A Lucky Coin

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Chu Yi was rather exhilarated. He had been exhilarated all night. The fact that he could detect his own exhilaration meant that he truly was exhilarated.

He sat in the passenger seat, humming softly the whole time.

“Are those two your new friends?” Dad asked.

“Yeah, Yan Hang.” Chu Yi nodded. “These c-clothes and shoes are all, from him.”

“His name’s Yan Hang?” Dad looked at him. “Is that man his father?”

“Yup.” Chu Yi smiled. “We just w-went to the m-music fest together.”

“When did you meet them?” Dad asked.

“Last, month.” Chu Yi turned and stared at Dad. Dad had more questions than usual today. Normally, he rarely asked these things. No one in his family had the habit of trying to understand what he did.

“I see.” Dad drove to their building, found a spot, and parked. “Do you know his family background?”

“W-what’s wrong?” Chu Yi frowned.

“I think his dad,” Dad said, “is a bit strange. You should… spend less time around them.”

Chu Yi was stunned. Before he had time to ask anything more, Dad had already pulled out the car keys and gotten down.

“What do you mean, s-strange?” Chu Yi followed him out and asked.

“I’m just not very comfortable with him,” Dad said. “It’s a precaution.”

“Oh.” Chu Yi answered and stopped asking.

When they got home, Nana and Pops were already asleep. Mum had just showered; she sat on the sofa watching TV. The moment she saw Dad, her face grew long. “Does your driving team give you overtime pay when they make you work extra hours? You said it was one hour, but it’s been several.”

“I had to wait for the passenger. The flight was an hour late,” Dad said.

“Why did they make you go? Isn’t this your day off?! Are you the only driver in the company?!” Mum was very upset. “You’re such a coward. You do whatever they tell you to do. You don’t even know how to turn them down!”

“You and Lao Ding haven’t been getting along for ages now! Doesn’t your superior Luo know that? Making you work overtime to cover for Lao Ding.” Mum was unforgiving. “Aren’t they basically making you suffer on purpose?!!”

Dad was in the washroom, silent and still.

“What are you doing, just standing around?! Can’t find your soul after going crazy all night?!” Mum turned around.

Chu Yi hurriedly bowed his head and walked to the desk, turning on the table lamp and sitting down.

“You didn’t even finish your homework, and you still had the nerve to get all rowdy out there!” Mum glared at him.

Chu Yi quietly took out his book and lay down on the desk, doing his best to bury his face.

Only when Mum went back to her room did he finally breathe easy and look at the homework for the day.

There was quite a bit of homework. He would probably have to work on it past one o’clock. But Chu Yi didn’t mind; when he thought of how he had gone out and had fun tonight, it was fine even if he had to do homework till tomorrow morning.

Yet after writing a few words, he stopped. Mum’s scolding didn’t affect his night’s worth of happiness, but Dad’s attitude earlier made him a little gloomy.

Mum calling Dad a coward wasn’t just angry abuse; Dad had little bravery and did everything cautiously. Whenever he ran into any minor problems, he would usually do his best to avoid them… he was the epitome of cowardice and fear.

Ah.

His ability to put up with things was probably inherited from Dad.

Dad was heavily guarded too, though not like Mum and Nana, who took everyone’s good intentions as insults. Dad always felt that, in light of their family’s circumstances, anyone who approached them of their own accord could potentially be digging a pit for them to leap into.

The fact that he judged Uncle Yan that way right after meeting him made Chu Yi’s heart feel choked.

From Chu Yi’s point of view, even people like Li Zihao weren’t particularly bad—they were almost certainly just moving with the crowd. Only those like Liang Bing fell into the category of “respectful distance to be maintained”.

Oh right, and that Lao Ding.

Dad’s colleague. Chu Yi had met him once. They’d never even spoken to each other, yet for no reason whatsoever, he felt afraid of this person. His eyes were unusually fierce.

Saying that he and Dad didn’t “get along” with each other wasn’t quite accurate. In reality, Dad unilaterally felt that Lao Ding was dislikable and ought not be provoked. Lao Ding didn’t even take Dad seriously; not long ago, he’d even beaten Dad up over an argument about whether the petrol tank had been filled.

And Dad being the way he was, when they met again, smiled awkwardly all the same.

At least on this front he was better than Dad. He could put up with people he hated, but he didn’t force himself to cozy up to them. Chu Yi’s mind was a whirling mess, thinking of Dad one moment, then the concert the next, and then Yan Hang after that.

Yan Hang was a very special person.

Not just because Yan Hang was the first real friend he had ever made.

His English was great; he was very handsome, sometimes very cool; he was very free-spirited; he fought very well; the food he made was amazingly good; he even had a very good-looking ankle…

And he was very kind.

