◎Throwing Salt◎

Luo Peiyin remarked: “Art galleries are closed on Mondays.”

“Except on public holidays. The day after tomorrow is New Year’s Day!” If it were anyone else, Zhao Yue might have added a quip about living such a comfortable life that you’d forgotten what day it was — even failing to realize that the day after tomorrow was the first day of the nineteen-nineties. But since it was Luo Peiyin who had said it, Zhao Yue was more cautious about making jokes at his expense, and swallowed the remark back down.

Zhao Yue sensed that Luo Peiyin was not in a good mood this evening, and shifted his attention back to Xiao Jia: “It’s that hard to give back five hundred yuan? Just make it a gift. Walk into any department store and buy a watch — you won’t find one for less than that. You two have quite refined tastes, spending the holiday at an art gallery. She’s going to restock tomorrow — why not keep her company, ring in the last day of this year together, and bring in 1990 side by side?”

Luo Peiyin tossed the can of cola from the centre console to Zhao Yue: “You talk so much. Aren’t you thirsty?”

Zhao Yue cheerfully accepted the cola and even said thank you.

“She shouldn’t run into any danger on an overnight train, should she?” Xiao Jia had developed a selective hearing system for Zhao Yue’s commentary and only registered what he himself cared about. By now Gu Qiao would either be at the station or on her way there. She said someone was going with her, but he hadn’t asked who — and now he was starting to worry whether that person was reliable.

The can popped open with a crack and the built-up foam surged out all at once.

“She’s on the overnight train? What time specifically?”

Xiao Jia only knew it was in the small hours — he didn’t know the exact time.

The car suddenly accelerated, then braked sharply, pulling up in front of a payphone booth. Zhao Yue barely kept his mouthful of cola from spraying out — and he thought his own driving was bad; tonight’s driving was worse than his.

Luo Peiyin got out of the car and went into the payphone booth. Zhao Yue checked his watch five times without seeing Luo Peiyin come back out.

Eight minutes later, Luo Peiyin emerged and said to Zhao Yue: “Drive Xiao Jia home.”

“What about you? What’s happening?”

“Stop worrying about it. Nothing serious.”

The more Zhao Yue thought about it, the more he felt that Luo Peiyin had been off all evening. A thought suddenly exploded in his mind. He asked Xiao Jia: “What’s this girl’s name?”

“Why do you ask?”

“What’s the secret? You said you wanted to help get her some business, right? If one day I happen to find a job and someone asks me her name, it won’t look good if I can’t say.”

“Gu Qiao. The ‘Gu’ from grain, and ‘Qiao’ with the ‘yu’ radical and the ‘yao’ component.”

“Gu Qiao? You said the girl’s name is Gu Qiao? What does she look like?”

Xiao Jia noticed how agitated Zhao Yue seemed and guessed he must know someone by the same name. He described Gu Qiao’s features.

“Damn! This girl you’re talking about is your Brother Luo’s cousin.”

“Brother Luo’s cousin?” Would Brother Luo’s cousin be short enough on money to borrow from him?

“Not by blood.” If only she were. Zhao Yue offered Xiao Jia a word of warning: “If you have no particular feelings for her right now, it’s best to keep it that way. Save yourself the heartache later. Don’t say your older brother didn’t warn you.”

—

Gu Qiao’s pager went off — but at that moment she was on a late-night public bus, with no way to call back. The number wasn’t one she recognised.

She guessed it might be Proprietor Zhai calling — had he decided not to take the goods after all? The bus pulled up to a stop, and Gu Qiao jumped off in a hurry. The road was icy — she nearly slipped, but she didn’t give it a second thought and immediately dashed toward a payphone booth. In the freezing night air she could see her own breath. She stomped her feet inside the booth to keep from going numb, and on the fiftieth stomp, Proprietor Zhai called back.

Proprietor Zhai hadn’t been able to sleep — he was too anxious about the deal.

Hearing Gu Qiao’s voice at this hour, he was immediately on edge: “You’d better not tell me something’s wrong with the goods. If you dare play me for a fool…”

“The delivery will be on time — guaranteed! I just wanted to confirm one more time. No backing out tomorrow.”

“As long as you get me the goods on time, you have my word I’ll take them!”

