Chapter 42: Grandfather
Chen Yi told the confused Li Mu a story.
“A long time ago, at an artillery base, the guard on duty kept saying that he saw someone in white floating near a grave nearby.”
“This made everyone at the base really nervous. Later, the commander realized it couldn’t go on like this, so they talked about it and brought in a master.”
“There was a big machine gun there. They fired one shot, and boom, the grave and all the dirt were blown away. After that, nothing strange ever happened again.”
After telling the story, Chen Yi left, leaving Li Mu standing there in a daze.
He didn’t feel sleepy anymore, even though it was the afternoon. He thought about going out to do some food deliveries, but then suddenly remembered his grandpa.
He was supposed to visit his grandpa on the first day of the National Day holiday and get some living money, but that time, Ren Tianyou had helped him go instead.
By the way, Ren Tianyou’s hometown was also near his grandpa’s place, so in the past, during holidays, both families would go back together. That’s how his grandpa came to know Ren Tianyou as well.
“I should go visit Grandpa,” he muttered to himself. After tidying up a bit, he glanced at the mirror on the dining table and asked with a bit of unwillingness, “You really don’t want to come out?”
Xiao Jing might have been a little interested in going out when Li Mu first teased her, but ever since she overheard the conversation between Li Mu and Chen Yi, she was too scared to even think about it.
She was afraid of becoming another ghost’s takeout meal.
“Fine, don’t go if you don’t want to,” Li Mu said with a blank face. “But if I take all the mirrors from the house with me, you’ll have nowhere to hide.”
“Waaah~” Xiao Jing looked at him with teary eyes, like she was about to cry.
But right now, she was using Li Mu’s own appearance, and Li Mu couldn’t stand it when she acted cute while looking like him.
His face turned dark, and he ignored her and walked straight out the door.
There was a direct bus from Fengcheng County to the small village where his grandpa lived.
The village was built beside a river and was a bit remote, located near a popular scenic area.
When Li Mu got off the bus, he was right at the entrance of the village.
Most of the young people here had gone to work or study in other cities, so only children and older people still lived in the village.
Even though it was still the afternoon, the village felt quiet. Now and then, he saw a few elderly people chatting by the doors of their houses, or little kids running around the streets.
Chickens and ducks roamed freely everywhere. The concrete roads hadn’t been repaired for years and were full of holes and bumps.
After walking through the narrow alleys for ten minutes, Li Mu finally arrived at the gate of his grandpa’s house.
It was a small courtyard house with four wooden buildings surrounding a central yard. The wood was already old and starting to rot.
The main door wasn’t closed, so Li Mu stepped inside and called out, “Grandpa, are you home?”
“Who’s there?” An old man with a thin, hunched back came out of one of the front rooms, a tobacco pipe in his mouth. He looked up at Li Mu, paused, and asked hesitantly, “You are...?”
“It’s me, Li Mu.” He walked closer so his nearsighted grandpa could see him better.
But to his grandpa, getting closer didn’t help much. He could barely tell the difference between people and animals, let alone tell if someone was a boy or a girl.
“Oh, Xiao Mu! Your voice sounds a bit different,” Grandpa said cheerfully, putting down his pipe and taking a pair of glasses from his pocket. They had been wiped so clean they almost shined.
Li Mu also felt a bit awkward about his voice, so he coughed twice and explained, “I caught a cold recently.”
After putting on his glasses, Grandpa looked up at Li Mu. A surprised smile appeared on his face. “Xiao Mu, you’re starting to look more and more like your mom.”
Well, looking like his mom wasn’t a big deal, people always said boys usually look more like their mothers.
Even though he was facing his grandpa, Li Mu still had his usual calm and distant expression.
Grandpa grabbed his hand warmly and pulled him into the house, chatting as he went. “Just last night I dreamed about your grandma. She said she missed you. Since you’re here today, go light an incense stick for her.”
“Okay.”
Li Mu looked around the yard quietly, and only after making sure the temperature felt normal did he feel at ease.
With Grandpa’s weak health, even if a ghost didn’t hurt him, just staying nearby could make him seriously ill.
While he was lighting incense for his grandma, Grandpa, who hadn’t seen his grandson for a long time, couldn’t stop talking beside him:
“Xiao Mu, how come you look like a girl now? You should get a haircut when you have time, your hair is too long.”
“We men should stand strong and tall, not dress up like girls.”
“You look so pretty, are you trying to steal girls’ boyfriends or something?”
“I told you a long time ago, don’t go to that vocational school. You should’ve joined the army. You’d get tanned and stronger, and after a few years you’d come back looking like a real man.”
Grandpa always had a lot of opinions about Li Mu. He thought Li Mu looked too delicate.
Now, seeing that he had gone from delicate to effeminate, Grandpa couldn’t stop lecturing him.
Li Mu had a good temper. If it were someone else, they might’ve exploded already, being called girly for no reason and then scolded. But Li Mu didn’t show any signs of being upset.
He was just getting a little worried inside. If he couldn’t fix this "girly transformation" problem, then turning into a woman one day seemed almost certain.
While talking, Grandpa suddenly remembered something and asked Li Mu, “Don’t you have two empty rooms at your place?”
“Yeah, what about it?”
“Your cousin just came back from the army. He’s still looking for a job,” Grandpa said, a bit worried. “Let him stay at your place for a few days until he finds something. What do you think?”
“Back from the army?”
Li Mu didn’t remember having a cousin who joined the army.
Or rather, he didn’t know much about his cousins at all, especially what they’d been doing these past few years... When they were kids, they played together a lot. But as they grew up, some went to college in big cities, others moved abroad with their families, and the group slowly drifted apart.
After thinking for a bit, even though he didn’t even remember that cousin’s name, Li Mu still nodded and agreed, “Okay, just for a week. It’s fine if he stays during the National Day holiday, but after that I’ll be living on school. If he stays at my place…”
Grandpa understood Li Mu’s worry and didn’t push him. “That cousin of yours used to be pretty wild. I wouldn’t feel safe letting him stay at your place alone either.”
Honestly, Li Mu wasn’t too happy about it. He liked living alone, it was more comfortable. Having a relative he didn’t really know staying over just felt annoying.
"Alright." But since his grandpa had spoken, he didn't have much of a choice.
Just as they finished talking, a lean man with a buzz cut stepped into the yard through the front gate.
Both Li Mu and Grandpa turned their heads to look out the window at the same time.
“Grandpa, who’s this girl?” the man called out casually without really looking closely.
Li Mu’s opinion of him immediately dropped to zero.
“That’s your youngest cousin, Li Mu.”
“Oh, it’s Li Mu.” The man walked over to the window with a grin and looked more carefully. “You’ve gotten a lot better-looking since you were little. I heard you’re going to a vocational school?”
“Yeah.” Li Mu replied coldly.