I decided to go back to the crematorium. I asked Liu Yang and she said it was all up to me.
I went home to accompany Liu Yang and asked Li Xiaohuan not to come again. She was unhappy, but didn't say anything. It seemed that she was waiting for something. I didn't know what would happen, and I was always uneasy. This uneasiness has been with me all my life and made me very painful. Perhaps, a person's life is a life of unrest.
I told Liu Yang whether I should go back to be the director or not. She said, "You should go back to the crematorium and do paper-making if you like, because you can't leave the crematorium. What I like most is makeup, and I know this best."
Because one time, when I was putting on makeup, I stood in front of the mirror and scared Liu Yang, but she didn't say anything. To be honest, this is the thing, I really can't get rid of this feeling of putting on makeup.
I agreed to go back to the crematorium as the director. I sat in the office and my mood changed. I was back again. This was something I had not expected. The office was made up by Bu Lele, and I did not move.
Li Xiaohuan came in.
"master."
She came in bouncing, walked up to me, and kissed me. I was startled.
"What are you doing?"
"Tsk, look how scared you are. I am your apprentice. Congratulations."
Li Xiaohuan walked away triumphantly, and I looked at him in a daze.
I don’t know what will happen to me in the end when I return to the crematorium. Returning may be a good thing, or it may not be.
Entering the dressing room, the feeling is definitely different. Dressing Room No. 13 is clean and bright. Obviously Li Xiaohuan has cleaned it carefully and made tea. I was sitting there drinking tea when the deceased came in. This is when the work started. I didn't expect that the first thing he did was a big makeup. It seems that the pushers over there did it on purpose. These guys are really bad enough.
Li Xiaohuan took a look and said.
"You just have to wear heavy makeup when you come, otherwise they are very caring to me."
"These bad boys are here to test me."
There was a tattoo on the body, on the neck, of a snake, with the head exposed, so the body should be that of a snake. Such a tattoo would be troublesome for both the deceased and the makeup artist.
He actually got a tattoo of a snake. Sometimes, as far as tattoos are concerned, it's okay to have anything you like, but you can't have random tattoos. Some people get tattoos of tigers, tigers coming down the mountain, tigers going up the mountain. Those are not done casually. Some people can do it, but some can't. However, these people will be entangled after death and will be reincarnated for generations.
"Master, what should I do?"
I sat there and looked at this man with a tattoo of a snake, what a creative idea.
"Snake head against head, cut the snake and then make up, that is, cut off the snake's head."
"How to cut it?"
"Use makeup to make the snake head disappear."
Li Xiaohuan can also do this, but I can't let her do it because her legs go weak when she sees a snake.
I know that if you don't do your makeup well, you will encounter a snake. The snake on this man's body is just a tattoo on his body. In fact, this man has kept such a snake for at least five years. You can tell from the tattoo that if something is on the body, after more than a year, there will be a corresponding thing outside, and it is alive. You are raising it. Of course, if the tattoo on your body is damaged or washed off, then the thing outside your body will die.
If we kill this snake, we won't be in trouble. If we ignore it and burn it, then the snake will become trouble for the makeup artist or the refiner.
I opened my makeup box and Li Xiaohuan sat at the bar, watching me put on makeup. She was nervous the whole time.
I spent an hour putting on heavy makeup to cut off the snake's head. Now the snake's head is gone, so I think there should be no problem.
When I was getting ready to put on makeup, I heard a hissing sound. I stopped moving. Li Xiaohuan also heard it. It was the sound of a snake coming out, there was no doubt about it.
"Call the monitoring room and have them check dressing room 13 to see where the snake is."
Li Xiaohuan was already standing at the bar, her hands shaking with nervousness.
It's normal for her to be afraid. I have a natural fear of snakes.
I don’t know what I did wrong.
I sat on the chair, lit a cigarette, and watched. The sound was still there. It was really strange. There was no snake anywhere on the surveillance camera. I listened to the sound and it seemed to be on the dressing bed, but I didn't see it. We didn't see the snake, so we didn't move.
The director came in.
"Captain, what's wrong?"
"Keep your voice down, there's a snake."
The director listened and found that it was true.
"It should be on the makeup bed."
The director picked up the stick.
"You'd better not do anything extreme. This snake is probably not an ordinary snake."
The director put down the stick, his hands shaking.
"You go out, it's okay, I'll call you if there's anything."
The director went out, and I asked Li Xiaohuan to go out as well, but she said she couldn't go out and stayed with me. I didn't say anything else.
Just as I was thinking about what to do, Zhang Wen came in and sat on the chair next to me and said.
"Li Xiaohuan, come down."
Li Xiaohuan just came down from the bar at this time.
"It's all right. The snake is under the shroud, wrapped around the body of the deceased."
I glanced at Zhang Wen. This man who came from the crematorium in the provincial capital was so strange to me. A designer, he should be a designer, but he ended up being a refiner. I really couldn't understand it.
No matter what his excuse is, whether it is to be filial to his mother, I still don’t understand.
