Unrequited Love

When Luo Zhi and his mother arrived at the funeral home, there were only a few cars in the always crowded parking lot. The suburbs are much colder than the city, and the north wind blows, as if thin blades cut across the face. Luo Zhi was wearing gloves, but his hands were still cold and unconscious.

The building where the ashes were parked was empty. The manager of the mail room in the lobby was about to go out. He was a little surprised to see Luo Zhi and his mother. He took the ID book and the key in his mother's hand and took a look and said, "A copy."

The administrator went out in a hurry, thought about it, and said, "Anyway, there is no one. I'm going to eat. You can go in. After paying the ashes, just bring the small door to me."

When he finished speaking, he opened the door of the corridor, nodded to his mother, and left.

Luo Zhi knew that there was nothing to steal here, except for ashes.

That building is weird, a bit colder than the outside. Luo Zhi and his mother went up to the third floor and found the fifth room, the fourth shelf, the sixth row and the fourth column. In the small glass window is a dark red urn with black and white photos of father when he was young.

Dad is very handsome, with an optimistic temperament of proletarian workers.

As soon as the glass window was opened, the small electronic recorder inside was activated, and sorrow and music sounded slowly. Mother leaned on the ladder, Luo Zhi stood on it, carefully took out the ceramic peaches, refrigerator, and washing machine on the periphery and handed it to her mother. After cleaning up, she gently took out her father's urn.

After years of renovation in the funeral home, the place for burning paper worship has been moved from the loess field outside to the large courtyard dedicated to memorial. A row of brass stoves dedicated to burning paper spread along the fence of the yard, so smoked that the original color is no longer visible.

At half past eleven, the group of old women who usually hug the dead to ask for life by "talking about superbirth" were not there. A gust of north wind swept the remaining paper ash in the furnace to Luo Zhi's feet.

She used her frozen hands to help her mother arrange the fruit, wine, and father's spiritual position and ashes, and then lit the paper money together.

The heat rushed in, warming her expressionless face slightly.

Mom still cried. His face was pale, and his tears were like broken beads.

Luo Zhi turned his head to avoid her mother's rants: "I'm here to send you money, how are you doing over there? After Luoluo was admitted to college that year, she couldn't come back to your grave in winter, and came back to see you this year. Your daughter can make money on her own. I am more comfortable with this job now than before. I don’t have to stand and my legs and feet are much better..."

Luo Zhi's tears were in his eyes, but he didn't want to fall.

In fact, she blamed her father.

He treats his mother well or treats her well. It is not his responsibility to live with her and her mother to this point. However, the coldheartedness of the grandma's family and his own death still make her mother lonely.

The world is cold. A grievance spread to everyone in the world, and everyone's blame was less light than a sigh. Therefore, Luo Zhi simply gave the strong hatred to his father and grandma's people. Once, also given to Sheng Huainan.

When she was admitted to university, her mother insisted on letting her visit her deceased grandparents. She resisted her mother for the first time. She didn't look at anyone.

Grandpa is obstinate, grandma is snobbish and vanity. Both of them fiercely oppose mom marrying dad. Of course, there are considerations about caring for their daughter, but it may also be mixed with the knots of family and face. Grandpa was honest and conservative throughout his life, and refused to help his father, who was an ordinary electrician, to change jobs. Grandma resolutely cut off relations with his mother after marriage. Luo Zhi's father died in an accident, and his grandfather and grandmother retired and died. Only Luoyang's father was a kind man. My dear ones, that's all.

As for the grandmother's family, it was unsuccessful to cling to the status of the mother's family. After the death of his father, he scolded his mother coldly and shut down Luo Zhi in the room, but drove his mother out of the house.

The old house of my grandmother’s house was relocated, and the allocation indicators, including the boards and furniture left by the old house, were all scraped off by a few aunts and uncles.

Why doesn't she hate?

The paper burned out, and there were sporadic red embers under a pile of black ashes, and occasionally a trace of sparks burst out.

Mother was cleaning up the spiritual position behind, Luo Zhi leaned on the fire stick, and asked gently:

"If you can collect paper money, then there is spirit in the sky, why not help us?

"I wanted to ask you very early."

Mother's lips are white and some are going to collapse.

"I'll take it back by myself. Mom, you can get in the car first with your things."

"Don't, go back together. Aren't you afraid?"

"What are you afraid of? They are all dead."

Luo Zhi looked indifferent, took the spiritual position and ashes from his mother, put the key in his pocket, and turned back into the building.

There was only Luo Zhi's own footsteps in the stairwell, and the echoes collided back and forth in an empty space.

She stepped on the ladder, arranged the urn, spiritual seat and decorations, put down the white screen on the window, and closed it.

After a pause, it opened again.

"Dad." Luo Zhi called out, tears suddenly falling.

"I was wrong. When I didn't say anything. Bless you mother."

She closed the door, took out the key and locked it.