Even knowing what kind of person he had for a grandmother, even knowing what his family was like, and knowing that he was the sort of person who would put up with anything without principles, Yan Hang still respected him a lot.

That’s right. It was respect.

Chu Yi lay on the table. Yan Hang respected him.

What a good person.

–

“Supper?” Yan Hang asked Dad as he walked in the door.

“I’m bloated from tea.” Dad burped. “I can’t eat. If you’re hungry and want to make supper, I’ll eat a little with you.”

“…I’m not hungry,” said Yan Hang.

“Then don’t eat. You have work tomorrow. Get some rest soon.” Dad went to his room.

Yan Hang stood in the living room for a few seconds, then went to his room too. He took out a set of clean clothes and got ready to shower. His mind was a little messy, and he needed a shower to sober him up so he could organise it.

Or maybe he wouldn’t.

Like tidying a room, he could just throw everything haphazardly into a box, then cover it with a lid and be done with it. As for how things were in the box and what the box contained, that could wait till a day when he accidentally opened it again.

When he reached the living room while carrying his clothes, Dad was also walking out of his bedroom with clean laundry.

He looked at Dad. Dad looked at him.

In the next second, they both rushed to the bathroom at the same time.

Yan Hang was faster than Dad, but he wasn’t as ruthless.

More accurately, he wasn’t as shameless.

Just as his hand touched the door handle of the bathroom, Dad yanked the waistband of his trousers from behind.

Both the trousers and his underpants were pulled back.

“Oi! Lao Yan, you’re getting too fucking old and undignified!” Yan Hang felt like his butt was about to fall out of his pants.

“You’re old!” Dad kept pulling him back.

Yan Hang had to hold the door frame with one hand and pull up his trousers with the other. “You’re my father!”

“Now you remember that I’m your father!” Dad let go.

But before Yan Hang could walk in, Dad grabbed his waist and then pinched the wrist of the hand holding the door frame.

His wrist went numb. Yan Hang sucked in a mouthful of air and let go.

In two seconds, Dad had already tossed him aside and gone in, even closing the door.

“You have some nerve!” Yan Hang hammered the door.

“Did you manage to learn it?” Dad laughed inside.

“You want me to learn something as shameless as yanking trousers?” Yan Hang turned his wrist in circles and sat at the door of the bathroom; the numbness still hadn’t fully passed.

It was true though. He never managed to use this technique very well. He didn’t press the right place.

Many times, he’d press till it hurt before his victim would let go.

He would probably never compare to an old fox like Dad in this respect.

An old fox.

Was he?

Probably.

He was an orphan who didn’t even know where he came from. At a time when others would be enjoying an easy life without care, he was busy mulling over how to survive.

All these years, Dad had let him live a bohemian life without being hurt by the outside world, and Yan Hang could feel the kind of man he was, the sort of skills he had.

He was a good judge of character, and good at pretence too.

Today, when Chu Yi’s father’s expression changed, Yan Hang caught it in a casual glance. There was no way Dad didn’t see it too.

Dad avoided this detail and only said that it was his first time seeing him. This wasn’t particularly in keeping with his usual self. Usually, he would take this opportunity to analyse the meaning behind that expression.

So it was possible that Dad wasn’t telling the truth.

But in Yan Hang’s many years of experience with him, it was also not impossible that he really hadn’t seen him before.

Chu Yi’s father was the kind of person you might not notice even if he stood right in front of you; perhaps even if words were spoken, the next day you’d still forget what he looked like.

Yan Hang lit a cigarette and put it in his mouth.

There were many things he was unwilling to think too much about. He did his best to act as if he was a stalk of green foxtail Dad had planted in a flowerpot, well cared for and brought out every day to see the sights, his only worry being that the person carrying his flowerpot around would one day vanish suddenly.

But he couldn’t help dwelling on it. As the days passed, this worry was no longer something he could simply put aside.

After a long daze, he threw the long-extinguished cigarette butt into the bin.

It was possible that Dad had really never met Chu Yi’s father, but he must’ve once appeared in a place where Chu Yi’s father could’ve seen him; he had to have done something that caused Chu Yi’s father to recognise him instantly, causing him to change his expression.

Dad opened the bathroom door. Seeing him, he was taken aback. “Are you queuing?”

“I’m feeling dissatisfied because I didn’t get to be first to shower,” said Yan Hang.

“Shower, then. If you’re not satisfied, shower a little longer.” Dad laughed and stroked his hair. He chucked the clothes he had changed out of into the bucket beside them and returned to the living room.

When Yan Hang finished showering, Dad was on the sofa with his eyes shut. It wasn’t clear whether he was asleep or just resting his eyes.

