The uncle's words made Lin Banxia's anger to the extreme, and he shouted: "What the hell are you talking about? Xiaohua is dead? I don't know what I am playing with?? In order to perfunctory me, you actually Can you say such nonsense??"
"I... I'm not perfunctory you!!" Uncle shouted loudly, "I'm not perfunctory you - she's already dead!!"
"Okay, you said Xiaohua died, so there must be a tomb, right?" Lin Banxia sneered, "Can you tell where her tomb is?!"
The uncle said: "The tomb... the tomb... the tombstone is at the Black Songshan Cemetery, buried with your parents... She is really dead..." As he spoke, his voice became weaker and less confident. looks like.
Based on what Lin Banxia knew about his own relative, how could he believe his nonsense? He sneered: "You have to say she is dead? Obviously you have seen her and talked to her—"
Unexpectedly, just as he said this, the uncle trembled slightly all over his body, his lips wriggled for a while, but he didn't say a word. No matter how Lin Banxia continued to question, she refused to speak again.
Song Qingluo was worried that Lin Banxia was getting more and more agitated, she patted his shoulder lightly, and said in a low voice, "Banxia, calm down first."
Lin Banxia stared at her eyes that had turned red from anger, and hummed expressionlessly. After listening to Song Qingluo's words, he released the restraint on his uncle.
"You also said she was dead, right?" Lin Banxia tried to calm herself down.
"Yes, she is already dead!" He Tianlei cried.
"Then why do I clearly remember the things I played with her." Lin Banxia stared at her uncle's eyes, "She still lives with us, you even beat him or her?"
After he said this, his uncle's face was even more ugly. Lin Banxia saw the intense fear that was almost overflowing in his eyes, as if Lin Banxia said that these ordinary everyday things were extremely terrifying.
"You say it." Lin Banxia gritted her teeth.
Lin Banxia's series of questions irritated He Tianlei, who was standing next to him. He shouted: "Ask, you can ask, don't you know what you were like when you were a child?!"
Lin Banxia sneered and asked, "What was I like when I was young?"
He Tianlei said, "Skinny looks like a monkey, people hate it when they see it - I should kill you!!"
Lin Banxia said, "Don't you think about killing me?"
After He Tianlei's reminder, the vague memories in the past are now a lot clearer, but these memories are not pleasant. Lin Banxia remembers clearly that he was often bullied by He Tianlei when he was a child, and he ate at most one meal a day. It's still the kind of leftover food left at home ready to be thrown away. Lin Banxia was hungry all day, thin and small like a poor monkey. Sometimes the neighbors couldn't stand it any longer and would secretly give him some food, but even so, he didn't dare to eat in front of He Tianlei. Because the domineering child will grab his food and step on his feet like garbage.
Lin Banxia's aunt also knew what her son was doing, but she didn't care at all. After all, Lin Banxia was just an annoying burden in her eyes at that time, and it was nothing to skip a meal anyway. influences.
He Tianlei was agitated by Lin Banxia, and wanted to go forward and start with Lin Banxia, but Song Qingluo stood beside him. Song Qingluo glared at him coldly, he stopped moving, and shrank his neck involuntarily. : "Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't do it!"
Lin Banxia said: "Didn't do it? You just didn't succeed." He was tired of entanglement with these two people, "If you don't plan to tell me where Xiaohua is, don't think about the half a million."
When my uncle heard 500,000 yuan, he compromised again. He whispered, "Banxia, she is really... gone."
Lin Banxia sneered, reached out and put the bank card back into her pocket, pulled Song Qingluo and turned to leave. Seeing that he was really here, my uncle was completely anxious, reached out and grabbed his sleeve, and said hoarsely: "Okay, okay, don't you just want to know why we are like this? I tell you, I tell you everything—"
He wiped the sweat from his forehead and said, "Lin Banxia, do you remember? There was a time when you liked talking to yourself."
Lin Banxia didn't answer, looked at him blankly, and waited for him to continue.
"We thought you just had a problem with your brain at first." Uncle smiled shyly, "But until one day, I suddenly discovered that there was a strange little girl in the family."
Even though time has passed for many years, when mentioning this little girl, my uncle's body still trembled involuntarily: "I started to think that she was a child of whose family, but who knew that you actually called her Xiaohua, I At that time, I was angry, I wanted... I wanted to educate you, so I took you and the little girl out of the house with a wooden stick, who knows, the two of you ran up the back mountain and couldn't be found."
Lin Banxia frowned. He didn't remember the story his uncle told, but he vaguely remembered what Hou Shan looked like.