Luo Zhi walked slowly to the stairwell, turned his head, and saw that the angle of the window in Room 5 was just right to meet the noon sun, and the dust floated slowly in the light, turning upside down.

It's too beautiful. She walked in like she lost her soul.

There are small red silks on the glass cabinets in this room, connecting the two adjacent glass windows.

Both are dead couples. After his death, he was moved to this room by his children, with his ashes lying side by side, connected by red silk, with a picture of the old couple in the middle.

She stood in front of the glass window, looking at it one by one.

No matter how nice people are in the past, no matter whether they love or not, their feelings accumulate, and they still stay together.

The red silk is bound to life and death. Even if love cannot be born anyway, at least it will leave a mark in the heart, which will never be erased. What's more, the soft spot is mostly the fantasy of the author in the novel, which is unpredictable. After so many years, the world has only produced a pair of butterfly butterflies?

It was too cold in the room. Her feet were already stiff when she was outdoors. She accidentally tripped her left foot on her right foot, and one staggered down. She wears a lot in winter, and it doesn't hurt too much to fall. She was about to get up, and when she turned her head, she suddenly saw the lowest glass window.

The glass window has been broken for a long time, but the fragments have fallen in the cabinet. If you don't pay attention, you can't see it at all. There is a lot of dust inside, and the photo in the center is also tilted to one side. Luo Zhigui reached out and pulled out the photo.

The usual old couple posing for a photo. But the old lady's face was in chaos, and her nose and eyes drifted away from the original place vaguely.

Luo Zhi was frightened, his back was instantly covered with sweat, but he did not throw away the photo.

She carefully stuffed the photo back, struggling to get up and rush into the sun in a cold war, holding on to the window sill to gasp.

Suddenly the mobile phone in her trouser pocket vibrated, and her first reaction was only to feel that something was crawling on her thigh, and finally she shouted "Ah" in fright.

He took out his phone tremblingly.

"Sheng Huainan calls"

"Hey."

"Luo Zhi, didn't you come to class? I called you just now and I was not in the service area several times. Did you receive the text messages you sent? How can I take the quiz. I answered it for you."

The heart settled down in an instant. The sun shone on her shoulders, and her face was slightly warm from the sun.

"Is it a small test? I didn't go, thank you."

"Everyone lost their souls at Christmas. Zhang Mingrui didn't come. I wrote three copies by myself and my hands cramped."

Sheng Huainan's voice was bright and contrived. Luo Zhi changed his hand to hold the phone, sighed in the hand just now, and continued to repeat: "Sorry, thank you so much."

There was silence on the phone.

"Why didn't you come to class? Is the illness still good?"

"I'm home."

"Go home?"

"Yes, there is something at home."

"Where are you talking, why do you feel so unclear, as if the signal is not good."

"I'm..." Before Luo Zhi finished speaking, a woman suddenly flashed in at the door, moving too fast, as if she was floating on the water. Luo Zhi was startled and screamed. The screaming tail was severely cut off by the opponent's fierce eyes, and she was dumb in the air.

"Luo Zhi? Luo Zhi!"

The woman actually wore a bright red skirt, the length below the knee, because of the bloated trousers inside, static electricity was generated, and it clung to her legs; the upper body was wrapped in a purple floral scarf, showing only a haggard face.

"Luo Zhi?! Can you hear it?"

The woman stared at Luo Zhi for a while, then walked straight to the shelf on the left, and found a small pane, looking inside through the glass, the height of the pane was just enough for her to reach her forehead. She turned her back to Luo Zhi like this, and began to whisper and mutter something silently.

"Luo Zhi, are you okay?"

Luo Zhi suddenly came back to his senses: "I... nothing."

"Where are you?"

"I'm in the first funeral home, in the building where the ashes are parked."

"That is……"

"My father’s death day, today. 15th anniversary. Now I am back and locked the urn back in the locker by myself. I thought I was the only living person in the whole building. You know what, I saw a photo just now , The old lady in the group photo has no face. I don’t know if the soul is floating out along the broken glass window, maybe it’s looking at me now. Haha. By the way, are you afraid of ghosts? Actually I am not afraid, but It's really weird here, there are red silk everywhere, but why does that old lady have no face..."

Luo Zhi didn't know why he said this, his voice was brisk and clear, but he couldn't stop the brakes and talk nonsense.

"Luo Zhi!"

Sheng Huainan's voice was loud, Luo Zhi's eardrums shook, and he finally woke up a little, and stopped talking.

"Sorry, I was talking nonsense."

"Are you... afraid?" Sheng Huainan asked softly.

The voice was calm and concerned, Luo Zhi smiled gratefully into the air, forgetting that he couldn't see it.

"Where are the dead and the living terrible." Luo Zhi smiled.

She turned her head and her smile froze on her face.

The woman slowly turned her head to look at her, and then slowly pulled out a pair of **** scissors from the cloth pocket she was carrying.

"But there are living people here," she murmured.