Flying-Bird Hourglass

13.

I woke up with the hourglass in my hand. The hourglass was normal. The sand didn’t fly from the bottom to the top. It was honestly leaking sand down at a constant speed.

I stood up, obviously feeling something was wrong, my body shouldn’t be so light and strong, my hands—my hands shouldn’t be so full and plump.

A woman’s voice came from the kitchen: “Yingwen, hurry up and eat, don’t be late for the graduation ceremony today.”

Graduation?

I hurried and put the hourglass in my pocket, with the seagull tie hanging around my neck: “I’m coming.”

In the hot summer, I was magically rejuvenated, until I walked out of the house after eating, I still hadn’t turned back.

I didn’t remember many things, but I always remembered my high school graduation ceremony, maybe because Rong Qianshan said he liked my seagull tie, so I always remembered this hot summer day.

I boarded the bus, threw two coins into the coin box, and sat in the first seat by the door.

The bus swayed to the next stop and the door opened. A boy with a schoolbag came up. He was tall and thin, with fair skin, and wearing a pair of thin-framed glasses. He picked up the bus card and sticked it to the toll machine. “The balance is insufficient. Please recharge.”

He pushed the frame of his glasses with a hint of embarrassment, and tried to stick the card again, “The balance is insufficient, please recharge.”

“Here.” I took out two coins and handed them to him, “It’s on me.” He looked like Rong Qianshan. I wasn’t good at recognizing faces. The first time I saw Rong Qianshan, he was thirty. For many years, I had imagined how Rong Qianshan looked when he was young. He always said I would see him.

He reached out his hand and whispered: “Thank you.” Then he threw the coin into the coin box and sat on the seat next to me. He looked at my clothes carefully and smiled, there was a small vortex on the corner of his lips. “That’s a nice tie.”

“Thank you.” I said, “I’ll be graduating from high school today.”

“Congratulations, you’re going to become an adult.” He said.

I looked up at the station message screen and said, “It’s my stop. Goodbye.”

“Bye,” he said.

I jumped out of the bus with quick steps. I stopped on the platform for a moment, with hands in my pockets, I touched the hourglass, my heart palpitated. I took it out, most of the sand had leaked out. There was only a little bit of sand left. I didn’t know why, but I thought the flow of sand got faster.

I turned the hourglass upside down, no matter how I turned it, the sand only flowed towards one end, very stubborn, like Rong Qianshan.

The hourglass that Rong Qianshan gave me had a temperament like Rong Qianshan’s.

When the sand completely poured to the other side, a familiar dizziness made my eyes went dark. I opened my eyes again, the lush balcony, the slanting afternoon sun, I curled up on the chair as if I had a sweet nap.



14.

I tried to clarify all this logically.

If the boy on the bus was Rong Qianshan, then it was logical that he knew about my seagull tie.

He met me when he was young, but I never met him when I was young. I didn’t go to school by bus on my graduation day, I missed it when I was too focused choosing clothes. I grabbed a bicycle and rode to school.

Who was I in my dream?

I looked at the hourglass in my hand, the gray sand, gleaming in the sunlight.



15.

I remembered that I had a debate with Rong Qianshan, in a dream.

I said he was not a real person, and he refuted me fiercely.

“Why do you say that I’m not real? If you can’t find me in your world, does it mean I’m not real? I can’t find you in my world. Are you a manikin?”

Of course I wasn’t a manikin, but, Rong Qianshan, your sophistry was very immoral.

His fingertips almost poked my nostrils: “Yu Yingwen, you just want to find a woman!”

“I’m not, don’t talk nonsense.” I waved quickly, “There aren’t many women my age in the hospital.”

He jumped to his feet with anger: “Not many, but there is! You betrayed my heart.”

“I haven’t cheated yet, how come I’m a traitor.” I corrected him. “Strictly speaking, I should be a traitor reserve.”

“Be whoever you want to be.” He leaped over and grabbed my cheek, “Wait for it, I’ll let you see me, in reality.”

Then he asked me to attend his funeral in reality, Rong Qianshan, you were you indeed.



16.

What the hell were you up to?

I studied the small hourglass over and over again, and the wooden frame of the hourglass was carved with small flying birds. I liked the sea and Rong Qianshan liked seagulls. He said that we were made for each other, and I said birds of the same feather flocked together.

I was an optimistic person, someone who was especially very capable of relieving my own stress. Even my attending doctor said that in theory, a person like me had no connection with mental illness, but I was exactly like this. I had been schizophrenic for 20 years.

Perhaps this was the inevitable consequence of studying philosophy. Two of my seniors committed suicide and one of my seniors killed someone. I was mentally ill. Thank God for being merciful.



17.

A glass of milk before going to bed helped sleep and supplemented calcium. I bent down to clean the dishes, moved slowly to the bed, and sat down.

My eyes stopped on the hourglass on my bedside, I stared at it for a long while. I didn’t believe in fallacy, picked up the hourglass, pushed aside the bottom plate, and pressed the red button.

I adapted well to this crossing, standing by the side of the road with my eyes open, the traffic was noisy, and people came and went.

I stood blankly in front of the zebra cross, wondering if I should take a step.