They are surrounded by mountains, and the back mountains are full of paddy fields. In summer, there will be many small fish and shrimp in the paddy fields. Simply clean it up and bake it with fire. Although there is not much meat, it is also good to pad the stomach. Being kicked out of the house by her uncle was a common occurrence for Lin Banxia, so it seemed normal that she didn't remember this.
"Then what?" Lin Banxia said, "Just because of this? Are you so scared?"
"Of course there is a follow-up." Uncle whispered, "After that, something strange happened at home. One day, when I opened the cabinet, I saw that little girl squatting in the cupboard at home. I tried to pull her out, but as soon as my hand grabbed her arm... I realized..."
Lin Banxia said, "What did you find?"
"I found that she is not human at all." Uncle said here, his face was covered with sweat, and he kept wiping his forehead with a towel, "I couldn't pull her at all, so she squatted inside and looked at me with white eyes. Sensen's, it doesn't look like a living person at all. I was frightened and closed the cupboard directly. After a while, when I opened it again, she was gone... "
Lin Banxia stared at her uncle with strange eyes: "Are you sure you saw the little girl, didn't you see something else?"
The uncle said: "Dang, of course, I remember this matter too clearly. After that, she seemed to be living at home. Your aunt has seen it, and Tianlei has seen it... It's like a ghost... "
Lin Banxia said, "The little girl in the closet?" His fierce tone just now finally calmed down, as if he had changed back to the usual calm Lin Banxia, but the next sentence made Song Qingluo wrinkle. raised his eyebrows.
Lin Banxia said, "Are you sure you remember correctly? Shouldn't it be me who was locked in the cabinet?"
Uncle's expression instantly became embarrassed. When he was a child, Lin Banxia was the family's punching bag. As long as someone was not going well, he could vent his anger on him. Uncle likes to beat people, while aunt rarely does anything to Lin Banxia. But it wasn't because she was reluctant, but because she had another way to punish Lin Banxia - lock him in a dark cabinet.
The cabinet was short and small, even Lin Banxia could only squat in it, the outside of the cabinet was locked, and he couldn't push it open.
He would cry and beg at first, but when his tears dried, he would just stare blankly ahead with a pair of big dark eyes. If the aunt's anger dissipates quickly, he will be released in about a few hours. If it is slow, then I don't know how long it will take. Lin Banxia vaguely remembered that the longest time seemed to be the whole day of being locked up. When he was dragged out of the cupboard, he collapsed, but his life was hard, and someone just stuffed him with some food, and he just come alive again.
The cupboard was Lin Banxia's childhood nightmare, so he didn't like dark and narrow places. But fortunately, all his childhood memories are very vague, so it did not have much impact on his usual life.
Lin Banxia's question made his uncle unable to answer for a while. He murmured a few words and apologized to Lin Banxia. Unfortunately, this apology is meaningless.
Lin Banxia didn't believe a word of what they said.
"I know you guys won't tell the truth." Lin Banxia lost patience with them, "I'll figure it out myself, bye."
"Lin Banxia, Lin Banxia—" Uncle became anxious when he saw this, and wanted to reach out and grab Lin Banxia, "We didn't lie to you, what we said was true—that girl, really isn't your sister, yours Sister, she's dead-"
"Already dead?" Lin Banxia sneered, "Even if she really died as you said, she wouldn't have died of illness. Am I still not clear about the dirty things in your family?"
The uncle's face was very ugly: "Even if you don't believe me, then we have raised you to such an age, the money..."
Lin Banxia smiled: "Money?" He took out his bank card again, and in his uncle's eager eyes, he squeezed his fingers slightly, and the fragile bank card snapped in half in his palm, "I'm sorry, I won't give you a penny." He wiped his face, turned around and left, his uncle wanted to stop him, but Song Qingluo stopped him.
Lin Banxia walked out of the ward and went all the way down, not stopping until she reached the flower bed below the hospital. He crouched down and covered his face with his arms.
Song Qingluo stood behind Lin Banxia without speaking.
"How could this be?" Lin Banxia's voice was dull, "I don't believe their words at all, how could Xiaohua be fake, everyone knows her... Obviously he has played against Xiaohua, how can he make up Say these words?"
Song Qingluo knew that he was in a bad mood, and after thinking about it, she squatted down, put a cola-flavored candy in Lin Banxia's palm, and patted his back lightly.
Lin Banxia squeezed the candy and said hoarsely, "I'm going to Xiaohua's tomb to see..." He stood up and forced himself to cheer up, "Will you come with me?"
Song Qingluo said, "Of course."
