Chapter 23 Diary (1)

  I sat quietly with Erliang, the police arrived soon and took me to the police station for a record. They all knew me and knew I was Erliang's best friend, and they had also discovered that Erliang's behavior had been somewhat strange in the past few days, so no one suspected that the murderer was me, which could be seen from their attitude.

  But I don't know how to make it clear to them, and I haven't even told them that I met Erliang at Lao Chu's house, let alone that I saw the woman in red and chased after her again, only to find out that something had happened to Erliang on the bed. Because I don't know how to explain it to them, they may not believe me either, as can be seen from the outcome of the two letters signed by Chu Jiangshan.

  I said I met Erliang on the street and brought him home because he didn't look right. After going downstairs, I realized that I had forgotten my phone, so I went back upstairs again. As a result, I found out that something had happened to Erliang. As for those two torn papers, I did not hide them either. The police took the papers and said they wanted to check the fingerprints, asking me to go home and rest first, waiting for the summons from the bureau to cooperate with their investigation at any time.

  When I got home, it was almost dawn. There were several text messages from Xiao Rui on my phone. At that time, I was dazed and didn't hear the notifications. When I opened them, they were to ask if I had arrived home safely, and then asked if I had arrived home yet. I replied with one message: "Erlang left, my best friend left."

  Xiaohui quickly sent me a text message: "You still have me." Then my tears flowed again.

  I was thinking about how to bring up the matter with my sister-in-law, who is married and living elsewhere. Of course, she isn't called "Big Mother", not even "Second Mother", this is just a habit in their household, like a nickname in an ordinary family. Since I'm close to Er Liang, I also follow him in calling his sister "First Mother".

  It's hard to say something that has to be faced. When my mother heard the bad news, she burst into tears on the phone, but I didn't know how to explain it to her.

  One of the girls rushed over by plane that day, because she was a colleague and had a good relationship with everyone in peacetime. So, regarding the matter related to Erliang, everything went smoothly, and various test reports came out in just a few days. The paper only had fingerprints of me and Erliang, and indeed, I was the only one who had been to the room. However, the cause of Erliang's death was finally confirmed as sudden release of large amounts of catecholamines from the adrenal gland, causing heart rate to suddenly increase, blood pressure to rise, and myocardial oxygen consumption to rapidly increase. The rapid blood circulation hit the heart like a flood, causing cardiac muscle fibers to rupture, leading to cardiac arrest and death.

  One of the girls looked at this identification result with some confusion, I said in a low voice: "To put it simply, Erliang saw something too terrifying before he left." Of course, except for me, I'm afraid no one would believe these words, and even I myself don't want to believe that Erliang was scared to death. But his appearance is exactly the same as Wang Qiang and Lao Chu, whom Erliang showed me before. Maybe it's true that most people won't believe it, I think One Girl won't believe it either, but I couldn't hide it from her, even if it's such a result.

  But just then, I found that the woman's body suddenly stiffened, her face turned pale, and even I saw a thread of fear in her eyes.

  I hastily supported her body and asked: "Yi Niang, what's wrong?"

  A girl hastily shook her head, but didn't say anything. I and she finished the relevant procedures and left the office, took a taxi to Erliang's new house. All the way, A girl kept her head down and didn't speak, I clearly felt that she had something on her mind, because fear was greater than sadness in her eyes.

  After getting off the bus, my mother suddenly said she didn't want to go up anymore. I seemed a bit passive. My mother smiled at me apologetically, but her smile was full of bitter intentions. She said: "Alei, accompany me for a walk."

  We were walking casually in the neighborhood, my mother with her head down and not saying a word. I didn't know how to break the silence either. It wasn't until after a while that I heard my mother say: "A Lei, you're Er Lang's best friend, our family has never treated you like an outsider. Tell me, has Er Lang been acting strange lately?"

