Wild Fire Bids Farewell To Summer Chapter 32

After the Great Cold 1

Morning, 6:00.The thermometer shows 3℃.

Wei Zhiheng sat on the camp bed.The mattress springs made a series of noises from the head to the end of the bed.He arched his back and pressed his left hip with his right hand, his knuckles turning white.There is a dull pain in the bone marrow cavity, deep and continuous, which rises and throbs with the heartbeat.

He was wearing a gray sweater with the cuffs covering his hands, leaving only five fingers exposed.The nail caps are tinged with light purple, with a white edge.He lowered his head and rested his forehead on his knees. The breath he exhaled bounced back, carrying the sweetness that had accumulated in his mouth all night – rotten apples mixed with rust, deposited on the back of his tongue.

A woman’s voice came from downstairs.Wei Meihua was on the phone on the second floor. She was talking about the stone business. Her Zhuang dialect was mixed with the harsh Guiliu dialect, and her voice ended in a rough tone: “That big slab… yes, it’s off-white, with lightning patterns… Nanning customers are in need…” The voice came up through the gap in the floor, then broke off, turning into the beeping sound of mobile phone keys.

Huang Jinye stood by the window.He was only wearing a black sports vest, and there was a ring of white stone powder on the right shoulder strap – it was rubbed when he helped his mother move samples yesterday.There are three new scratches on the back of his right hand, running across the palm lines. The blood scabs are dark red and the edges are embedded with stone powder.He was carrying a school uniform jacket in his left hand, No. 055, made of cotton, which had been washed hard. The collar was yellow with sweat stains, the cuffs were frayed, and the smell of turpentine was stubbornly embedded in the fabric.

“Put it on,” he said, his voice hoarse and his throat stuffed with cotton wool.

Wei Zhiheng raised his head.There is a piece missing in the upper left part of the field of vision, and the black and yellow right shoulder disappears into the blind spot.He stretched out his hand and grabbed it twice before grabbing the hem of his coat.The fabric is rough, has a yellow body temperature, and is hot to the touch.He wrapped it around his body, moving slowly. The number 055 was placed upside down on his chest. The red color faded into dark brown.The sleeves were too long, covering his hands, and the hem hung down to his thighs, swallowing his entire body, leaving only a pale face floating above the collar.

The smell of turpentine came up, pungent, masking his own sweet, rotten smell.He took a sip, his Adam’s apple rolled, and he wanted to eat sourness – the kind of sourness like green mango dipped in chili salt, which made his teeth weak.This thought lasts for three seconds and then disappears.

Huang Jinye came over.The right foot landed first, with a thud, and the left foot dragged, grazing the ground – the water in the knee swayed, making a muffled sound.He squatted down beside the bed, his right knee making a dry rubbing sound.

He said, “Turn around.”

Wei Zhiheng didn’t move.He stared at the scratches on the back of Huang Jinye’s right hand, at the raised white skin on the edge of the blood scab, and at the stone powder embedded in the palm prints.He said: “Your hands are shaking.” His voice was muffled and filled with liquid.

Huang Jinye lowered his head and looked at his hands.It was indeed shaking, a subtle tremor in the muscles under the skin, starting from the inside of the wrist, jumping and spreading to the knuckles.He put his hand into his trouser pocket, touched the limestone specimen with his fingertips, and clenched it tightly. The stinging pain made him steady his fingers.

He said: “Put on the medicine. Turn around.”

Wei Zhiheng turned over.The movement involved his waist, and a dull pain deep in his ilium intensified, and he hissed, as if air was leaking.He was lying on his side, with his back to Huang Jinye and his left shoulder down.Jacket No. 055 was shrunk, and the hem was rolled up, revealing the gray sweater, and further up, revealing a section of the waist – the skin was pale, so thin that it was almost transparent, with purple blood vessels bulging, branching, and coiling under the skin.

Huang Jinye picked up the aluminum foil package from the bedside table.Morphine patch, rectangular, white, with sticky edges.He tore it open, and the foil made a sharp tearing sound.The smell of plastic comes out, chemical and pungent.

He held the patch and hovered his right hand above Wei Zhiheng’s waist.He saw that Wei Zhiheng’s spine was bulging.There are several patches of purpura on the skin, the size of coins, with purple and black centers. They are pinhole bruises left by blood transfusions in the past few days.

He dropped.The patch is applied to the skin and the coolness penetrates instantly.The skin on Wei Zhiheng’s lower back was cold, deep-seated, cold from the bones, 16°C, like the water of an underground river, like the stones in a tomb.

Huang Jinye pressed the edge of the patch with his fingers, touched the skin with his fingertips, and slid it.The skin was so cold that he retracted his fingers and pressed them again.

