Wooden Ear 1

  God is my witness, I am a good girl.

  I excel academically, enjoy helping others, persevere through hardships, and respect my elders. I willingly go about my daily routine, sleeping at 10 PM sharp every night and waking up at 6 AM the next morning. The first thing I do after waking up is to open the curtains and look out the window; at that time, the sky is always a little bright, even in summer when the sun just starts to peek through. Then, I sit by the window reading English aloud with a loud and sweet voice. My mom walks over and hands me a cup of rich milk. I gulp down the milk and continue reading my English.

  My mother stood in the morning room filled with love and looked at me tenderly.

  Unfortunately, I'm a good girl with a few minor flaws - my heart and my left ear. I was born this way, and although I've had surgery on my heart using very advanced technology that didn't leave any scars, so it's something I can ignore. But the hearing in my left ear has always been poor, and if you stand to my left and talk to me, there's a good chance I won't hear anything at all.

  So when I read books, I always read louder than others.

  Although it is like this, I don't think there's anything wrong with me. Before the age of seventeen, I loved myself as simply and purely as many kind-hearted people in this world loved me.

  However, what's more embarrassing is that on a certain day when I was seventeen, I suddenly fell in love. I still can't remember the weather of that day, but I only remembered his face, a boy leaning against the railing by the street opposite to school at dusk with a big bag of books that had been washed until it turned white. His face was so handsome. It was my first time seeing him, and I got scared and turned my head around, my heart beating rapidly for no reason.

  His name is Xu Yi.

  I once hated this name very much because the last character is difficult to type on a computer using Wubi. I practiced for many days before I could smoothly repeat it over and over again.

  On the white screen, it's all this name, I use red to make it bigger and more vivid. It seems like he is standing right in front of me.

  After knowing Xu Yi, my blog finally had some real meaning.

  I'm talking about knowing Xu Yi.

  The fact is that we don't know each other and have no chance to get to know each other. All I know is that he's in his third year of high school, about to graduate, with excellent grades. Another thing I know is that a girl from a technical school is crazily chasing after him.

  I've seen that girl. Her attire is very strange. Sometimes, I think she's like a plant, especially when she wore a green skirt and stood at the entrance of our school, I saw her with green eye shadow, golden powder on her face, holding a yellow sunflower, standing alone there.

  Another time, she used oil paint to write four big characters on her white clothes: I love Xu Yi.

  Many girls passing by her side shouted loudly.

  She has become a beautiful scenery at the entrance of our school.

  The most crucial thing is that in the end, Xu Yi actually fell in love with her.

  He fell in love with her.

  One day after school, he walked up to her and said: Let's go see the cat you're feeding.

  The girl jumped up with a whoosh, cheering and opening her arms, running around like a glider before stopping in front of Xu Ye. She said: "Handsome boy, I finally believe that love can be won! Haha, I'm so happy I could die!"

  That girl who liked to dye her eyes green, I later found out that her name was Ba La.

  I finally met Ba La at the ramen shop behind school.

  It later occurred to me that this was actually something I had been planning all along.

  I still remember that evening when it was raining outside and the store was particularly noisy. After finishing my evening self-study, I felt very hungry, so I went to a ramen shop. She sat with her back to me at a certain table by the wall, wearing a pink thin sweater, which made her stand out. When I walked closer, I found that she was smoking 555, a British brand of cigarettes, and she seemed to be savoring it very much, just like a little sister eating chocolate. The small TV in the store was playing a silent TV series, and when I looked at her, her eyes never left the TV from start to finish.

  I sat down across from her.

  Then she glanced at me.

  Then she reached out and grabbed a handful of coriander from my steaming bowl and threw it into her own. Then she spat out the cigarette butt and ate her noodles in silence. For the first time, I saw her so clearly, with a round bun at the back of her head, a melon-shaped face, not a single pimple, and especially big eyes. I thought she was very beautiful. The kind of beauty that gets more stunning as you look, hidden but surprising. She didn't wear green eye shadow.

  I thought to myself at the time: No wonder Xu Yi...

  "Are you also from Heaven?" She asked, looking at the badge on my chest.

  "Uh-huh." I said.

  "Oh." She said, "Do you recognize me?"

  I reluctantly shook my head.

  "The naughty kids in your school all know me." She said proudly, then smiled again, her face becoming even more delicate.