  I gritted my teeth and told Yiniang everything from the beginning, including the painting I had hidden. In my heart, I always felt that if it weren't for me hiding that painting, Erlang wouldn't have gotten into trouble. I didn't ask Yiniang to forgive me; this was no longer something that could be faced with just forgiveness.

  The first wife didn't scold me, I hung my head and didn't know how to face her. At this time, I heard the first wife sigh and say: "Actually, it's not your fault, Er Liang... has been a bit off for a long time."

  "What did you say?" I was shocked, although I had long felt that Er Liang was hiding something from me, but after all, everyone has their own secrets, and it's rare for two friends to have no secrets at all. What really made me feel that he was a bit abnormal was when he came back from the deep mountains, but just a few days later, something happened. Now hearing Er Niang's words, Er Liang had been a bit off even before that, I was not only shocked but also eager to know what was going on, perhaps it would help me find out the real cause of Er Liang's death.

  Erlang must have seen something before he died, such as the woman in the red skirt. The image of that pale face with too much powder on it and a row of blood-red teeth immediately flashed into my mind.

  One of the girls looked at the grass on the ground and said softly: "Erlang also has a sister, called Erniang." I nodded, indicating that I knew this.

  The first daughter continued: "The second daughter and the second good feelings are very good, but the second daughter is very early to die." I lightly sighed, the second good family has too many misfortunes, now Ye's family only one daughter left, I said: "One daughter, from now on you are my sister."

  A girl lifted her head and smiled, patted my hand without saying anything, then lowered her head and was stunned for a while before raising it again to look into my eyes. I felt that there was a hint of fear on her face. The girl said: "Do you know how the second daughter-in-law died?"

  I just heard Erliang mention that he had a sister who died young, but I didn't ask about the specific situation. I've never been the kind of person who likes to pry into others' business. Now that my mother brought it up, I reckon there must be some secret behind it.

  A girl began telling me a story from many years ago, and although it had been many years since then, she still sounded scared when mentioning it.

  That was twenty years ago, I remember that at the time I was eight years old, Erniang was six years old, and Erliang was only four years old. The three of us lived in the countryside, it was summer and the fields were busy with harvesting, adults wouldn't take care of us kids, they just warned us not to play by the river, anyway, the countryside is different from the city, there are no cars on the road, as long as we didn't go near the river, there would be no danger.

  Because my father was a teacher, he had high expectations for us from a young age, and we were required to write in our diaries every day. Although under his guidance we learned more characters than other children of the same age, after all, we were too young to write anything meaningful.

  That summer, I took Erniang and Erlang to that rear mountain we had never been to.

  One girl's voice began to tremble, as if she had remembered something terrible. I hastily signaled her to speak slowly. One girl paused for a moment and continued: "That day we were too bold, knowing that the adults would not return from the fields immediately, so we played and forgot about time. Er Liang was busy catching cicadas, while I and Er Niang went separately to pick wild vegetables. When I realized it was already late, I found that Er Niang had run off somewhere."

  I was scared to death with Er Liang, I called out to her desperately, but still didn't hear Er Niang's response. I was so anxious that I almost cried. Fortunately, Er Liang was clever and suggested climbing up the tree to take a look. If we still couldn't find her, then we would go back to get the adults to help us.

  There aren't many trees on the hill behind, nor are they particularly tall and lush. Er Liang is still young, but his tree-climbing skills are quite impressive. He climbed up a small tree and shouted loudly: "Yi Niang, I saw Er Niang!"

  He climbed down the tree, pulling me to run to a place, saying that he saw Erniang standing there. After running for not too long, I saw Erniang. In fact, she was not far from us all along, but at that time, I was young and excited to find Erniang, and didn't think about why Erniang couldn't hear our calls.

  Erniang stood there stupidly, as if she hadn't seen us. I said: "Erniang, you can go home now, Dad and Mom are coming back." But Erniang didn't move at all.

  I got angry and pulled her up, Erniang slowly turned around and said: 'Then let's go back.'