His fingers were shaking, the pressure turning into tremors, the pads of his fingers pulsing against the skin.He tried to control, but the more he controlled, the more he shook. His knuckles became stiff, and his nails left white marks on his skin. After he let go, the purpura spread from the center of the indentation.His thumb dug at the lower left corner of the patch, and a translucent glue mark appeared, which stuck to his fingertips.Instead of tearing it off, he rolled it into small balls, which bounced onto the sheets like tiny hailstones.

Wei Zhiheng said, “It’s cold.” His face was buried in the pillow, and his voice was muffled, “Like a block of ice.”

Wei Meihua’s voice came from downstairs again, louder: “Transportation charges are extra! Did you hear me? Extra!” The sharp end of the Zhuang words pierced the floor, echoed in the studio for two seconds, and disappeared again, as if the microphone was covered.

Huang Jinye said nothing.His right hand was placed entirely on Wei Zhiheng’s lower back, with the heel of his palm pressed against his waist and the upper edge of his iliac bone caught in the tiger’s mouth.His palms were hot, Wei’s skin was cold, and the temperature difference caused a stinging pain.He could feel Wei’s body heat draining toward the floor, toward the walls, toward the frozen window.

He said: “My dad used to…” His voice was stuck in his throat, as if it was blocked by something.He paused and did not continue.He was three years old when his father died, and his memory is blank.

Wei Zhiheng didn’t respond.His breath hit the pillow, hot and wet, smelling of blood.The morphine started to take effect and the pain became distant.He felt that there was a patch on his back, which was also a huge limestone specimen. Huang was using the stone to hold him down to prevent him from floating away.

He stretched out his hand.His right hand stretched out from the quilt, his fingernails were tinged with light purple, and he grabbed Huang Jinye’s left wrist – that hand was hovering in mid-air, and his fingers were still pressing.He clenched tightly, his nails digging into the yellow skin and pressing against the radial artery.The pulse was beating fast and erratically, as if it was about to break through the skin and jump out.

He said: “Don’t move.” His voice was soft, it was a request, not an order, “That’s it.”

Huang Jinye froze.He maintained a bent posture, with his right hand still attached to Wei’s waist, and his left hand was clenched, unable to move.He felt Wei’s fingers shaking, so much that they didn’t match his pulse.

There was a flash of red outside the window.A red plastic bag was blown up by the wind—actually there was no wind, it might have been the airflow caused by the passing truck in the distance—the plastic bag stuck to the icy window glass, stayed there for two seconds, then slipped off and disappeared.

The sound of the radio came from downstairs, the murmur of electric current, and then the singing voice of a grand opera, an old female voice, with a long drawn-out tune, babbling, and the words could not be heard clearly.Wei Meihua lowered the volume and her voice became blurred, as if coming from underwater.

Huang Jinye slowly sat down.He sat on the edge of the bed, the springs of the mattress sagging, pulling his body towards Wei Zhiheng.His right hand was removed from Wei’s waist and hung in the air. His fingers were spread wide and the joints were stiff. Blood seeped out from the scratches in the tiger’s mouth and dripped on the No. 055 school uniform jacket. Dark red spots spread on the gray cloth.

Wei Zhiheng let go of his wrist.The fingers slipped convulsively and hung on the sheets. The purpura on the fingernails showed a swollen purple color in the dim light.He curled back up, bringing his knees to his chest, arching his back, and wrapped his coat and quilt tightly into an airtight cocoon.

Huang Jinye took out a limestone specimen from his trouser pocket.Ivory white with gray flint bands, flat base and sharp edges.He tightened his grip, and the stone pressed against the purpura on his palm, causing a dull pain.The stone was cold, just like his body temperature at the moment – approaching Wei Zhiheng’s 16°C.

He lay down.Sideways, side by side with Wei Zhiheng, twenty centimeters apart, sharing the No. 055 school uniform jacket – Wei wrapped the front half, Huang pulled the back half, and the fabric was taut in the middle, pulling the two of them.He closed his eyes and heard Wei Zhiheng’s breathing become deeper and gurgling with blood foam. He heard the singing voice of the opera downstairs cut off and turned into the rustling noise of snowflakes. He heard the first drop of water melting from the ice outside the window hitting the window sill with a ticking sound.

The springs of the camp bed made a continuous sound under the weight of the two people, irregularly, rising and falling.Huang Jinye didn’t count his heartbeats, didn’t hover his fingers, he just lay down, holding the cold stone, letting the body temperature exchange through the No. 055 school uniform jacket, hot flowing to cool, and cold flowing to hot, until he couldn’t tell whose temperature was whose, until the light outside the window changed from inky black to dark blue, until the morphine patch completely fit the skin, like a second layer of skin, like a second layer of bones.

The last thing Wei Zhiheng felt before he fell asleep was Huang Jinye’s knee lightly hitting his calf bone. It wasn’t heavy, as if accidentally, but also seemed to confirm that he still existed.He wanted to speak, but his tongue was heavy and no sound came out.He just moved his fingers in the darkness, and his nails scratched on his palms, leaving light white marks.