本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛My amorous feeling for Qiao was getting stronger. My eyes were following her wherever she went and my mind was preoccupied with fantasies about her. I thought I started losing my mind.
Qiao was a good dancer. She sometimes demonstrate her dancing for the class, hair flying, body twisting and swing in such grace and ease that I could only admire in a distance; her body exuded great energy, flexibility and coordination. She was always a centre of the group, a source of gossips, and a magnet of attention.
Second year, for her, I played less table tennis, but danced more.
To learn dancing, my classmates and I were flocking to the nearby University where dance classes were offered. But the signing fee was exorbitant and few of us could afford it. My class pooled resources. Qiao, along with several other students who were good at dancing, was selected and sent to a dance class. After each dance class, they would go back to school immediately to practise and teach the rest of the class when their memory was still fresh. The scheme went well and we had a great fun. But not all students were participating in dancing, for instance, Xie was not interested in dancing and never joined us.
I did have an ulterior motive then when dancing with girls. It was a wonderful opportunity with which you could near many girls officially, touch them legally, check out them individually, and talk to their ears in loud music and at such a close distance that both of dancers would appear to be taking a bite at each other alternately in the dim and flashing lights.
As if there were an invisible hand in the ball room, at the beginning, before the dance party started, all the dancers would sit distinctively by two groups – boys and girls, who were nervously talking among themselves while secretly sizing up the other group. No one seemed to know what to do. Then, seeing no boy coming their way, some impatient girls would start dancing in pairs, taunting the boys for their cowardice. I was almost always the first one to ask a girl to dance, because I knew, with such good availability of girls at the beginning, it was unlikely that I would be declined a dance.
Once a week, a student-organized dance party would be held in the school. To gain Qiao’s attention, my tactic in those parties was to be the first one to dance and dance only a few tunes and then leave the ball room hastily, putting up an air that I was a busy man; I always danced with either the most attractive girls or the most unattractive girls to build a style. I was at an age that I would do anything to be different, and I had to make girls keep talking about me. And that worked. Pretty soon, I could feel, Qiao’s eyes were following me. Now, here is the trick: if you want to attract a particular girl, you need to show you are interested in her, but at the same time, also show you are not that interested or maybe you are thinking other alternatives – competition create jealousy. That was how I timed my cursory glimpses directed toward Qiao who would hastily turn away whenever caught by my “accidental” stares.
My real enthusiasm at the time was street dance. Disco was sweeping China with such a force that disco music was everywhere and everybody was dancing; there was absolutely no rules for street dancing. I had seen a guy spinning on his head and wondered why he liked to dance on his head. Someone could even do some difficult summersaults with such an ease that I sincerely felt sorry for his wasting gymnastic talent. I preferred Universe Stroll – a dance imitating the anti-gravity acts of an astronaut, and Robot Dance – a dance imitating a robot. They were relatively easy to learn and did not require too much destruction to the bodies of dancers. I remembered a choreographic move I liked was to dance in an imaginary glass box, with my arms sticking out, palms stretched touching and feeling environment, only being stopped by the sides of an imaginary box as if I was completely confined in it. Another time, I was trying to learn a dance move that required climbing up an imaginary rope. To get a feel of climbing, I practised with a real rope in my room and, as soon as I secured one end of the rope to the ceiling, my mother stormed into my room, wailing and wrestling the rope out of my hands, and made me swear never to do it again. She thought I broke up with Xie.
Qiao and I, along with several hard-core dancers, danced away the summer of 1988. It was real fun. We often danced late into the night. Casual romance. High hormone.
When street dance cooled down a bit, I played table tennis more. Xie used to tease me about my obsession about Qiao by feeding me information about her, sometimes real, sometimes pure fabrication; and each time, it worked. It upset me tremendously if I was told of Qiao was going out with such and such a guy and that would invariably lead to an urge in me to let Qiao know how I felt about her. This gut-wrenching feeling of loving someone but unable to say it tortured me, growing stronger day by day. Her teeth, her dance and her playing piano - everything about her greatly interested me and added to her charisma. My jealousy of her being with someone else became so intolerable that I decided to tell her what I felt and how I loved her. I figured it was a necessary gesture, like those wolves pissing around in the woods, on one hand to attract female wolves; on the other hand, to scare away competitors.
It happened in a corner of the playground. Qiao probably knew what was about to happen. She appeared extremely uncomfortable when I told her I had something very important to tell her. She was restless, looking down, hands in pockets, one foot drawing something on the ground while I made my statement. I had no idea what I hoped to achieve out of this opening-up. In retrospect, the whole thing was laughable. At that time, it wasn’t funny and the feeling was strong and genuine. What I did not expect was that she started crying when I told her how I loved her – the first time in my life that I had ever said those three most-abused words. Her cry completely ruined my well-rehearsed plan and miserably confused me. I was hoping an answer as simple as “yes” or “no”, or something equivalent, anything but silent weeping which could not be interpreted as “yes” or “no”. But I felt good and relieved after my monologue about my love. I had to get it off my chest. The only thing she said throughout the talk was asking me if we could talk about this after taking the University Entrance Exams! It was still about one year away! Sensing it was impossible to get anything meaningful out of her, I practically fled from the playground. I couldn’t remember how I got home, only vaguely remembering it was one of the darkest days in my life. It was so painful that I felt my head was exploding, my heart was crushed and my guts were twisting into a knot and my legs were rubbery. I locked myself in my room, refusing any food, replaying all the scenes Qiao and I spent together.
My mum thought I had broke up with Xie again and left me alone in my room.
Qiao and I completely stopped talking, shunning each other. However, my chivalrous confession was legendary in the school; much talked and quickly reached other classes. One of Qi Qin’s song, Sometime in the Winter, well depicted my mood then. The melancholy melody and helpless words touched me every time I sang it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k29N3i4xunA&feature=youtu.be
Gently, I am about to leave you,
Please wipe your tears away from the corner of eyes.
In those endless long nights,
And in the coming days,
My dear, don’t cry for me.
Lonely and unknown, is my path ahead;
Please pray for me, in your smiles,
Though bracing the wind,
Though soaked in the rain,
I will be thinking about you in the wind and rain.
In the days, in your absence,
I will treasure myself more;
In the days, without my company,
You must take good care of yourself.
You asked me when to come back home,
I also ask myself the same question,
Not now,
I don’t know when,
I think it might be sometime in the winter...
Again, I went to Xie for solace and licked my wounds, who was sensitive enough not to mention Qiao anymore.更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net