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In return, Lydia may promise to do everything her mother asks her to do. She learned to write the plus sign, sort of like a diminutive "t." Every morning she counted on her fingers the number of porridge bowls, four plus two, three plus three, seven plus ten. Whenever her mother stopped asking questions, she would ask her to continue, which thrilled Marilyn—it was as if Lydia had switched on a power source within her. Lydia was lying on the edge of the pool on a small stool, her oversized apron hanging from her neck to her ankles, watching Marilyn put some baking soda into a glass of vinegar. "It's a chemical reaction," her mother said. Seeing the foam overflowing from the cup flowing into the drain, Lydia nodded. She played store simulations with her mother and practiced arithmetic with pennies and nickels: two cents for a hug, four cents for a kiss. At this point, Ness dropped a quarter and said, "You can't figure out what you can get for this." Their mother immediately kicked him out.
Deep down, Lydia felt that everything that was supposed to come would come. One day, the books she reads will no longer have illustrations; the problems she has to solve will become longer and more difficult; arithmetic will include fractions, decimals, and exponents; and the games will become more complex. Seeing the roulade, her mother would say, "Lydia, I'm thinking of a number. If you multiply it by two and add one, you get seven." She would work backwards until she got the right answer. Then her mother would bring dessert with a smile. One day, Marilyn would give her a real stethoscope, and she would unbutton the top two buttons of her shirt, place the head against her skin, and let Lydia listen directly to her heartbeat. "Doctors use this," her mother would say. It was still early, though, but Lydia already knew these things would happen. All kinds of knowledge swirled around her, clinging to her, only increasing every day. No matter where she went, they were there. However, whenever her mother told her to do something, she would just say, "Yes, yes, yes."
Two weeks later, Marilyn and James drove to Toledo to pick up her clothes and books. "I can go by myself," Marilyn insisted. She had forgotten her marbles, bobby pins, and buttons in the pocket of a dress in her closet. The dress had become too tight. Soon, Marilyn donated it to charity, and the three forgotten souvenirs were still there. Leave it in your clothing pocket. However, when she saw the empty small apartment, she couldn't help but feel sore eyes. She silently sealed the books into cardboard boxes and threw the half-filled notebooks into the trash. She wanted to conduct the small funeral alone. "Really," she said, "you don't have to come." James insisted. "I won't let you carry anything heavy under the current circumstances," he said. "I'll ask Vivian Allen to come over and look after the children in the afternoon."
As soon as James and Marilyn set off, Mrs. Allen switched the TV channel to soap operas and sat down on the sofa. Lydia hugged her knees and sat under the dining table, but there was no cookbook in her hand; Nath tugged at the threads on the carpet, indignantly. Just now, his mother woke him up and tucked him under the dining table, but Lydia had already taken up most of the space here. He knew every answer to his mother's questions, but whenever he tried to chime in while Lydia was counting her fingers, she told him to be quiet. At the museum, he wanted to see the simulated starry sky exhibit in the planetarium, but they spent the entire day looking at skeletons, models of the digestive system, and other things Lydia wanted to see. That morning, he came to the kitchen early with a clipping folder, and his mother was still wearing a bathrobe. She gave him a sleepy smile over the rim of her teacup. This was the first time she had really looked at him since returning home, and his heart was as happy as a bird, almost flying out of his throat. "Can I have a boiled egg?" he asked. Miraculously, she replied, "Okay." At that moment, he completely forgave her. He decided to show her his collection of pictures of astronauts, along with descriptions of each launch event. She can understand it. She'll be impressed.
Then, before he could say anything, Lydia came down the stairs, and his mother's attention was drawn to Lydia's shoulders. Nath pouted in the corner, flipping the edges of his clipping folder, but no one paid him any attention until his father walked into the kitchen. "Still thinking about those astronauts?" After he finished speaking, he picked out an apple from the fruit bowl on the counter, took a bite, and laughed to himself. Even across the kitchen, Nath could still hear the powerful sound of chewing and the snap of teeth penetrating the peel. His mother only listened to Lydia talk about what she had dreamed about last night, and was completely unaware of the existence of father and son. She also completely forgot about boiling eggs. Nath's heart sank, so heavy that he couldn't breathe.
On the sofa, Mrs. Allen snored, with a trace of drool hanging on her chin. Nath crawled out from under the table, half-opened the front door, and jumped out onto the porch. The ground slapped against his heels, as if carrying an electric current, and the iron-gray sky above his head was pale and distant.
"Where are you going?" Lydia looked out the door.
"It's none of your business." Nath was worried that Mrs. Allen would hear the noise, wake up and call him home, but nothing happened. He knew without turning around that Lydia was looking at him from behind. He strode down the steps to the street to see if she dared to follow him. After a while, she followed him.
Lydia followed Nath all the way to the lake and stepped onto the small pier. The house across the lake looks like a beautifully crafted dollhouse. The mothers inside must be boiling eggs, baking cakes or stewing meat. The fathers may be grilling meat. They turn hot dogs with forks and grill the meat to sear the perfect texture. black line. Those mothers never left their children and flew away, those fathers never slapped their children in the face or kicked down the television and laughed at them.