“Chu Yi says he’s coming over tomorrow. Don’t flake on him,” said Yan Hang.

“Relax.” Dad laughed with his eyes shut. “I told you, I’m not going out for a while.”

Yan Hang went back to his room. He put his earphones in and lay on the bed.

There was a notification on his phone. He grabbed it and took a look. It was from Chu Yi.

A photo.

It was the round red rock that Dad had picked out today, with a hole already drilled in it.

[working overtime huh]

Chu Yi immediately sent another photo over. It was still the red rock, now threaded with red cord, but two strings instead of one, forming an X and knotted on either side of the rock.

[two holes?]

[Yeah, intersecting holes, so I can put two strings through it and it won’t fall off so easily. I’ll take the black one tmr, drill an extra hole and put another string through it]

[ok]

Yan Hang looked at the black rock on his ankle and sighed.

Chu Yi’s behaviour discomfited him somewhat. He felt that the way this child threw himself into being good to people who were just a little nice to him would get him hurt one day.

Then again… with the way Chu Yi had grown up, his heart was probably as tough as King Kong by now.

“I worry too much.” Yan Hang lay on his arm and closed his eyes.

Being able to sleep was a good thing. Dreaming whenever he slept was really depressing.

Especially when he never dreamt of anything good.

He was following Dad and a woman as they ran in the darkness. He was very cold and scared.

He did his best to run faster, to get closer to Dad; he wanted to see Dad’s face, and that woman’s face too. But from beginning to end, they were constantly a few steps away.

Ahead, a figure appeared.

He couldn’t see their face clearly.

But he was sure that it was Chu Yi’s father.

A lifted hand.

A knife.

Blood everywhere.

When Yan Hang wrenched his eyes open, he could still hear his quickened breath, his drum-like heartbeats yet to calm down.

He lay in bed with eyes wide open for a while before he finally woke from his reverie.

The sky was hazily brightening.

At least he’d slept for a few hours. He patted his own head in consolation.

After lazing in bed for a moment more, he put on his clothes and walked out of the room.

He’d only entered the living room when he was startled—on the window sill, someone sat with legs crossed.

Though he didn’t even have to think to know it was Dad, this sitting position was pretty novel; he looked like an immortal about to perform some technique.

“I realised that the morning air from the living room window is better,” Dad said. “There’s probably a youtiao vendor outside my window. They fry them at four o’clock every day. It all smells of smoke and oil.”

“Want to swap rooms with me?” Yan Hang walked over to him and looked out. “Nobody stopped to admire you even with that special morning exercise pose you have going on…”

Before he finished his sentence, someone stopped.

“Says who.” Dad pointed at Chu Yi, who had suddenly emerged, running happily from one side. “You see? He’s going to stop any minute now.”

Chu Yi seemed in decent spirits, his steps light and quick.

But just as he turned the corner, he caught sight of Dad sitting in his meditative pose on the window seat. Evidently unprepared, he froze where he stood.

“Stopped.” Dad snapped his fingers and stretched a hand out to Yan Hang.

Yan Hang took a bag of groundnuts from the side, opened one, and placed a single peanut in Dad’s hand.

“Don’t be stingy.” Dad kept his hand outstretched.

Yan Hang tsk-ed. He fished a fifty-yuan note from his pocket and exchanged the nut for it.

“Little Chu Yi!” Dad put the money away with satisfaction and called out to Chu Yi. “What are you standing there for?”

“Uncle.” Chu Yi walked over and stood before the window. “W-What are you d-doing? You look l-like a p-painting.”

Yan Hang laughed.

“With… a… frame.” Chu Yi dragged his words out to add slowly.

“I’m gonna hit you.” Dad laughed and leapt down from the window seat. “Have you had breakfast? Come in and eat with us?”

“I have,” Chu Yi said, then looked at Yan Hang. “But I’m not f-full y-yet.”

“Do you eat sandwiches?” asked Yan Hang.

“Yes.” Chu Yi nodded.

Sandwiches were very simple. Yan Hang opened the fridge, his mind going over the ingredients swiftly—cucumber, egg, luncheon meat, cheese, and a pack of wholewheat bread. All good.

He took the things and walked into the kitchen, laying the ingredients neatly on the counter out of habit. Chu Yi followed him in.
“This is simple, you don’t have to help,” said Yan Hang.

“Mm.” Chu Yi crouched down and pulled the little rock at his ankle. “I’ll make a n-new hole.”

“Okay,” Yan Hang answered.

Chu Yi retrieved a small pair of scissors from his pocket, snipped the knotted red cord, and took the rock away.

Yan Hang suddenly felt a little upset.