◎ The Gloves ◎

Chen Hui thought he must be mistaken, but the person knocking at his door was indeed Luo Peiyin.

Whether it was the department rumors or the glowing praises Zhou Zhining heaped upon Luo Peiyin, Chen Hui had always found them hard to quite believe. Once, when Zhou Zan was present and Zhou Zhining brought up Luo Peiyin’s virtues again, Zhou Zan said suddenly from the sidelines, “That’s only because his morals have never been put to the test — he can be a good person rather easily.” Zhou Zan was habitually measured and rarely passed judgment on young people, so this assessment made it clear that he held no great admiration for Luo Peiyin. Zhou Zhining retorted: “How do you know young Luo couldn’t withstand a test?” Zhou Zan smiled and said: “Isn’t being spared from testing a kind of good fortune? I hope all young people are blessed with it. This kind of luck is worth envying, but not admiring.” Zhou Zan was a romantic — he believed that what truly deserved admiration was someone who constantly struggled against the worst parts of their own nature, not someone whose very outward circumstances had been favored by heaven.

Chen Hui had originally become acquainted with Zhou Zhining first, and only through her met her father afterward. But now when he visited the Zhou household, it was Zhou Zan he most wanted to talk with. Chen Hui felt that Zhou Zan, though already accomplished, could understand the frustrations of young people still striving to make their way. Chen Hui’s current view of Luo Peiyin aligned with Zhou Zan’s: someone who might deserve envy but not admiration.

Luo Peiyin exchanged a brief greeting and got straight to the point of his visit: “Is Gu Qiao here?”

“She’s not. Hasn’t she come home yet?” Chen Hui had already learned from Zhou Zhining that Gu Qiao was not Luo Peiyin’s biological cousin — the two shared no blood relation. But that was a private matter, and he hadn’t mentioned it to anyone else in the family. An unrelated “cousin-brother” turning up at the door like this inevitably raised some questions in Chen Hui’s mind. Gu Qiao hadn’t come home at this hour? Why was Luo Peiyin here looking for her? He’d heard from Chen Qing that Gu Qiao had been running a stall in the evenings on top of her day job these past few days — surely nothing had happened to her.

Luo Peiyin now knew for certain that Gu Qiao had lied, and he didn’t repeat her fabrication: “Could I speak with your sister? I’d like to ask her a few things about Gu Qiao.”

At eight o’clock that evening, Luo Peiyin had driven past the street where Gu Qiao sold clothes, intending to take her home with him, but he didn’t see her. By nine o’clock she still hadn’t appeared at home. He asked Third about where Gu Qiao had gone. He didn’t ask Fourth — he suspected that with Fourth’s loose tongue, not only would he be unable to give a clear answer, but he’d also spread word of his inquiry to every person in the household. Third quickly got the specific information from her mother and reported back to her second eldest brother. Gu Qiao was studying with the daughter of a friend of her father’s — a family with the surname Chen.

Third couldn’t help asking Luo Peiyin: “Is Cousin-sister really busy studying lately? She doesn’t even have time to eat together with us.” Recently, every Sunday, her second eldest brother would fulfill his duty as an older brother and take her and Fourth out for a meal. She very much enjoyed spending more time with her second brother, but she couldn’t be satisfied simply by having food to eat the way Fourth could. On one side, Fourth would rattle on about uninteresting school stories that nobody cared about; on the other, silent Second Brother — the contrast between the noise and the quiet only made her more unsettled. Still, when she asked Second Brother questions, he would answer them. Luo Fourth — whenever he saw her talking with Second Brother, feeling himself being ignored, he would simply talk louder. Three people together always produced all manner of difficulties; there would invariably be one who felt the other two could do without them, or two who felt the third was the odd one out. But with four people it was different. Every time they ate together, Third wished Cousin-sister could be there too.

And now Luo Peiyin had suddenly shown up at the door — even Chen Hui felt somewhat concerned for Gu Qiao. He immediately called Chen Qing out.

Given Chen Qing’s nature, if there were no urgency, she would certainly have asked where this man in front of her had bought his trench coat and belt. But seeing the expression on his face, she set all of that aside: “Little Gu probably went to Xinji. She told me — once she’d finished selling the jeans, she wanted to go to Xinji to stock up on leather jackets. Don’t worry too much. I told her it wasn’t safe for a girl to travel alone on a train with all that cash, and she should find someone to go with her. She agreed. Little Gu is very smart — I’m sure she found someone to come along for the sourcing trip. With someone by her side, nothing will go wrong.”

Afraid that Gu Qiao’s relatives might blame her, Chen Qing added a few more words: “Her family has so much debt — working two jobs was unavoidable. Who in their right mind would set up a stall outdoors until late at night when they could be at home? It’s gotten so cold out.”

Auntie Chen, hearing that Gu Qiao still wasn’t home, grew anxious too, scolding her own daughter: “A young woman alone out there — how dangerous, and she’s pretty on top of it, and carrying money. Why didn’t you talk her out of it?”

“Little Gu keeps this hidden from her family. Would she have listened to me?”

