Chapter 41: The Youthful Version of Elder Sister

  "What happened last night?" Blue Jeans asked us as she squatted down.

  Only then did I see clearly that the round-eyed almond eyes in front of me were a 17- or 18-year-old girl, who looked exactly like my older sister when she was young. If I wasn't 100% sure that she was currently lying in a hospital thousands of miles away, I might have been startled and thought that my sister had suddenly become younger overnight.

  "What happened last night? Where's the body?" She saw that we didn't say anything and asked again.

  "The corpse took a sickle and smashed the mourning hall, then ran away." I joked. It's so easy to say this now, but if only last night's scene had been so humorous.

  "Nonsense! How can a dead person do such things? Did you two break into the mourning hall and move the body somewhere?" She thought I was deceiving her, so she scolded me.

  "Little girl, where did you get this from? We were locked in the inner room, and you just opened the door lock. How could we have destroyed the mourning hall, let alone moved the body?" I protested her unreasonable speculation repeatedly.

  She was speechless after hearing this explanation and couldn't find a reason to refute me for a while.

  "Little girl," Wang Jue asked as he got up from beside her, "do you have any medicine for fever?"

  She turned around and saw Wang Ke's face flushed with sweat, his head covered in sweat, panting heavily as he straightened up.

  "My home has medicine, haven't you eaten for a long time? I'll get something for you to eat first." She turned and left the inner room. I supported Wang Jue as we walked outside, the main hall was in disarray, not one thing was intact, it was impossible to even find a stool to sit on.

  Helplessly, I could only sit on the threshold of the main room and wait for the little girl. Before long, she appeared with a bamboo basket, looking just like the village girl in Sun Wukong's Three Beats White Bone Demon.

  She walked up to us, put down a basket containing a teapot, a bowl of steamed buns and a small medicine box beside it.

  First, I handed the medicine to Wang Jue. Wang Jue swallowed it in one gulp and picked up the teapot, drinking with relish. Since last night, he had been running a fever until now, and except for that small pot of water sent by Ah Li, he hadn't eaten or drunk anything. After he finished drinking, I handed him a steamed bun, and I also started eating one voraciously.

  When people are hungry, everything tastes good; in times of danger, it's easiest to be moved. Looking back, my older sister worked hard to support our family by herself, while I skipped school every day to play games. I don't remember how many times I used her ID to stay overnight at the internet cafe and got caught by her halfway and taken home. How many times did I hurt her heart with all-nighters, refusing to go to class, and getting into fights? Now she's lying in a cold hospital bed, and facing this young version of my sister, I suddenly feel very guilty. Perhaps people need to experience many things before they learn how to love. Saying one sentence, writing a card, making a few more phone calls - all these are good; but when it's needed, taking responsibility, facing difficulties together without backing down, that's what makes a man.

  "Little girl, what's your name?" I asked while nibbling on a steamed bun and admiring this youthful version of my older sister.

  "My name is Hua Gu, and most families in this village have the surname Hua."

  "So you're also Miao ethnicity?" Seeing that she liked talking, I became interested and started chatting with her.

  "Yes, genuine and native Miao girl."

  "I heard Miao girls can raise cicadas, can you?"