Lin Banxia forced a smile.
After coming out of the hospital, Lin Banxia took the bus to the nearest Heisongshan Cemetery. There are not many people in the town, and it is surrounded by mountains, and the dead are almost all buried in the same place. Aunt once mentioned that Lin Banxia's parents were also buried there, but because Lin Banxia was young, she almost never went to worship.
It was noon at this time, the scorching sun was scorching the earth, and while sitting on the bus without air conditioning, Lin Banxia felt extremely stuffy. He lowered the window most of the way and let the wind blow on his face, wanting to cool down. a little. But the wind was also hot, which made him feel more and more irritable.
Fortunately, the cemetery is not far from the town, a thirty-minute drive away.
After getting off the car and walking down a long path full of tall pine trees, Lin Banxia went to the cemetery management office to inquire about the situation. People from the management office looked at Lin Banxia's ID card and quickly found the place where his parents were buried, but after hearing the name He Xiaohua, they said that there was no such person in the cemetery.
Lin Banxia was overjoyed when she heard this: "No?"
"Yes, no." The manager said, "Did you remember your name wrong?"
"No, it's my sister." Lin Banxia said vaguely, "My uncle said that she died when she was very young, so I just wanted to drop by..."
"When I was very young? How young?" the manager asked.
"It's not even one year old yet." Lin Banxia replied.
"One year old?" The manager hesitated for a moment, then lowered his voice, "How long ago?"
Lin Banxia said, "It's been more than 20 years... What's wrong?"
The manager said: "There was a local custom in the past, and children under the age of one could not enter the cemetery. It is not good for the whole family to enter the cemetery. Generally, they just find a mountain bag and bury them... Of course, these are in the past. Feudal rules, now they are all about science, twenty years ago, they would definitely not have been buried in a cemetery.”
Lin Banxia's expression changed slightly when he heard it. He thanked the management staff and bought some flowers, incense and candles next to him, planning to visit his parents first.
On both sides of the winding path, there were all tombstones of the same shape. Lin Banxia went all the way down according to the numbers, and finally saw a desolate tomb in a remote corner.
Incompatible with the surrounding tombs, this cemetery is covered with weeds, and there is no trace of worship. The tombstone made of bluestone slabs has been covered with green ferns, which looks extremely desolate. Lin Banxia took out a tissue from her pocket, bent down and carefully cleaned the tombstone. Song Qingluo squatted down and pulled out the weeds next to her. Neither of them spoke, the atmosphere was a little quiet.
After Lin Banxia cleaned it up, he saw two black-and-white photos on the tombstone. The faces of the young man and the woman in the photos were very unfamiliar. He looked at it for a while, and then his eyes drooped: "I still don't believe Xiaohua is dead."
Song Qingluo said, "Maybe she is not dead."
Lin Banxia said, "But why did they lie to me?"
Song Qingluo said, "Perhaps, the little flower you know is two different people from that little flower."
Lin Banxia glanced at Song Qingluo and smiled bitterly, "You don't think they're lying to me?"
Song Qingluo said, "They have no reason to lie to you."
Lin Banxia was silent.
"Exchanging a daughter for 500,000 yuan, would they not do this kind of business with huge profits?" Song Qingluo analyzed calmly, "Since this is the case, they have no reason to hide her existence... But their current attitude is this, Even lying is too absurd." If you just want to delay time, you can obviously find other more reasonable excuses, but the behavior of Lin Banxia's uncle and younger brother is completely unreasonable.
Lin Banxia frowned slightly, thinking that Song Qingluo's analysis was right, but emotionally, she couldn't accept it. Just when he was deep in thought, the phone suddenly rang. He took it over and saw that it was still an unfamiliar number. He glanced at Song Qingluo: "Is it Uncle?"
"No." Song Qingluo said, "I haven't seen it before."
"Who is that?" Lin Banxia was a little puzzled and pressed the call button.
But who knew that as soon as the call button was pressed, there was a burst of crying accompanied by excited insults. Lin Banxia listened for a while, only to hear the voice of his cousin He Tianlei. He was very emotional. , He spoke all in dialect, and even Lin Banxia had a hard time listening. After barely understanding it, he cast a stunned look at Song Qingluo.
"What's wrong?" Song Qingluo didn't understand at all.
"My uncle has an accident." Lin Banxia said blankly, "Say he's... crazy."
Song Qingluo was slightly taken aback: "Why are you crazy?"
Lin Banxia said, "I don't know." He asked a few words in dialect, but He Tianlei couldn't hear him at all. He just kept insulting. After listening for a while, Lin Banxia simply hung up the phone and said, "Let's go. , he can't explain clearly, let's go back to the hospital to have a look."
