was indeed lost and shifted into work mode. After a few calls to nearby police stations, they found out that the boy’s father, a returning overseas Chinese, had already reported the missing child.
“Take a seat and wait. His father will be here soon to pick him up.”
Qi’s English wasn’t great, and he struggled to communicate with the boy, who clung to Shao Xue’s sleeve, unwilling to let her go. The three teenagers sat down, keeping the boy entertained until, within ten minutes, a sweaty middle-aged man arrived, looking frantic.
“Thank you all so much! This kid nearly gave me a heart attack.”
“Oh,” Zhang Qi immediately perked up upon hearing the man’s accent, “Uncle, you’ve still got the hometown dialect!”
“Sigh,” the man exhaled in relief, pulling his son close. “I haven’t been back in over ten years. Just got off the plane, and I didn’t even recognize the streets anymore. Turned around, and he was gone.”
Qi Ming Yang gestured for the man to come over and fill out some paperwork. While doing so, the man insisted, “You three don’t leave. I have to treat you to a meal later.”
As a returned overseas Chinese, the three teenagers were hopeful for a fancy meal. However, once they were in the car, it became clear the man was heading for one of the older generation's favorite spots—a humble intestines shop. With the child wedged between Zheng Su Nian and Zhang Qi in the back, and Shao Xue riding up front, she hesitated before finally asking, “Uncle, are we going to eat intestines?”
“Of course,” the man sighed as he navigated the bustling traffic. “I’ve been craving this for over ten years. Grew up eating it, but after moving abroad, I couldn’t find anything that tasted right. Just been waiting for this one taste.”
The roads had changed significantly, and the man missed several turns. Shao Xue chirped directions from the passenger seat, noticing the furrows deepening in his brow.
“Everything’s changed,” he said, sounding lost. “I don’t recognize anything.”
Zhang Qi reassured him, “It’s normal. You’ve been away for so long, it’s only natural that things are unfamiliar.”
“I know, but these skyscrapers, popping up out of nowhere,” the man gestured outside, “there’s not a trace of what was here before. If you didn’t tell me, I wouldn’t even know this was my hometown—it feels like a foreign place… Oh, watch out for that pothole!”
The child bounced in the backseat, hitting his head and bursting into tears, clinging to Zheng Su Nian for comfort.
The atmosphere in the car became awkward. Shao Xue scrambled to change the subject. “The roads change all the time now. Even my mom gets confused sometimes. But we’re almost there. Oh, Uncle, is this a car stereo? Can it play music?”
The man chuckled sadly and pressed the button to turn on the stereo. As the intro played, all the young people in the car froze.
“My grandpa used to play here when he was young, high up by the Qianmen Gate, right near his home. A string of candied haws was a holiday treat. His three meals were just pickled vegetables and a big bowl of tea…”
In the long interlude, Shao Xue thought she heard a faint sigh.
“Now I’ve returned from overseas, once again seeing the red walls and green tiles. The high Qianmen Gate, so often in my dreams. The years of wind and rain have mercilessly worn it down, but it stands even prouder. Call for almond tofu, how delicious the Beijing flavors. I bring back my childlike heart and memories, savoring again a big bowl of tea.
“There are a thousand drinks in this world, perhaps this one is the cheapest. But why, why, why does its rich aroma reach all the way to the ends of the earth?
“All the way to the ends of the earth.”
){kind=link}
0 Comments