"Do you want to swim?" Lydia peeled off her socks, stuffed them into each shoe, and then sat side by side with him on the dock, her feet dangling on the water. Someone dropped a Barbie doll in the sand: naked, covered in mud, and one arm missing. Nath tore off the other arm and threw it into the water. Then he tore off the other leg—the leg was harder to pull off. Lydia felt irritated.
"We'd better go home."
"I'll be leaving in a moment." He turned Barbie's head so that its face was facing the back of her neck.
"We're going to get in trouble." Lydia reached for her socks.
The other leg wouldn't come off no matter how hard he tried, and Nath turned to look at his sister. Suddenly, he felt himself losing his balance and leaning to one side. He didn't know what was going on, but everything in front of him was tilting, like an unevenly weighted seesaw, and everyone in their lives - mother, father, even himself - was sliding, sliding towards Liddy. Ya, under the influence of her gravity, no one can resist it, everything revolves around her.
Later, Nas couldn't remember what he said, what he thought, what he felt at that time, and even forgot whether he said anything or not. He only knew one thing, he pushed Lydia into the water.
Whenever he thinks of this moment, it feels endless. Lydia disappears under the water and is completely separated from him. He lies on the dock and seems to have a glimpse of the future. Without her, he was alone, and then he realized that even then, things weren't going to work out. Even without Lydia, the world is still unfair. He and his parents, and their lives, would revolve around the space where Lydia once existed, and eventually get sucked into the vacuum she left behind.
Not only that, but the moment he met her, he realized he had wronged her. When his hand patted her shoulder, when the water closed above her head, Lydia felt great relief. She sighed contentedly while choking, and struggled calmly. She urgently realized , she and Nath had the same feeling. She didn't want those things that were leaning and squeezing against her body. They were too heavy.
In fact, it only took a few seconds before Ness jumped into the water. He dove under the water, grabbed Lydia's arm and pulled her toward the surface, treading frantically.
Kick, he gasped, kick, kick.
They flopped toward the shore, moving slowly toward the shallows there. When their feet touched the sand, they collapsed on the spot. Nath wiped the mud from his eyes, and Lydia spit out a large mouthful of lake water into the grass. One minute, two minutes, and three minutes passed, and the two of them were still lying face down, out of breath. Then Nath staggered to his feet, and to his surprise, Lydia reached out and took his hand. She meant "don't let go," and in a daze of gratitude, Nath took her hand.
They staggered toward home, silent, leaving wet footprints on the pavement. Apart from Mrs. Allen's snoring, the only sound in the room was the sound of water falling from their clothes onto the carpet. They were only gone twenty minutes, but it felt like centuries had passed. They crept upstairs, hid their wet clothes in the laundry basket, changed into dry clothes, and said nothing when their parents returned, lugging suitcases and cartons of books. When his mother complained about water stains on the floor, Ness said he had spilled the drink. Before going to bed, Nath and Lydia brushed their teeth together by the sink, took turns politely rinsing their mouths, and said good night to each other as usual. This matter is too serious to talk about. It is like a scenery somewhere that they cannot see clearly at a glance. It is like the sky at night. It is endless and always feels too big. He pushed her down and then pulled her up again. There is one thing Lydia will remember throughout her life. There would be one other thing Ness would remember throughout his life.
Every year at the end of summer vacation and the resumption of school, Midwood Elementary School holds a welcome picnic. Marilyn pressed her hand against her belly, and Hannah grew heavier by the day; their father carried Lydia across the parking lot on his shoulders. After lunch there were games to see who could throw a hollow Waffle ball the farthest, who could throw the most sandbags into a coffee can, and who could guess the number of jelly beans in a gallon glass jar. Nath and James participated in the "Father and Son Egg Race" - each running forward with a raw egg on their head, served in a teaspoon like a dish. They led all the way, but when they were about to cross the line, Ness tripped and the egg fell. Miles Fuller and his father won first place and were awarded blue ribbons by the principal, Mrs. Haggard.
"It's okay." James said. Hearing this, Nath felt a little better, but his father added: "If they competed and read books all day..." For a month, he kept repeating similar words, which sounded like a joke, but in fact it was no. Whenever he found himself blurting out something, James would subconsciously bite the tip of his tongue, but it was already too late. He doesn't understand why he says these things to Nath, which only reveals more painful truths: Nath reminds him more and more of himself, of childhood memories he's trying to forget. He knew that his son had become the epitome of his past, which made him feel sad and ashamed. Thinking of this, his eyes drifted to the side. Nath looked at the broken eggs on the ground. The yolks were flowing on the grass blades and the egg whites seeped into the soil. Lydia smiled at him and he crushed the eggshells with his feet wearing canvas shoes. James turned around and Nath spat at his feet.
Next is the "three-legged race". A teacher tied Lydia and Nath's ankles together with a handkerchief and they hobbled to the starting line. Those kids who compete are tied to each other with their parents, siblings. Before she started running, Lydia tripped on the upper of Nath's shoe and swayed. Nath stretched out an arm to keep her balance. He wanted to keep up with Lydia, but when Lydia stepped forward, Nath inadvertently pulled her back. The handkerchiefs were tied so tightly that they strangled their ankles uncomfortably, like a yoke tying two mismatched animals. Even when they fell on their backs in opposite directions on the soft and slippery grass, None of them let go.
① In Marilyn’s textbook, “eg” is mistakenly printed as “egg”.