Yu Hua - Brothers

At this point Poet Zhao's girlfriend screamed, "I'll fucking kill you, philanderer!"

Poet Zhao was finally able to make out his girlfriend's face and fearfully hugged his head as he allowed her to beat the stuffing out of him. The movie that was showing was The Shaolin Temple. Later audience members would say that they enjoyed double screenings of The Shaolin Temple that night — one starring Jet Li and the other with Poet Zhao. Furthermore, everyone agreed that Poet Zhao's version was more impressive, that his girlfriend was even better than the Wulin master, and that the martial arts she used in cursing and beating Poet Zhao were even more deadly than Jet Li's. From that day on Poet Zhao became notorious, his reputation for wickedness exceeding even Baldy Li's after he was caught peeping at Lin Hong's bottom. Zhao's girlfriend immediately kicked him out and married someone else, and went on to bear her new husband a cherubic son. Though he was deeply regretful, from that point on Zhao never managed to have another girlfriend, let alone a wife. After learning this painful lesson, Poet Zhao waxed lyrical to Writer Liu with a sigh, "They speak of going for wool only to end up shorn. ‘Tis I, ‘tis I."

Writer Liu laughed appreciatively but thought to himself that since he also had designs on Lin Hong, it was really but for the grace of God that he had avoided losing his current wife and ending up like Poet Zhao. Writer Liu patted Poet Zhao's shoulder, then — though it was unclear whether he was congratulating himself or consoling Poet Zhao — he concluded, "It is a wise man who knows his own limitations."

Of the nineteen infatuated men, only two were bona fide bachelors, and these two initiated courtship procedures, both declaring that they had neither a marital history nor even a girlfriend history. One even showed Lin Hong's parents his medical records, which stated that he had no history of mental illness or any other chronic illness. The other, when he learned of this, immediately presented his parents’ medical histories. Spreading them out as if he were unfurling a pair of scroll paintings, he showed Lin Hong's parents that his own parents had no history of mental illness or chronic illness either. As for himself, he patted his chest and said that he had no medical history at all. He claimed that he had never been sick in his life and in fact didn't even know what it meant to be sick. He said he was so healthy that he had never even sneezed, and that as a child he found it very curious when someone sneezed, thinking that their nose was farting. As soon as he said this, his own nose started to itch and his mouth opened of its own accord. Realizing that he was about to sneeze, he made dramatic gestures as he swallowed the sneeze, looking as if he were gulping down poison. He feigned a yawn and said with embarrassment, "I didn't sleep well last night."

These two bona fide bachelors both paid several visits to Lin Hong's house. Though they saw with their own eyes her tepid response, the polite smiles from Lin Hong's parents inflated their hopes. Already imagining themselves as prospective sons-in-law, these two bachelors started calling Lin Hong's parents Mom and Dad. Covered in goose bumps from embarrassment, the parents demurred, "Don't call us that, don't call us that."

One of the bachelors was comparatively tactful and switched back to calling them Uncle and Auntie. The other, however, was even more obtuse than Baldy Li and continued calling them Mom and Dad, explaining that since he would be calling them that sooner or later, he might as well start now. Lin Hong's parents snapped back, "And who is your dad? Who is your mom?"

Lin Hong despised these two handsome misers, who kept coming to her house empty-handed just before dinner and dawdling in order to get a free meal. It's true that once one of them did give Lin Hong some melon seeds to snack on. He kept reaching into his pocket while they were chatting but waited until her parents retreated to the kitchen to hand her the seeds, looking as if he were giving her some South African diamonds. Lin Hong saw that the seeds were already soaked with the sweat from his palm and mixed with lint from his pocket. Revolted, she turned away, pretending she hadn't seen them, and thought to herself that this oaf was even worse than Baldy Li, if that were possible.

Initially Lin Hong's parents, upon seeing a suitor lingering about when they were ready to eat, would courteously invite him to stay for dinner. After each of these bachelors had had dinner once at Lin Hong's home, he immediately bragged to everyone that he and Lin Hong were officially an item. They would even spice things up a bit, one boasting that Lin Hongs mother had served him personally, the other claiming that Lin Hong had fed him with her own spoon. The bachelors even asked their friends to help spread the stories of their romantic adventures with Lin Hong. Their friends, however, suspected that none of this was true; and while it would have been easy to simply repeat the stories, they would lose face if Lin Hong disavowed them. The two bachelors, however, saw things differently, and upon hearing each other making up preposterous stories, they felt the need to make even more outlandish claims so as not to fall behind. Even if they fell short in the end, they nevertheless felt that to have courted Lin Hong in the first place was definitely something to be proud of and would certainly raise their personal worth — which would come in handy in courting other girls.

These two sensationalizers finally encountered each other on the street. As one of them was proudly recounting stories of his romantic adventures with Lin Hong, the other, walking by, couldn't stand it anymore and shouted, "Bullshit!"

The two then stood there in the middle of the street and proceeded to curse each other, spittle flying everywhere. Everyone watched as they simultaneously rolled up their left sleeves, then their right. The onlookers retreated to give them room, fearing that a fierce battle was about to erupt. The two suitors then squatted down and rolled up their pants legs, exciting the onlookers even more. Everyone was certain that they were about to put up a ferocious fight, a fight for the ages. After the two had rolled their pants legs up above their knees, they noticed that they now had nothing left to roll up, but they still didn't come to blows; rather, they continued cursing each other as before, the only difference being that now they wiped the spittle from their mouths with more intensity.

As everyone was waiting with anticipation Baldy Li appeared on the scene. Having just given Tao Qing his work report over at the Civil Affairs Bureau, he was on his way to the Good Works Factory when he saw a huge crowd of people. He pulled one of the onlookers aside and asked what was going on. With a certain degree of exaggeration the person exclaimed, "World War Three is upon us!"

Baldy Li's eyes glittered, and he shoved his way through the crowd. When the people of Liu Town caught sight of him, they became even more excited, saying that now there was sure to be a great show, that what had already been a competition between two heroes had now become, with the arrival of Baldy Li, a Romance of Three Kingdoms. Hearing the two men — fingers pointed at each others chests and spittle flying everywhere — each claiming Lin Hong as his own, Baldy Li immediately erupted in a fury and launched himself between them. Grabbing each by the collar, he roared, "Lin Hong is my girlfriend!"

The two suitors hadn't expected Baldy Li to appear and immediately stopped in shock. Baldy Li roared again as he released the one on his right and swung his fist at the one on his left, giving him a black eye. Then he proceeded to give the one on his right a black eye as well. That morning Baldy Li ended up beating both men so badly that they were left moaning in anguish. The onlookers were now so giddy that they repeatedly stomped their feet, sensing that this was even better than returning to the Three Kingdoms period and watching Cao Cao beat up Liu Bei and Sun Quan. Several onlookers became so frenzied that they imagined themselves to be the famous Three Kingdoms strategist Zhuge Liang and urged the two suitors to join forces and attack Baldy Li together. One onlooker pointed at one of the suitors and shouted battlefield strategies at him as though he were Liu Bei: "Join forces with the Kingdom of Wu to defeat the Kingdom of Wei! Join with Wu to defeat Wei!"