  After returning home, my parents were already at home and had been searching for us everywhere, almost going crazy. When they saw us return safely, they scolded us a few times after asking where we had gone, but that was it. At night, it was time to write our diaries as usual. Every time we finished writing, my father would check them and then evaluate our diaries. My father always liked Erniang's writings, saying they had a lively spirit, but this time Erniang was severely criticized by my father because he thought she had lied.

  Writing a diary was a kind of torture for us at that time, because we really didn't know what to write. So, without prior agreement, we all wrote about the incident in the backyard today. As a result, I found out that what I and Erlang said were completely different from what Erniang said. At first, Father thought Erniang had added her own imagination and wanted to praise her, but Erniang insisted that she was telling the truth, while Erlang and I were lying.

  I said exactly the same thing as Erliang, so of course Father believed us. As a result, Erniang got scolded by Father because he thought that a child who had learned to lie from a young age and still refused to admit his mistake even after being exposed would definitely not amount to anything. But Erniang stubbornly insisted that it was we who were lying. That evening everyone was in a bad mood, so after dinner we all went to bed early.

  I was sleeping with Erniang, and in the middle of the night I vaguely felt that there was a light in the room. When I opened my eyes, I saw Erniang sitting at her desk. I called out to her: "Erniang, why aren't you asleep yet?"

  The second daughter turned her head and smiled at me, but didn't say a word, continuing to do her thing. I said: 'Second daughter, what are you doing?'

  This time, however, Second Sister ignored me. I saw her pick up a pen and write something in her notebook, then tear it out and continue writing, only to tear it out again, repeating this process over and over.

  I was scared by Erniang's appearance and burst into loud crying. My parents heard the cry and rushed in, they were also scared by Erniang's appearance. Father looked at what Erniang had written and said: "Erniang is good, it's Dad's fault." Then he let Mom accompany us to sleep, while he himself accompanied Erlang to sleep in another room.

  Second sister lay in mother's arms, quietly sleeping, but I kept my eyes open and couldn't sleep, even in the darkness, I seemed to see second sister sitting at her desk, turning her head to smile at me.

  The next day, my parents saw that Erniang had calmed down and told us not to go out and play today, then they went busy with farm work. I quietly asked Erniang what she wrote last night, but she just stared blankly without saying a word.

  After waking up from my noon nap, I found that Erniang was gone again. After searching the front and back of the house, she couldn't be found anywhere. Erliang hastily went to the fields to find the adults to come back and search together. It wasn't until evening that everyone finally found Erniang on the mountain in the back, but she had already... That place was where we found her last time. To this day, I still remember how she looked then, as if she saw something very frightening.

  So many years have passed, and our whole family has deliberately avoided mentioning this matter, but in fact, we all know that no one can forget Erniang, especially Erliang. He had the best feelings for Erniang since childhood. I often see him crying alone in front of Erniang's photos, but none of us are willing to bring up those sad past events.

  But just a little while ago, he suddenly called me and asked if I still remembered writing diaries when I was a kid. I said yes, what's up?

  Er Liang said to me: "Yi Niang, that day Er Niang really didn't lie, the diary she wrote was true."

  When she said this, her whole body began to shake. I hastily supported her and asked: "What did Erniang's diary say?"

  One girl took out a small notebook from her bag, the paper looked very old, she said: "Erlang originally asked me to send this diary to him before, I kept delaying, now he's gone, keeping this thing is useless, Ari, you're Erlang's best brother, after you read it, please burn it for him."

  I knew this was Erniang's diary from when she was a kid, I nodded in response to Yiniang and took the diary, carefully opening it and flipping directly to the last page. The handwriting on it was childish, with only a few words below the date, but after reading those few words, all the hairs on my body stood up.

  "Today, I saw an aunt wearing a red skirt on the mountain. The aunt's face is really white, but why are her teeth red?"