Gu Qiao hung up and walked toward the station alone. So who had paged her? The station forecourt was wide and empty at this hour. The ice on the road had been cleared once, but a thin new layer had formed again. She walked with her eyes fixed on the ground, arms wrapped around herself. Afraid of something going wrong, she had split up the money — some of it was tucked inside her stockings and tied tightly around her waist.

Equally tight was the north wind, flowing in on her from every direction in the night. In darkness and cold combined, even the most accustomed solitary person will, in a single unguarded moment, crave another presence. Having someone beside her would perhaps make things easier. Gu Qiao thought of Luo Peiyin — thought of his hand around her shoulder. When their shoulders had pressed against each other, it was as though their warmth had merged, and the cold had been entirely forgotten.

The moment she finished thinking this, Gu Qiao cursed herself for being pathetic. Keep this up and you’ll be done for! She hadn’t even earned much money yet, and already she was indulging in a craving for warmth — going soft. If an emperor couldn’t bear to leave his warm bed every morning, he was bound to crumble — and she was no different. Were it not for the bitter cold, how would she ever have had the opportunity to sell gloves and earn her first pot of gold? Gu Qiao gave herself a stern internal lecture. She told herself: don’t be afraid, stay steady. As long as you keep that string pulled taut, nothing will go wrong. The colder it gets, the greater the opportunity for her.

Gu Qiao curled into a waiting room chair and began mentally mapping out her schedule for the day. She was so deep in thought that when a hand tapped her shoulder, she leapt straight off the seat in alarm, instinctively pulling her padded coat tightly around herself: “What do you want!”

And then the tone of alarm changed to one of surprise: “Cousin!”

“Did my message not get through on your pager just now?”

“It was you who paged me, Cousin?”

“Who else would it be?”

“It was…” She could have said, but he wouldn’t know who it was anyway. Gu Qiao couldn’t help asking: “Cousin, how did you know I was here?”

“Have you forgotten who you told?”

Luo Peiyin caught the shift in Gu Qiao’s expression and didn’t beat around the bush: “Xiao Jia and I know each other.”

Gu Qiao let out a quiet “oh.” But just a few hours ago, Xiao Jia had known nothing of her connection to Luo Peiyin — so how had Luo Peiyin learned from Xiao Jia? She tucked all these questions away inside herself and didn’t ask a single one. She braced herself to be scolded — for failing to tell him about the restocking trip in time, and for wasting his time coming out here.

But no scolding came. Luo Peiyin asked her: “What time did you book the return ticket for?”

“Cousin, I’ve already bought mine.” Luo Peiyin glanced at the time on Gu Qiao’s ticket, then told her to sit tight — he went to buy his own.

Luo Peiyin reflected that he had perhaps placed too much weight on the word “cousin.” Gu Qiao didn’t take those two characters seriously at all. She called him “Cousin” with such warmth not because she was trying to claim kinship for personal gain — she called him that the same way strangers on the street called each other “older brother” or “older sister” when asking for directions, purely because it felt more respectful than using a name.

But since he had already decided to see this journey through with her, he decided he should still fulfil the responsibilities a cousin ought to.

—

They arrived at their destination before four in the morning, and from there sat in the waiting room until daylight. The hardships of the train journey went without saying — but at least with people pressing in on all sides, you didn’t feel the cold. The waiting room held neither warmth from human bodies nor warmth from heating. Gu Qiao was wearing the padded coat she had recently bought. She hadn’t realized when she bought it, but now she could tell — it was cheap and poorly made. Irritated but also oddly relieved, she was glad she’d only bought one.

She sat with her arms crossed on the icy cold chair, her head drawn down into her collar.

Luo Peiyin pulled his high turtleneck up to his ears, then took off his thick hunting jacket and wrapped it around Gu Qiao.

“Cousin, you wear it. I’m not cold.”

But he stubbornly kept it wrapped around her. Gu Qiao was well aware of what her size difference with him meant — what fit him perfectly would be far too large on her. But wearing it was another experience entirely. This jacket, which made him look tall and lean, swamped her entirely. Wrapped in it now, it was almost as though she were wrapped in his arms. And immediately, Gu Qiao felt embarrassed by such an entirely inappropriate comparison.

“Aren’t you cold, Cousin?”

She got no answer. Luo Peiyin’s gaze had moved toward the outside of the waiting room, where it was not yet light.

Together, the two of them watched the last sunrise of that year from the train station.