Song Qingluo said yes.
So the two hurried back to the inpatient department of the hospital, but when they arrived at the floor where Aunt Lin Banxia was located, they found that the floor was full of people watching the fun, including family members and patients, and most of them had faces on their faces. They were all curious, and many people were discussing in whispers.
Lin Banxia listened to it casually, and probably understood what was going on. She said that when a man went to the toilet, he suddenly went crazy and rushed out of the toilet with a tumble, and rolled directly down the stairs, although there was no life. It was dangerous, but one of his legs was broken, and when he was carried away by the medical staff, he was still shouting for help, and he looked extraordinarily infiltrating. The worst thing is that this person also has a wife who has a sudden cerebral hemorrhage. When you think about it carefully, it seems that the whole family has fallen into evil... I don't know if I have offended something that shouldn't be offended...
As soon as Lin Banxia heard it, she knew that this person must be his uncle, but what happened to him, why did he suddenly go crazy? Just as Lin Banxia was about to ask carefully, a cursing man came over at the end of the corridor and rushed directly in front of Lin Banxia, wanting to do something to him. Lin Banxia took a closer look, only to realize that it was his cousin He Tianlei. At this time, his expression was ferocious, his eyes were red, and he looked as terrifying as an evil ghost crawling out of hell.
Seeing that he wanted to attack Lin Banxia, Song Qingluo raised his leg and gave him a kick without hesitation, kicking him to the ground.
He Tianlei fell to the ground, but still refused to admit defeat. He yelled at Lin Banxia again. Although Song Qingluo didn't understand what he was saying, he knew that he definitely didn't say anything nice, so his expression turned cold and his tone was calm. Said: "If you scold again, I will pull out your tongue."
He Tianlei immediately shut his mouth, he actually thought the man was serious.
Lin Banxia looked at him and said, "What happened?"
He Tianlei wanted to speak swear words reflexively, but saw Song Qingluo squinting his eyes slightly, and when he reached the swear words on his lips, he turned abruptly and said, "Lin Banxia, you are going to kill my dad!!"
Lin Banxia was surprised: "I want to kill your father? Did I do anything?"
"You left, what are you doing back?!" He Tianlei said bitterly, "It's okay now, it's okay now..."
Lin Banxia said, "Where is your father?"
He Tianlei pointed to another ward.
Lin Banxia didn't bother to pay attention to him, so she turned and walked to the door of the ward. Before entering, she heard the whining sound inside. Lin Banxia looked at him and found that her uncle was actually tied to the bed by the restraint belt, and her mouth was blocked. A towel, looks like a psychotic episode.
At this time, when he saw Lin Banxia, he struggled violently all of a sudden, whimpering in his mouth, his expression panicked to the extreme.
Lin Banxia looked at him and wondered, "What did he see?" He took a few steps forward and walked to his uncle's side. Uncle's struggle became more intense, and he kept shouting a word. Xia listened for a while, and finally understood.
He shouted: "Cabinet."
cabinet? what cabinet? Lin Banxia didn't understand, she reached out her hand to remove the towel from her uncle's mouth, but was stopped by He Tianlei.
"Don't untie it for him, he will bite his tongue." He Tianlei said.
Lin Banxia had no choice but to give up. He said, "What did your dad see?"
"How do I know." He Tianlei said, "He just went to the toilet once and came back like this."
Lin Banxia frowned.
"Let's go out and wait for the doctor to calm him down." He Tianlei's tone was still not very good.
Lin Banxia nodded and followed He Tianlei out. Neither of them noticed that when they walked out, the uncle let out a desperate whimper, and his eyes stayed on the small cabinet opposite the bed, as if the cabinet contained something to make Something he was afraid of, but he couldn't move at all.
With a click, the door of the ward was closed, and the room fell silent, leaving him alone.
The uncle kept whimpering and wanted to get up from the bed, but the restraint restrained his movement. After a while, he heard a soft sound, which was the sound of the cabinet door opening—
The three people outside the ward did not know what happened inside.
He Tianlei lit a cigarette and took a few puffs, as if reluctantly suppressing the anger in his heart, he said, "Where did you go just now?"
Lin Banxia said lightly, "I went to the cemetery."
"Why go to the cemetery?" He Tianlei asked.
"Didn't you say that He Xiaohua was buried there?" Lin Banxia said, "I went, no."
He Tianlei sneered, "Are you really stupid or are you pretending to be stupid? He Xiaohua was not even a year old when he died, who would be willing to bury such a dead child in a cemetery? Don't they just find a random hill to bury them? ?"
