Yu Hua - Boy in the Twilight - Stories of the Hidden China

They giggled. “He’s a real blockhead,” Wen Hong said.

“Sometimes even dummies have their uses,” Li Ping remarked.

The two girls giggled once again. “When was it he asked you out?” Wen Hong quietly asked.

“Last year. What about you?”

“Last year, too.” They had another giggle. “How did he go about it?” Wen Hong inquired.

“He called me up,” Li Ping said. “He called and asked me to meet him at the entrance to the Cultural Bureau. He said there was going to be an event. An instructor in ballroom dancing was coming from Shanghai and would teach us how to dance. So I went …”

“You never saw the ballroom dancing instructor.”

“How did you know?”

“He made just the same kind of date with me.”

“And then he asked you to go out for a stroll?”

“That’s right,” said Wen Hong. “Did you go for a walk with him?”

“We walked a little way, and I asked him if it was time to go for the dance lesson. He said no, what he wanted to do was go out for a walk together. I asked him what he had in mind.”

“Did he say it was so you could get to know each other better?”

Li Ping nodded. “He said the same thing to you?”

“That’s right,” Wen Hong replied. “I asked him why he wanted us to get to know each other better.”

“I asked him the same question.”

“He said he wanted us to be friends, and I asked him why.”

Li Ping picked this up: “He was slow to answer.”

“Right,” Wen Hong said. “He rubbed his chin for ages and finally said …”

Li Ping imitated Li Qigang’s tone of voice: “To see if we fall in love.”

The two girls roared with laughter. They laughed so much they couldn’t stand up straight, and it was a full five minutes before they recovered. Then Li Ping said: “When I heard him say ‘fall in love,’ my hair stood on end.”

“I was as petrified as a mouse in a cat’s jaws,” said Wen Hong.

Again they burst out laughing. “How did you respond?” Wen Hong asked.

“I said I wanted to go home.”

“That was very civil of you,” Wen Hong said. “I told him: You’ve got as much chance as the toad that fancied the swan.”

ONE EVENING SEVERAL WEEKS LATER, Wen Hong arrived at Li Ping’s apartment. Li Ping was doing herself up in front of the mirror. She had just finished combing her hair and had begun to paint her eyebrows. She had an eyebrow pencil in her hand as she opened the door, and seeing this Wen Hong asked: “Are you going out?”

Li Ping nodded and returned to her seat in front of the mirror. “I’m going to a movie.”

“Who with?” Wen Hong pricked up her ears.

Li Ping smiled, but did not answer.

“You’ve got a boyfriend!” Wen Hong exclaimed. “Who is he?”

“You’ll find out soon enough.”

“So that’s the way you want it.” Wen Hong gave Li Ping a jab. “You have a boyfriend, and you don’t even tell me.”

“I’m telling you now, aren’t I?”

“Then I’ll stay and meet him.” Wen Hong sat down on the sofa and watched Li Ping putting on her makeup. As Li Ping painted her lips, she said, “This imported lipstick is really good.”

Wen Hong thought of something. “I ran into Li Qigang this morning. He was wearing an imported tie. It looked really nice.”

“That singer Scarlet gave it to him,” Li Ping said.

“That’s right, that’s what he told me,” Wen Hong said. Then, with a trace of suspicion, she said, “How did you know?”

Li Ping massaged her face with both hands. “He told me.”

Wen Hong smiled. “Do you know something? Scarlet likes Li Qigang.”

Seeing Li Ping nodding in the mirror, Wen Hong asked: “Did you know that too?”

“Yeah,” Li Ping answered.

“Did he tell you himself?”

“That’s right.”

“This Li Qigang …” Wen Hong seemed displeased. “He told me not to tell anyone, but the guy goes around himself telling lots of people.”

“He hasn’t told a lot of people. Just you and me, right?”

“Who knows?” said Wen Hong.

Li Ping stood up, and tried on the dress she had laid out on the bed. “How do I look?” she asked.

“You look great,” said Wen Hong. “How much did he tell you?”

“About what?”

“About Scarlet chasing him.”

“Not much.”

Wen Hong watched as Li Ping swiveled from side to side in the mirror. “Did you know that he and Scarlet spent the night in her hotel room?”

Li Ping spun around and stared at Wen Hong. “He told you that too!”

“That’s right.” Wen Hong was rather pleased. Then she noticed something. “He told you too?”

Li Ping could see there was something odd about Wen Hong’s expression. She turned around and said offhandedly, “I asked him about it.”

Wen Hong smiled. “I didn’t ask him. It was he who told me.”

A fleeting smile appeared on Li Ping’s face. Wen Hong laid her arms on the back of the sofa and gazed at her friend’s figure. “This Li Qigang is actually quite classy, don’t you think?”

“That’s right,” said Li Ping. “Otherwise, why would a woman as pretty and popular as Scarlet take a fancy to him?”

Wen Hong nodded. She put her hands in her lap. “Actually Scarlet is no beauty. From a distance she looks good, but when you get close up she’s not so pretty.”

“When did you get to look at her close up?”

“I haven’t,” Wen Hong said. “It was Li Qigang who told me that.”

Li Ping looked unhappy. “What did he say exactly?”

Wen Hong seemed pleased. “He said Scarlet isn’t as pretty as me.”

“Not as pretty as you?”

“Not as pretty as us.”

“Us?”

“You and me.”

“He mentioned my name?”

“Yes.”

“That’s not what you said in the beginning.”

Wen Hong looked at Li Ping in surprise. “Is something wrong?”

“Not at all.” Li Ping gave a quick laugh, then turned around and looked at herself in the mirror. She wiped the corner of her eye with her left hand.

“If the two of them spent the night in a hotel,” Wen Hong said, “what do you think they did?”

“I don’t know,” Li Ping said. “He didn’t tell you?”

“No, he didn’t,” Wen Hong said, inquiringly.

“Probably nothing happened,” Li Ping said.

“No,” Wen Hong said. “They put their arms around each other.”

“It was Scarlet who put her arms around him,” Li Ping blurted out.

The girls looked at each other, stunned. Li Ping was the first to laugh, and then Wen Hong. Just as Li Ping sat down, there was a knock at the door, and as she was about to get up again, Wen Hong said, “I’ll get it for you.”

She walked over and opened the door, to find a neatly dressed Li Qigang standing smiling on the doorstep. He gave a start, clearly not expecting to be greeted by Wen Hong. After a moment he tilted his head round the door and said to Li Ping, as she walked toward him, “You look terrific.”

Wen Hong heard a chortle from her friend, who walked past her and out the door, then reached back to grasp the doorknob. Wen Hong suddenly realized what was what, and hurried out as Li Ping closed the door behind her.

On the sidewalk, Li Ping took Li Qigang’s arm. “Do you have a ticket?” he asked Wen Hong.

She shook her head. “No.”

Li Ping, her hand on Li Qigang’s arm, turned away. After a couple of steps, she looked over her shoulder. “Wen Hong, we’ve got to go. Drop by some time.”

Wen Hong, nodding, watched them stroll off. When they had gone twenty yards or so, she headed off in the other direction, giving a “Humph!” as she went.