While the Chen family was still talking, Luo Peiyin thanked them and had already hurried out the door. Auntie Chen called after him: “Let us know when she gets home!” She heard no reply — just the sight of a car pulling out of the alley.

Uncle Chen had gone to visit neighbors, leaving only three people in the Chen home. Auntie Chen sat at home, torn between irritation and worry: “What a headstrong girl — not telling a soul and just running off to another city by herself.” She then admonished her own daughter: “You are to stay home and behave yourself. No running off anywhere. My heart can’t take any more of this.”

Chen Qing reassured her mother: “I’m not running off anywhere. You don’t give me travel money, so I can’t go anywhere even if I wanted to.” She then asked Auntie Chen: “Have you ever seen Little Gu’s mother? Is she very beautiful?”

“I saw her once when she was young. She was quite beautiful, yes.”

Chen Qing voiced a thought she had been mulling over for many days: “Marrying well really is an art. If Little Gu’s mother had married the right man, Little Gu wouldn’t have to be out there setting up stalls every day. She might have even ended up like her cousin-brother, driving a car. Look at the way he’s dressed — clearly brought in from Hong Kong; nothing about it came for under eight hundred to a thousand yuan.” She then reflected: “Though nowadays men are all mercenary anyway. Simply being beautiful and marrying a talented young man has gone out of fashion. Without a good father, you still have to rely on yourself. I’ll probably have to do the same.” As she said this, Chen Qing glanced at her brother Chen Hui. She felt that he was working hard to distance himself from Gu Qiao while gravitating toward the girl surnamed Zhou — largely because the latter had a good father.

Auntie Chen was displeased: “What do you mean, ‘a good father’? Your father and I feed you, clothe you, and pay for your education — what more could you want? If you actually ended up with a father like Qiao’er’s — the kind who can’t stop making trouble — then you’d appreciate what you have!”

Chen Qing had nothing to say to that. She stuck out her tongue and retreated to her room.

Gu Qiao sneezed. It wasn’t from the cold — she was dressed very warmly from head to toe.

Gu Qiao crossed her arms tightly over her coat as she stepped off the train and walked toward the exit. Tucked between her arms and the coat was a bag containing the leather gloves she had bought. Her eyes were fixed on the ground in front of her, unable to see anyone taller than herself. Her money was all stashed below her waist — she had to keep close watch.

To appear mature and experienced — so as not to be cheated during the sourcing trip — Gu Qiao wore the padded-shoulder gray long coat her cousin-aunt had given her, wrapped a brightly colored silk scarf around her head, and had even spent one yuan on a pair of oversized sunglasses to put on. The sunglasses were large, covering half her face. As a precaution against theft, she wore a long skirt beneath the coat, with a pair of loose trousers layered underneath — men’s trousers she had specifically bought for the purpose, with many pockets. The outer pockets of the coat held only a few yuan; the rest of her money was distributed between a waist pouch and the various pockets of the trousers, each pocket additionally secured with a safety pin. She had considered hiding the money in her undergarments, but retrieving it would have been too awkward, and besides, she’d heard stories of people waiting in restrooms specifically to rob others who pulled money from their underclothing. The moment she drew her coat snug around her, it pressed against the skirt and trousers beneath, leaving no opportunity for anyone to pick her pockets.

Dressed this way, she looked considerably more mature and bulkier than she actually was. Even as she reached the exit, her nerves were still taut, terrified that her money might somehow be stolen. It was only when she accidentally stepped on someone’s shoe in the crowd that she stopped. After apologizing, the shoe didn’t move, and she looked up at the face of the person in front of her — and by reflex called out: “Cousin-brother.”

Perhaps it was the cold weather, but she felt that Luo Peiyin’s entire face carried a certain frosty edge. This quality made him seem slightly unfamiliar to her, yet she didn’t feel afraid. Rather, the fear of losing her money that had been permeating her mind all day suddenly dissipated. At this moment, Luo Peiyin’s face was, to her, like an announcement that the danger had passed.

The smile that had involuntarily crept into Gu Qiao’s eyes was concealed by her cheap sunglasses. Afraid Luo Peiyin might not recognize her, she quickly took off the glasses and called out “Cousin-brother” again — different from the instinctive call of a moment ago, this time it carried a barely concealed excitement.

After that “Cousin-brother,” she asked: “Cousin-brother, are you here to pick someone up?”

This question received no answer. Instead, her shoulder was pulled into an embrace. The padded-shoulder coat had made Gu Qiao feel that her shoulders were considerably broader, but now, with his arm around her, she felt as if her shoulders had been compressed back to their natural width. His grip was firm, and Gu Qiao even felt a slight ache, but she made no protest.

The thought that Luo Peiyin had come to the train station to find her occupied every corner of Gu Qiao’s mind. That thought propelled her forward, and even after she’d been settled into the front passenger seat, with the seatbelt buckled around her, her mind was still entirely taken up by it. She had many questions she wanted to ask — how had he known she was at the station, how had he known which train she would be on.

But she asked none of them. Instead, she reached into the bag she was clutching tightly and pulled out a pair of gloves: “Cousin-brother, these are gloves I bought for you. You can wear them when you ride.”

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