“Tomorrow is 1990!” Gu Qiao heard the excitement and exhilaration in her own voice. She had always craved change, and change meant the possibility of something better. “Cousin, may the new year bring you more and more good things!”  She felt his life was already quite good, but she wished him more good things still.

“You will have more and more good things too.”

“I absolutely will!”

Once the sun came out, the breakfast stalls outside the station opened for business. The steamed buns at the breakfast stall were genuinely difficult to eat — ten times worse than the canteen’s buns. Gu Qiao was still deliberating whether to take Luo Peiyin to a different stall to treat him to breakfast, when she saw that he had already finished a large steamed bun with a completely expressionless face.

Just as Gu Qiao had anticipated, one stall alone wouldn’t have nearly enough of the gloves she needed. She went from stall to stall before she had gathered the full quantity. The gloves boarded the coach with them, then went into the cargo hold for transport, and eventually arrived in front of Proprietor Zhai.

Proprietor Zhai was true to his word — he settled the payment at the previously agreed price. Gu Qiao inspected every single note with care, guarding against counterfeits.

“What would I gain from cheating you?”

Gu Qiao smiled: “I know you would never cheat me, Proprietor Zhai. But what if someone had cheated you without your knowing? I need to check carefully — if I come across a fake, I’ll let you know right away.”

“You really know what to say, this girl.”

Gu Qiao tucked the counted money into her waist pouch and smiled: “You’ve been kind enough to look after my watch for a whole day — I’ll take charge of it myself now.”

Only then did Proprietor Zhai remember the watch. Gu Qiao would have let him forget all about it.

“Where did you buy this watch? My son wants one.”

“It was a gift — I’m not quite sure where it came from.”

Proprietor Zhai looked at the young man standing beside Gu Qiao. He figured the watch had probably been a gift from him. Dressed like that in winter, that jacket must be very warm.

“Whereabouts did we get this watch? The new year is coming — I’d like to give my son one too.”

“I’m sorry, I’m not entirely certain either.”

Proprietor Zhai found this puzzling. Someone in the clothing trade — and you could decline to say where you bought that jacket, fine. But what was there to keep secret about a watch? It must have been bought at a wholesale market — a grey-market piece being passed off as a department store purchase! Yes, that had to be it. This girl probably didn’t even know — otherwise she wouldn’t have been so reluctant to let go of it as collateral. Next time someone came to him offering items as security, he’d better look more carefully.

—

Walking down the street, Gu Qiao felt as though her heavy cotton shoes had turned light — almost as light as snowflakes. She absolutely had to treat Luo Peiyin to something. He had been on his feet for her since the small hours of the morning.

As they walked, she spotted the sign for an American California Beef Noodle restaurant. Chen Qing had told her about it once — it had opened a few years ago, around the same time as KFC. A bowl of noodles ran more than three yuan, while a bowl of ordinary beef noodles elsewhere cost less than one.

She wasn’t here for the noodles — she was here for the words American California. She had heard from her aunt that Luo Peiyin would be going to the United States to study next year — and it seemed the place he was going to was the very California on that sign. Perhaps the closest she would ever get to California was this bowl of noodles.

Gu Qiao decided to be extravagant for once — but Luo Peiyin declined.

She thought he was trying to save her money and was firm: “I’ve never tasted American beef noodles before. Let’s both go in and try them.”

“Don’t worry — they taste the same as what you eat every day. Even if California had beef noodles, they’d only be found in Chinatown.”

Gu Qiao smiled faintly: “Oh.” She didn’t quite know why, but not being able to spend these few yuan felt harder than spending them would have.

In the end they found a Northwestern-style hand-pulled noodle restaurant. According to Luo Peiyin, Northwestern people made the most authentic hand-pulled noodles. A bowl here cost eighty fen, and Gu Qiao made sure Luo Peiyin got an extra two liang of beef.

While waiting for the food, Gu Qiao reached into her bag and took out a pair of gloves for Luo Peiyin: “Cousin, these are genuine sheepskin gloves. Try them on.” She had always kept in mind that the gloves she’d bought for him last time weren’t pure sheepskin. This time, while buying her large batch of pigskin gloves, she had also picked up some sheepskin ones.

Seeing Luo Peiyin hesitate, Gu Qiao quickly added: “Cousin, I bought some for everyone at home. These are my New Year gift to the whole family.”