Lin Banxia was surprised: "He Xiaohua is your own younger sister, so you don't have any feelings for her at all?"
"What kind of feelings, I haven't even seen her look." He Tianlei said ruthlessly.
Lin Banxia was accustomed to their family's weak feelings, so when He Tianlei said this, he just sneered: "Then as you said, it doesn't matter if your father is like this, what are you calling me for?"
He Tianlei said: "Hey, what you said is wrong, it's entirely your reason that my dad became like this." He put out the cigarette in his mouth and spat on the ground, "You don't keep the 500,000 yuan. Don't even think about leaving here."
It turned out that he was waiting for him here, but Lin Banxia suddenly felt amused: "Oh? It's my reason, I scared him into this?"
"It's not you." He Tianlei said, "It's your He Xiaohua."
Lin Banxia said, "What do you mean?"
"My dad didn't lie to you." He Tianlei said, "You did bring a girl home. You didn't say it before and I didn't remember it. I've seen pictures of my sister, and she does look like her."
Lin Banxia crossed her arms and looked at He Tianlei coldly.
"But she is not He Xiaohua." He Tianlei said.
Lin Banxia said, "Then what is she?"
"How do I know." When He Tianlei said this, he seemed to be a little cold, so he rubbed his arms hard, trying to get rid of the cold feeling, "At first, only you could see her, and then everyone in the family After seeing it all, I realized something was wrong, but it was too late by then."
He Tianlei took a sip of water, as if caught in some kind of terrifying memory: "You know what? As long as you go home, you can see her, maybe under the bed, maybe in the cupboard, maybe anywhere you can imagine. Out of reach... She's everywhere, it's like..."
Lin Banxia: "It's like?"
He Tianlei said: "It's as if she is also a member of the family."
But everyone knows that she is not her, but it.
No one knew what it was, and no one knew how it appeared. Its existence almost drove everyone crazy, except Lin Banxia.
Lin Banxia readily accepted the girl-like thing, and he even regarded it as a friend and played with it happily.
Although He Tianlei was very young at that time, such a picture was deeply imprinted in his mind, and because of this, their behavior towards Lin Banxia became more and more rude and cold-blooded, as if they subconsciously believed that it was Lin Banxia. Pinellia brought it.
But now that I think about it carefully, what causes and what fruits are planted, if they had been nicer to Lin Banxia at the time, maybe nothing would have happened.
But there are so many ifs in the world.
He Tianlei lit a cigarette again, and Lin Banxia's face blurred in the smoke. The cousin in front of him is very different from the bean sprouts in his memory. He is taller than himself, and his expression is gentle most of the time. Only when he looks at their family, the edge hidden under the gentle will be Vaguely revealed. He Tianlei was a little afraid of Lin Banxia who looked like that, which reminded him of some bad things.
"Okay." If it was what He Tianlei said before, Lin Banxia would probably regard him as crazy, but now he has experienced many unbelievable things, and he knows that some weird rumors are not groundless. , he said, "what does that have to do with your father being mad?"
"You're back." He Tianlei said, "You are back the one he likes the most... Do you think it will appear again?"
He said, laughing at himself: "A normal person sees something that would make you crazy, but you will feel happy when you see it, Lin Banxia, maybe we were wrong at the beginning, that thing is not a monster, you are."
"You're the strange monster that doesn't fit in with normal people." - Really, every word is heartbreaking.
"Shut up." Lin Banxia didn't respond yet, but Song Qingluo spit out two words coldly, "If you provoke again, I'll show you what the real monster looks like."
He Tianlei's hand holding the cigarette shook a little. He wanted to say something to show that he didn't care, but found himself speechless. This beautiful man who didn't know his name in front of him somehow gave him a terrible feeling, as if he Threatening words are not just threats, but will come true in the next moment.
Lin Banxia said, "So what do you mean now, when she came back, your father went crazy when he saw her?"
He Tianlei said: "Yes." He observed Lin Banxia's expression and seemed to want to see some fear or other withdrawal from his eyes.
However he was disappointed.
Lin Banxia, the monster, laughed, and the smile came from the bottom of his heart. He said, "My He Xiaohua, is back."
He Tianlei suddenly realized at this moment that Lin Banxia really doesn't seem to be... like a normal person.
The author has something to say:
Lin Banxia: I did a very important thing.
Song Qingluo: Did you find out about your sister
Lin Banxia: No, I got back the 500,000 yuan that readers care about.
Song Qingluo:…