Boy in the Twilight (11 page)

The rapidity of his flight made her realize that what he said was not a joke, and she felt her breath come with a flapping sound, like wind blowing on a wall where a piece of paper has been posted.

Having a boyfriend offers many conveniences—for instance, when you want to see a movie, there’ll be someone to buy your ticket and supply you with prunes and olives—so many it will take you days to finish them. If it’s a question of going off sightseeing, then boyfriends come in even more handy, paying for food and accommodation, carrying this or that for you … Sponsors, that’s the word for them.”

As Wen Hong spoke, she scanned the faces within view.

It was a summer evening, and after her shower Li Ping was lying in her nightgown on a rattan couch that lay in the street outside her home. The street, which was not very wide in the first place, had become so crowded with people trying to cool off that it was now as narrow as a corridor. Bamboo beds, rattan chairs, and other furniture that really belonged indoors had been moved outside, and even mosquito nets were unfurled. The locals generated a constant buzz of noise, like a flock of bees attracted by rapeseed blossom, and the street was as packed tight as a strip of fresh green growth. As Li Ping lay on her couch, her long hair cascaded over the back of her pillow, where it was blown about by an electric fan she had laid on the ground. Wen Hong, sitting next to her, spoke up once more. “Hey, I see a sponsor now.”

“Who?” Li Ping put her hands behind her head and gave her hair a shake.

“Li Qigang,” Wen Hong said. “Shall I call him over?”

Li Ping gave a sudden giggle. “That moron?”

“He’s seen us,” Wen Hong said.

“He’s coming over?”

Wen Hong nodded. “Yes.”

“That geek tried to go out with me,” Li Ping said.

“He asked me out, too,” Wen Hong whispered.

Both girls burst out laughing. Li Qigang walked up to them with a smile on his face. “What’s so funny?” he asked.

The girls laughed all the more loudly, one almost bent over double, the other clasping her knees as she sprawled on the couch. Li Qigang stood unflappably at their side, maintaining his smile. He was wearing a short-sleeved shirt, trousers, and shiny leather shoes. With the back of his hand he wiped away the sweat on his forehead. “Everybody’s looking at you,” he said.

Hearing this, the two girls stopped laughing and took a quick look around. They noticed a few people casting glances in their direction. Wen Hong straightened herself and gave her hair a good shake as Li Ping sat up and pulled her nightgown over her knees.

“You girls should get a haircut,” Li Qigang said.

The two girls looked at him and then at each other.

“Do it in a page-boy style,” Li Qigang went on.

Wen Hong spoke up at this point. “I like my hairstyle,” she said, running her hand through her hair.

“I like your hairstyle too,” Li Ping chimed in.

Wen Hong glanced at her. “Where did you have your hair done?”

“At Rougerie, the place on Zhongshan Boulevard.”

“They did a really good job. That cut is all the rage in Europe these days.”

Li Ping nodded. “I saw this style in a foreign magazine. It was all in English, not a single Chinese character. Your hairstyle was featured too. At the time I was really keen on doing my hair like you. Your hair really complements your face.”

“Lin Jing and the other girls said the same thing.” Wen Hong toyed with her hair.

Li Qigang noticed how the two girls were talking to each other and not paying him the slightest attention, so he tried to get a word in edgeways. “I still think the page-boy look is prettier. It’s so cute, and besides, the weather is so hot. With long hair—”

Wen Hong interrupted him. “Aren’t you hot in your long pants?” she asked.

Li Qigang looked down at his trousers. “They’re wool. They don’t feel hot.”

Wen Hong practically screamed. “You’re wearing woolen pants?”

Li Qigang nodded. “Ninety percent wool.”

Wen Hong stole a glance at Li Ping. “Wow, ninety percent wool.”

The two girls snickered, and Li Qigang watched them with a smile. Li Ping sat up on her rattan couch. “Why didn’t you buy one hundred percent pure wool pants?” she asked.

Li Qigang squatted down and untied his laces, then took his left foot out of his shoe and placed it on Li Ping’s couch. Pointing at the straight crease on his trouser leg, he said: “See this line? If it was one hundred percent wool, it wouldn’t be so straight.”

“You could iron it,” said Li Ping.

Li Qigang nodded. “That’s true, but after wearing the pants
for ten minutes, the line would disappear. Pants that are one hundred percent wool are no good.”

