Love In Fallen City

Chapter 10

 

When they got home, they pushed open the half-open door and a flock of pigeons flew out flapping their wings.

The hallway was full of dust and pigeon droppings. Lisa walked to the stairs and couldn’t help but scream “Ah!”

 On the second floor, her newly bought boxes and cages were lying crookedly and wide open. Two of them also rolled down the stairs, and the foot of the stairs was submerged in the flood of silk and satin. Lisa bent down and picked up a honey-coloured velvet cheongsam, but it was not her own thing. It was full of sweat stains, cigarette holes and the smell of cheap perfume. She also found many strange women’s belongings, torn magazines, and canned lychees with lids opened, dripping with residual juice, mixed with her clothes.

Were there soldiers stationed in this house? – British soldiers with women? They seemed to have left in a hurry. Most of the local poor peasants who looted from house to house had never visited, otherwise they would not have left all these things. Jungkook helped her call out to A Li. Finally, a grey-backed pigeon came out from the side, flew through the yellow sunlight in the doorway, and flew out.

Ah Li was nowhere to be found, but the owners of the house had to survive without her. They had no time to tidy up the house, so they had to prepare food first. They went through a lot of trouble and bought a bag of rice at a high price.

Fortunately, the gas supply was not cut off, but there was no running water. Jungkook carried a lead bucket to the mountain to draw a bucket of spring water and started to cook. From then on, they were busy eating and cleaning the room every day. Jungkook did all the rough work, sweeping the floor, mopping the floor, and helping Lisa wring out the heavy sheets. Lisa cooked for the first time, and the food had some flavours of her hometown.

Because Jungkook couldn’t forget Malay food, she also learned to make fried “sandbags” and curry fish. Although they felt unprecedented interest in food, they still tried their best to save money. Jungkook didn’t have many Hong Kong dollars with him, and they had to find a way to return to Seoul once they had a ship.

Living in Hong Kong after the catastrophe is not a long-term solution. The daytime is so busy that it just passes by. At night, in that dead city, there are no lights, no human voices, only the wild cold wind, three different scales, “Oh… He… Woo…” endlessly calling, one stops, the other gradually starts again, three parallel grey dragons, flying forward in a straight line, the dragon body extends infinitely, and the tail cannot be seen.

“Oh… He… Woo…” After calling, there are no more blue dragons, just three empty airs, bridges of vacuum, leading to darkness, leading to the void of the void. Everything is over here. There are only some broken walls and ruins left, and civilized people who have lost their memory stumble and grope in the dusk, as if they are looking for something, but in fact everything is over.

Lisa sat with her blanket wrapped around her, listening to the sad wind. She knew for sure that the grey brick wall near Repulse Bay must still be standing there. The wind stopped, like three grey dragons coiled on the top of the wall, their silver scales gleaming in the moonlight. As if in a dream, she came to the foot of the wall again, and met Jungkook. She finally met Jungkook. …

In this turbulent world, money, property, and everything that lasts forever are no longer reliable. The only thing that can be relied on is the breath in her mouth and the person sleeping next to her. She suddenly crawled to Jungkook’s side and hugged him through his quilt. He reached out from the quilt and held her hand. They saw each other clearly, and it was only a moment of complete understanding, but this moment was enough for them to live together in harmony for ten or eight years.