"Don't move yet. The snake will slowly calm down. That was your snake-slaying trick. Unfortunately, you didn't do one thing right. The snake should be killed three inches apart. You didn't hit the spot, just a little short."
I see that’s not the case.
"So that means the snake is not dead?"
"Yes, he is angry. This man has been raising this snake for several years. The snake has become a creature of nature as it is raised by him. Snakes are also spiritual creatures. Now that this situation has occurred, the best way is to wait until the man's yang energy has dissipated and his yin energy has not yet risen. There will be a time difference. This is when the snake is at its weakest, on the verge of death. If you kill the snake at this time, everything will be fine. But it is not easy to grasp the time."
I don't know, how can Zhang Wen, who is only in his twenties, know so much? This is what I can't figure out. No matter what, things have come to this, and I can only wait for the right time.
"How do I read this?"
"When Yin and Yang meet, the sun sets, and I will be with you."
Li Xiaohuan asked me to kick him out, and he's been shivering here.
The family members started making a fuss, so I went out and called them to my office and told them about the snake.
"Impossible, what you said is too outrageous. We are waiting to be buried. What is this?"
"I will definitely refine it for you today."
"Is there anyone who burns people in the dark? Those are extremely evil people, but we are not like that."
"This is the truth. The snake is wrapped around our bodies and we can't move."
"What happened to your crematorium? You let the snake enter the morgue. This is your responsibility. What do you say we should do?"
The family members cannot understand such things, and I cannot explain them clearly.
"So what do you want to do?"
"It will be refined immediately."
"I'm entangled with snakes, so I can't practice."
"Burn the snake too."
This idea is bold enough.
"I'm telling you the truth. If this continues, he won't be able to reincarnate. He will be a wild ghost for the rest of his life."
"We don't believe in reincarnation."
There is no way to explain it. If it was burned like that, it would be a troublesome thing. The snake would leave the dead body and hold resentment in it. We, the makeup artists and refiners, would be in trouble.
The family members requested that there be no farewell and that the body be refined directly.
I told Zhang Wen about this, and he looked at me for a long time.
"This will be extremely disadvantageous to you or the refiner. We cannot agree to it."
"But the family is making a fuss. They have called the police station and asked if they could get the snake down."
"Impossible. No one dares to move now. You cut off the snake's head, but it's in the wrong place, so it went back. We don't know where the snake is or where its head is. If you're bitten, you're dead. In addition to the snake venom, there's also the poison of Yin and Yang. That's not something that can be treated in a hospital.
It is a bit strange that Zhang Wen knows so much, just like He Dana.
"Is there no other way?"
"No more, wait for the director to come."
The director came with his men, and the family members were crying. I reported the situation in the office.
"I'm so sorry. I've caused you trouble on my first day in office."
"If you weren't here, that would be a big problem."
Bu Lele became the director and also came along. She is no longer so ostentatious, perhaps because of her position as director.
"What do you want to do about this?"
"When the Yin and Yang meet, the snake will be stiff, so kill it."
"Then wait until then, and I'll do the work on the family members' side, but I might lose some money."
"That's no problem. We have no other options when encountering something like this. It seems that this is the only way."
The director finally had a solution. Half an hour later, the family agreed to waive the cremation fees.
When the sun was about to set, Zhang Wen and I were in the dressing room. I had a knife, a very sharp knife.
As soon as the sun set, Zhang Wen lifted the shroud, and the place he lifted happened to be the snake's head. The snake raised its head once, but did not lift it up, and then lay there motionless. If it had not been at this time, Zhang Wen would definitely have been bitten, which would have been terrible.
The snake was stiff. It was the most poisonous snake in Northeast China.
I cut off the snake's head and put it in a bottle, then took out the body and put it in a bag. The snake was big enough.
"Apply makeup immediately, simple makeup, don't take too long, don't burn it, even if you separate the snake's head, there will be trouble."
I put on some simple makeup and after five minutes, I went straight into the refining furnace. The master at station number ten was also a little confused.
We breathed a sigh of relief after watching the body burn, and I separated the snake and buried it.
That night, I didn't sleep well. Snakes kept appearing in my dreams, scaring me awake several times.
This is what happens all the time in crematoriums, so it's no surprise that bizarre things happen.
The next day at work, I did not go into the dressing room. Li Xiaohuan was putting on makeup. She made an OK gesture on the surveillance camera, and I knew she was posing at me. After she finished her makeup, she sat at the bar to rest, then looked at the surveillance camera and smiled at it. I knew she was smiling at me.
I don’t know how to deal with Li Xiaohuan’s issue. She has never had a boyfriend, which makes me a little nervous. This girl is too stubborn and keeps clinging to me.
On Saturday, I went to the weaving room, but to my surprise, Li Xiaohuan was already at the door.
"Master, I knew you would come today."
"Why are you here?"
"I'm here to play."
When I opened the door, I was stunned, but I didn't say anything. I was a little surprised that there were two missing semi-finished paper-cuts in the yard shed. There were five of them. I didn't say anything and went into the house to look around. Nothing happened. But Li Xiaohuan screamed at a door in the second entrance. (To be continued)