  After we finished eating and walked out of the noodle shop, the rain got heavier and heavier. The rainwater kept dripping down along the cement eaves, and we couldn't go out, so we had to lean against the wall.

  I couldn't help but ask her: "Do you also like eating coriander?"

  "I don't particularly like it, but I just like taking things from others."

  I stared at her in surprise. She reached out to touch my face, then smiled with her eyes curved into beautiful crescent moons, and said: "Hehe, other people's things are always better. You'll understand when you're older."

  I didn't know how to continue the conversation, so I just said, "I don't like rainy days." She looked up at the sky and muttered to herself, "It won't come." Then she stood up and rushed into the rain.

  "Hey!" I shouted at her.

  She turned around.

  I pulled out an umbrella from my backpack: "You'll catch a cold if you get rained on."

  "What about you?" she asked me.

  "My home is just next door, don't worry."

  "Thank you." She took the umbrella and ran a short distance before suddenly stopping, turning around to say: "My name is Ba La, I'll be back next Saturday. I'll return your umbrella then."

  Chuan Shuo Ba La and Xu Yi have broken up, Xu Yi got into a fight for her and became bad.

  Another Saturday has arrived, school is not on holiday, I asked the teacher for leave, saying that my stomach hurts. The teacher easily believed me because she couldn't think that honest me would actually lie. But I really did lie, my stomach doesn't hurt, I went to a ramen restaurant.

  I was stunned as soon as I entered the ramen shop, because I saw her sitting very close to a boy, her face almost completely stuck to his, and she smiled charmingly and movingly.

  That boy was not Xu Yi, his name is Zhang Yang, I know him. He's also a senior in our school.

  Zhang Yang saw me coming in with a backpack and seemed a bit uncomfortable, so he pushed open the door.

  Barla waved at me and said: "Hi."

  I sat down and replied softly: "Hey."

  Zhang Yang quickly paid the bill and left. Bara's eyes followed his back all the way.

  After a while, Ba La walked up to me and asked: "Do you have any cigarettes? I've run out of mine."

  I shook my head.

  "Oh, right," said Ba La, "You're a good kid, you won't smoke! But why did you skip school?"

  She said with a flicker of her big eyes staring at me.

  My god, she's wearing green eye shadow again.

  "My stomach hurts today."

  "My stomach hurts and I'm still eating ramen." She laughed, "It can't be hunger pangs, right?"

  "Bah." I looked at her green eye shadow and said, "Why did you break up with Xu Yi?"

  She looked at me with a "heh" and burst out laughing, laughing so hard that tears were about to come out. Only then did she say with confidence: "I know, you like Xu Yi that little brat, don't you?"

  I stubbornly remain silent.

  "Don't fall in love," said Ba La, "you look like a good kid." She said as she took out my umbrella from behind the chair and handed it to me, saying "Here you go, good baby."

  As I walked away with my umbrella, the last thing Ba La said was: "Actually, I don't know Xu Yi at all."

  "Oh?" She burst out laughing exaggeratedly again. It was only then that I noticed the earrings she was wearing, which were also green, like a big drop of green tears, swinging back and forth on her ears.

  That day, I walked a long way, and suddenly heard Ba La calling me. She must have called out many times, but I only just managed to hear her. I didn't walk back, but the next thing she said, I heard very clearly.

  Ba La said: "Want to know what kind of girl Xu Yi likes? Come next time and I'll tell you!"

  I decided to write a letter to Xu Yi.

  This desire has been weighing on my heart like a stone for so many days. It's suffocating me, and I have no way to compromise with myself, so I can only write.

  My letter is actually very simple. I said: you should know that one failure doesn't matter, and one wrong choice isn't a mistake either. You have to believe that in this world, there's always someone caring about you. Hope you're happy.

  This was, of course, an anonymous letter. I mailed it at the post office and then walked home with a light step. As I approached my house, for some reason or other, I suddenly thought of that noodle shop not far from my home. My feet took me there without my being aware of it.

  There is a shortcut from my home to the ramen shop, but it's under construction and not easy to walk on, so there aren't many people passing by. That day, when I turned onto that small path surrounded by iron wire fences, I felt like there was some movement ahead of me.

  My hearing isn't very good, but I'm extremely sensitive.

  I knew something was wrong.

