Gardenia used to live in the court.
When her grandmother died that year, her breath flew away, her clothes were disheveled, and her hands and feet were cold. After her grandmother's funeral, her mother dug up this gardenia from her backyard. At that time, it was not as thick as a finger, and it was still stained with the wet mud of my grandmother's backyard. Grandma used to take care of the flowers and trees, her cough, the small sound of her walking, this gardenia has heard. That was in 1977.
Gardenias bloom in midsummer every year, and the neighbors are amazed by their strange fragrance. I picked gardenias, put them in a water bottle, and placed them in the dark corner of the old house. In the daytime, the light is dark, people are walking in the old house, the air conditioning is blowing, the clothes are folded, and you can always see the white flower shadow, diving around with the strange fragrance. The strange fragrance is like a fox girl, haunting the old house. I was lazy, so I rested in the attic for a while, and after a while, I flew out of the pavilion, and my figure was flickering. The shadow of the solstice is setting in the west, and dusk comes in an instant, and there is already a shadow of the moon in the court, only to feel that the green dissolves, and the smoke and trees are miserable. The gardenia tree in the atrium, holding hundreds of flowers and bones, is really rare and graceful.
Source: Visual China
At night, we sat under the stars, feeling so close to the moonlight, so deep in the wilderness, that there was a feeling of drowning. Our village seemed lonely, and we, alone in the firmament and the wilderness, were so cautious that we did not dare to speak loudly. Late at night, I heard the buds of the gardenia moving, and some flowers were about to burrow out of the leaves. The mother said, "Listen, that's what they're doing." ”
"How long are they going to make trouble?" I asked.
"I won't make trouble until dawn. Mother replied.
"We're going to sleep, who's going to keep them there?"
"There are stars. ”
"What happens after the stars fall?"
"The stars have fallen, and they are still thinking about them in the water. Mother smiled. We all believe that there is an infinite body of water beneath the earth, and that the sun, moon, and stars will fall into the water from the west.
So we went to sleep. Grandma is gone, and we are here, and we are gone, and Xingzi is with Gardenia.
Source: Visual China
Unexpectedly, we were forced to scatter to various places, and the old house was left unattended. When we came back a few years later, the gardenia had gone from a cluster to a stalk, with few leaves left and no longer flowering. The year before last, the brother went out to make a living, and he couldn't rest assured before leaving, so he moved the gardenia from the vestibule to the backyard. But less than half a month after he left, the gardenia died.
Now we're alive, and Gardenia is dead. Sometimes I think its flower soul is hiding behind the inner door of the threshold, and as soon as I walk in, it sways out and smiles at me.
It was only then that Grandma's breath really left us, flying out of the air, and the thoughts were gone.
Source: Visual China
Author: Yesterday Fei. From Reader Magazine, Issue 8, 2024.
Those shining days, there are "Readers" to witness with you.