“Hey, it’s time to go.” The man next to me patted me on the shoulder. I turned my head to look. With a handsome face and a pair of thin-rimmed glasses, it was Rong Qianshan. I asked, “Go where?”

“How do I know where you’re going. Don’t stand in front of me.” He pulled me aside, walked forward, took two steps, and suddenly stepped back, “Wait, I think you look familiar.”

The only thing Rong Qianshan was better than me at was his ability to recognize faces, almost to the point that he never forgot. He laughed at me for my face-blindness, said I was a vinegar tank.

“You are that… that, that,” he dragged me to the sidewalk, “that graduating kid on the bus.”

He was three years older than me, but what the hell was calling me a kid. I frowned: “My name is Yu Yingwen.”

“Rong Qianshan.” He laughed, and my favorite dimple appeared on the corner of his lips, “What a coincidence, are you also studying in Hangzhou?”

“Yes.” I nodded, “Philosophy major in Zhejiang University.”

“I’m studying physics.” He said, “I’m your senior.” He smiled, narrowed his eyes into two arcs of crescent moons. “I said, I’m your senior, did you listen?”

I kept my mouth shut, was this person born with innate liking to take advantage of me?

Seeing that I wasn’t talking, he shrugged indifferently: “I owe you two coins. How about I treat you a meal?”

“Or, you return me the two coins.” I said.

“No, that’s boring, I’m going to invite you to a meal.” He said, “So you’d owe me a meal minus two coins, then you’ll return it to me next time we meet.”

“Alright.” I nodded, who knew if there would be another time, I saw him looking so confident, I seemed to be possessed.

Or, he bewitched me.



18.

“Why do you study philosophy?” he asked.

I was carrying freshly cooked octopus balls: “Transferred. I applied for politics.”

“The law of all things is philosophy, and the essence of all things is physics.” He said, “My graduate research topic is the theory of parallel universes in quantum mechanics.” He joked, “Where nothing can be determined, quantum mechanics.”

I looked at his profile and asked him tentatively: “If two people are not in the same world, then do you think it’s possible for these two people to fall in love?”

“Oh, not in one world as in, literally?” He picked up the bamboo stick and took a ball. “Do you know Schrödinger’s cat theory? In fact, this theory also explains the parallel world. The cat is dead in one world, and the cat is alive in another world. The state of life and death is superimposed on the same cat. If the living cat resonates with the dead cat, it’s possible to open a channel between the two worlds.” He coughed, “I digressed. If the frequency of radio waves in one person’s brain is inexplicably the same as that in another world, they may meet.”

I tried my best to understand what he said, maybe philosophy and physics did have something in common, but I barely understood half of it. If Rong Qianshan and I were people of two worlds, when the me in his world and the young me in my world resonated, it was possible for him to connect the young me to his world.

So this hourglass was the machine that Rong Qianshan had studied for a lifetime through time and space?

Rong Qianshan must have worked hard to build the hourglass and handed it to me on the day of his funeral, in order to make us who we were when we were young.

I grabbed Rong Qianshan’s arm: “I’m not from this world, Rong Qianshan, if you can find me in your world and find a way to make us resonate, then we…” my words got stuck. I might not necessarily exist in this world, like he didn’t exist in my world. I had searched for more than 20 years, and there was no Rong Qianshan living in Xiaoshan District, Hangzhou.

“What’s the matter with you?” He leaned over with concern. “You look terrible.”

Rong Qianshan was an excellent physicist. How could he not think of a way that I, a layman, could think of? He didn’t send me back to help the young us, he did it for…

I didn’t know what he did it for.

“Nothing.” I ate the last small octopus ball. “Have you finished your graduation thesis?”

“The defense was over yesterday.” He said, “Are you full with just small balls? I’ll buy you braised pork belly.”

I took out the hourglass in my pocket, the sand was flowing down almost to the end. I shook my head: “No, I have something to do later.”

He tilted his head, like a big white bird full of doubt.

I waved at him, just found a corner to turn in, and the last piece of sand fell——

Back to reality.



19.

Rong Qianshan knew a lot about me, even if I hadn’t told him.

Not only did he knew, but he also wanted to show it off to me. Now I knew where he got this information from.

I gave it to him.

It felt unfair for a while. Why did he see me when he was young? I didn’t see him young until I was old.



20.

I opened my eyes, and at three in the morning, the hourglass was lying on my left hand.

I sat up, pressed the light switch, and put the hourglass in my palm to look at it. The sand on one side where the sand fell from was about… two-fifths less?

Therefore, it took sand to cross once, and I couldn’t cross indefinitely.

As expected, the universe obeyed the law of conservation and wouldn’t tolerate me crossing into another universe out of thin air.

However, the conservation of matter, my side consumed sand, what did Rong Qianshan’s world consume?

I laid down, turned off the lamp, and thought with my eyes open. This afternoon I crossed for the first time, I graduated from high school. I crossed at night, and he graduated from university. Half a day on my side, a year had passed on his side.

I looked at the hourglass in horror, Rong Qianshan, you’re so cruel. He used the sand to offset time so conservation of matter could be achieved.

If every crossing would cause a fast-forward effect of time on his side, the remaining sand could support almost three crossings.

I had to make good use of these three opportunities.