  It was almost dark by then, and I walked forward. The fact in front of me soon confirmed that my premonition was correct. I saw that the girl who was pressed against the wall was Ba La. The tall boy with his back to me was continuously kicking her with his knee, his movements fast and ruthless. Ba La bit tightly onto his arm, her eyes especially terrifying. That hatred seemed about to drip out of her eyes like blood.

  I rushed up at the fastest speed and pulled that boy away. "Bala" let out an earth-shattering cry: "Get out of here!"

  The boy is Zhang Yang.

  Zhang Yang backed away, extending one finger and lowering his voice to say: "You try it out, I won't let you off if you don't get rid of it!" Then he walked away without looking back.

  The bar behind suddenly slid down from the wall with a thud and knelt on the ground, covering his abdomen.

  I crouched beside Barra, trying to lift her up, but I couldn't.

  I pulled out a lighter from her pocket, the flame flickered and shone on her dirty face, her big eyes looked like two dirty glass balls. The wind blew over, the flame trembled and went out. In the darkness, I said to her: "How about I take you home? Tell me where your home is."

  "Do you have money on you?" Her voice and tone were as calm as ever, as if nothing had happened just now.

  I took out all the money I had on me, over 70 yuan.

  "That's enough." She stood up with a wobble. "I'm going home, I need to take a bath and buy some more medicine."

  I accompanied her to buy medicine and then accompanied her back home.

  She lived with her grandmother, and there was no one else in the house. Her grandmother was playing mahjong with several old ladies and nobody cared about her return.

  We sneaked into her room. She asked me to sit down first, then she went to take a bath. There were few books on her desk, but many high-end cosmetics. Her bed was covered with beautiful clothes. I picked up a book at random, it was a fashion magazine, the model on it had heavy makeup like Barbra Streisand.

  She came out quickly after washing up, and she was very different from usual. She wore a white nightgown and walked slowly in front of me. As she approached, she slowly lifted her clothes, and under the cold moonlight, I saw the red swelling and bruise on her belly, which looked hideous and frightening.

  Why is love like this?

  Dear Xuyi, is this what love is? Why are our young loves always so irretrievable.

  Dear Xuyi, I can only softly call out to you in my heart.

  "Right, what's your name?" Barla asked me.

  "Li Yu," I said.

  "Ear of ear?"

  "Almost, just add a king radical."

  "Is there such a word?" she asked me curiously.

  I nodded and took out the medicine to apply it for her.

  As I moved the cotton swab, Barra's body trembled slightly, and then she said in a low voice: "Do you know? Do you know what's inside?"

  My hands started shaking.

  "There's a little baby inside." Ba La stroked her belly and said, "You tell me, should I give birth to it or not? Maybe she'll be a pretty little girl."

  I slammed the cotton swab onto the ground and asked in a trembling voice: "Who is it, Xu Yi or Zhang Yang?"

  She chuckled: "Don't worry, Xu Yi is just like you, a good baby."

  "But why?"

  She lay down on the bed, adjusted her pajamas and said to me in a heavy tone that she had never used before: "Little ear, do you know? When you love someone, you can do anything for him."

  I walked into the "Forget It" bar on the third day of Chinese New Year.

  "It's okay" is near the technical school, every weekend it's always crowded with all sorts of strange and weird boys, they dye their hair in various colors, in winter they wear sleeveless shirts to play table tennis, loudly speaking foul language. The female owner of the noodle shop told me, you can definitely find it here.

  When I arrived, Barla was loudly telling jokes to someone. She saw me and pulled me outside. The snow had stopped outside, and the sunlight was dazzling. Barla covered her forehead with her hand and said to me: "Speak up, little ear, what's going on?"

  "Xu Yi," I said, "I heard he didn't do very well on the exam."

  "Really?" Bala was unmoved.

  "Why don't you help him?"

  "Why don't you?" said Barla.

  I bit my lips tightly and said, "I can't."

  "If you love him, tell him." He took out a cigarette, lit it up and looked at me.

  "I'm asking you," I said.

  He viciously crushed the cigarette butt and stepped on it: "Zhang Yang will kill me. But he's going to his grandmother's house in Shanghai for New Year's these two days, so you go instead of me to ask Xu Yi out. Make it seem like we ran into each other by chance, that way I'll be less troubled."