The Healing Sunshine (一厘米的阳光)

Chapter 2.3 - Hazy Memories (3)

And then, he blew out a faint cloud of smoke.

The entire time, Jǐ Yi's gaze was riveted on him. He laughed. "This I cannot let you try."

Jǐ Yi cast a look at her two good friends off in the distance. After pondering briefly, she still told him, "I know what it tastes like. My grandfather smokes, so I was curious and tried it."

The corner of Jì Chengyang's eyes turned up slightly.

"It's true." Once she finished giving this affirming statement in a quiet voice, Jǐ Yi had an expression of "I don't care at all to try out smoking" on her face.

Stretching out his fingers, Jì Chengyang took Jǐ Yi's nose between them and gave it a little twist. Then, he extended his left hand to her.

Jǐ Yi stared at him in surprise, and only after a moment did she gingerly place her own hand into his palm. Up ahead, those two girlies were still making a racket, imitating the battle between the two demons, Spider Demon and White Bone Demon. With her hand like this in Little Uncle Jì's, she strolled slowly through the darkness toward the living quarters of the military households. Actually, it was apparent that Little Uncle Jì was not used to holding the hands of children, as his clasp on her was a little too firm and was somewhat uncomfortable. Still, however, the entire time she did not move, for she was afraid that if she did, he would find her a bother and would not be willing to hold her hand anymore.

A Chinese Odyssey. Yammie Lam as Spider Demon, left. Karen Mok as Bai Jingjing, the White Bone Demon, right. ()

She heard a beep, beep coming from somewhere on him. She recognized the sound; it was a beeper.

Sure enough, Jì Chengyang clamped the cigarette between his teeth, used his right hand to fish out a pager from the pocket of his pants, and took a quick glance at the green-coloured screen. Then, tossing it back into his pants pocket again, he carried on having his smoke while leading her along as they walked, not paying any more attention to the content of the pager's message.

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Perhaps due to this one movie, when Jǐ Yi and Nuannuan were chatting, they both prayed that Little Uncle Jì would leave a little later. That way, they could go to many places that they normally would not be able to go to, those places outside of the dependents' residence area, the other ninety percent of the compound. The barracks? The shooting range? The training grounds? They even wanted to go play at the dairy farm that provided the milk for each day.

With the start of school, she would be in her second year of middle school.

She was a grown-up already and could keep going to conquer all those remaining places that were strange and unfamiliar to her. Her world was enclosed within walls of safety. As she went out and about each day, the people she encountered were ones whom she was acquainted with, and the places she went to every day were all ones familiar to her. In this world of hers, all the children carried not a single penny on them, and when they were hungry or thirsty, they returned home, had a bite to eat, had a drink of something, and then ran outside again to continue playing.