Wen Hong reached out a hand and felt Li Qigang’s trousers. “Pants this heavy will feel hot even if they’re ninety percent wool,” she remarked. Turning to Li Ping, she said, “What do you think?”

“You can see right away those are thick pants,” Li Ping answered. “Just now, as you were coming over here, I thought you were wearing cotton pants.”

Wen Hong tittered. “I thought they were serge.”

With a smile, Li Qigang removed his foot from Li Ping’s chair, slipped it into his shoe, and bent down to tie his shoelace. “Of course, compared to them …” He pointed at several youths passing by in Western-style shorts: “Compared to them, these are warmer. Long trousers are always warmer than shorts. Some people wear shorts the whole summer long and expose their chests as well, slouching around in sandals. That’s okay for them, but it won’t do for us. We in official positions need to maintain our image. We might get away with not wearing stylish clothes, but at least we have to look neat, don’t we?”

At this point, Li Qigang took a handkerchief out of his pocket and wiped his forehead. Wen Hong and Li Ping exchanged glances and smiled conspiratorially. “Where have you people in the Cultural Bureau moved to?” Wen Hong asked.

“Tianning Monastery.”

“You’ve moved to a temple?” cried Wen Hong.

Li Qigang nodded. “It’s wonderfully cool in the summer there.”

“What about the winter?” asked Li Ping.

“In the winter …,” Li Qigang conceded, “it’s cold.”

“Why don’t you people in the Cultural Bureau get yourselves an office building? Look how impressive the headquarters of the Finance and Business bureaus are,” Wen Hong said.

“We don’t have the money,” said Li Qigang. “No department has a smaller budget than we do.”

“So, of people in official positions, you’re the poorest.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” Li Qigang smiled.

Li Ping looked at Wen Hong. “No matter how poor they are, they’re still officials, and officials are always going to have higher status than us.” She turned to Li Qigang. “Isn’t that right?”

He smiled modestly. “I wouldn’t say we have higher status than you, but compared to the average worker, having a job in a government agency is a bit more dignified.”

The two girls chortled. Li Qigang again broached the topic of their hairstyle, repeating his recommendation. “You should really think about short hair.”

Again they laughed—and all the more loudly—but he took this in stride. “Do it the way Scarlet does her hair,” he went on.

“Who?” asked Wen Hong.

“Scarlet, the singer,” replied Li Qigang.

“Oh,” the girls responded. “I can’t see what’s so great about Scarlet’s hairstyle,” said Li Ping.

“Her face is too pointy,” said Wen Hong.

Li Qigang smiled. “Next month I’m going to Shanghai to escort her here.”

Hearing this the girls were taken aback, and it was a moment before Wen Hong asked, “Scarlet’s coming?”

“That’s right.” Li Qigang gave a restrained nod.

“To give a performance?” asked Li Ping.

Li Qigang nodded. “The most expensive seats will cost fifty yuan, and even the cheapest ones will be thirty.”

The girls’ eyes gleamed. “You’ve got to get us a couple of tickets,” they said.

“No problem,” said Li Qigang. “I’m involved in setting up the whole event, so there’s no problem at all in getting you two tickets.”

“Make it complimentary tickets,” said Li Ping.

“That’s right,” said Wen Hong, “I bet you can get your hands on lots of tickets. Give us two for free.”

Li Qigang hesitated a moment. “Okay, they’re on me.”

The two girls beamed. “Give us the fifty-yuan seats,” Li Ping said.

“We don’t want the thirty-yuan ones,” said Wen Hong.

“That’s right,” said Li Ping. “Don’t make us sit in the back row, where we won’t be able to see Scarlet’s face.”

Li Qigang again hesitated. He wiped his forehead. “I’ll make every effort to get you fifty-yuan seats.”

“Don’t say ‘make every effort,’ ” said Wen Hong. “It’s a real letdown when someone of your position says ‘make every effort.’ ”

Li Ping smiled. “That’s exactly right. It must be a piece of cake for someone of your status to come up with a couple of superior seats.”

“All right then,” Li Qigang said, after a moment’s reflection, “I’ll get you two fifty-yuan tickets.”

The two girls gave whoops of delight. Li Qigang smiled, looked at his watch, and announced that he had to attend to some business. The girls got up to see him off and, as soon
as he had walked away, they murmured in almost the same breath, “What a dummy.”

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?”