race against time（一）

In the spring of 1996, Jia Yiren got his wish and found a job in the chemical factory - he was responsible for digging drainage ditches for the factory.

The factory director expropriated more land from the village and expanded the chemical factory. More and more Jia family members began to work in the factory. The whole village was secretly thriving. It seemed that the chemical factory built in the village overnight became the door to a beautiful and wealthy life for the Jia family. And the factory director's bicycle became our family's passport to happiness.

Every afternoon after work, Jia Yiren would describe the factory director's bicycle to us in detail at the dinner table, over and over again, without getting tired of it. The crazy woman listened very seriously. Every time he told the story, the light in the crazy woman's eyes became brighter, and the hope in her heart increased. Although I knew that Jia Yiren was telling the story specifically for the crazy woman to please her, day after day, I really couldn't stand eating with that bicycle.

"Guangtou Jia told me that there are occasionally airplanes flying in the sky over the city." One evening, I tried to change the subject because I didn't want to endure Jia Yiren's repeated nagging.

"Plane?"

"Yes, airplane," I said, as proudly as Jia Guangtou told me at the beginning, "It's a car with two wings that can fly around in the sky."

"Plane can fly to any place it wants to go." I added this sentence without authorization.

The crazy woman looked at me in surprise.

"That's a bird." Jia Youfu said in a flat tone. He might think that Guangtou Jia's eyes were blurry, or he was teasing me on purpose.

"It's not a bird! Birds have to flap their wings constantly when they fly, and the wings of airplanes are straight and hard, so they can't flap at all."

"Then how does it fly into the sky?"

I was stumped by Jia Yiren's question and couldn't be proud anymore. Guangtou Jia only told me that the people in the city created airplanes and sent them into the sky. But he didn't tell me how the people in the city sent the airplanes into the sky, and he might not know it himself.

"Bicycles are much better than airplanes!"

Jia Yiren sneered at my remarks and shook his head disapprovingly.

"There are no roads in the sky. If you don't know the direction, the plane can't find or fly to where it wants to go. Bicycles can't do that! Riding a bicycle, as long as you keep walking along the road, you will reach where you want to go sooner or later. It's much more reliable to step on the ground than to fly in the sky!"

"Can tomorrow be okay?"

"Tomorrow?"

"Yes. I want to go and see tomorrow." I really can't stand Jia Yiren's bragging about bicycles, and I want to arrive tomorrow morning in one go.

"You don't need to ride a bicycle tomorrow, just run after the sun," Jia Yiren picked up his chopsticks and pointed to the darkening sky, "Run from east to west, the sun sets, and today ends; run from west to east again, the sun rises, and tomorrow begins."

"Really?" I was half-believing and half-doubting Jia Yiren's words.

"Why would I lie to you!"

After that, I really ran happily on the earth for a long time. At that time, the crazy woman rarely got sick again, and I also had time to go out and move freely. On the days when the golden rapeseed flowers bloomed all over the fields, I was like a happy puppy, chasing the sun, running on the dusty earth, and running in the spring breeze filled with the fragrance of flowers.

At first, no matter how fast I ran, the sun was still in the sky, so I suspected that I was spinning in circles. For this, I angrily accused Jia Yiren, blaming him for lying, and even cried several times.

Jia Yiren was busy digging the drainage ditch at first and didn't bother to pay attention to me. Later, he was annoyed by my noise and said to me impatiently: "The sun is flying in the sky, and you are running on the ground with two legs, so of course you can't catch up."

"But you said walking on the ground is better than flying in the sky!"

"Damn it! Is it over?" He inserted the shovel into the ground, raised his hand, and lifted me out of the ditch like a puppy by the back of the neck. "Then wait until you can fly, then chase it."

Jia Yiren's irresponsible and perfunctory words, as well as his ruthless ridicule, made me realize that chasing the sun is out of reach, and I turned my attention to the goal of "flying". I took it for granted that as long as I ran faster than a flying bird, I could fly. Then, sooner or later, one day, I will catch up with the sun and arrive at tomorrow ahead of time.

While running tirelessly, I felt a kind of hot emotion and power gushing out of my body, which made me feel like a giant who could cross mountains and seas in one step; and sometimes I felt like an ant, a tiny grain in the world. As I ran faster and faster, my body was gradually wrapped in steaming heat. Insects and birds could no longer lie down beside my ears and tell me clearly. The light spots shining through the leaves jumped wildly on my body, and the wind that stayed on my shoulders also flowed and rippled.

When running, the flow of light and shadow made me think I saw the flow of time; the chirping of the wind made me think I heard the chirping of time.

In the face of more abstract time, the seemingly within reach tomorrow has become insignificant.

The joy of chasing time made me temporarily forget the danger of running fast. When my steps were no longer steady and my body became more and more floating, I couldn't wait to open my arms, happily thinking that I was going to fly. However, the next second, I fell to the ground. The pain wiped out all my enthusiasm and expectations. I dragged my dirty clothes and bruised wounds and cried to find Jia Yiren again.

I showed him the purple and broken wounds, and muttered foolishly, "I am in so much pain."

"You know nothing about pain!"

Jia Yiren habitually ignored my noise. In his eyes, it was normal for a noisy child to bump into something. My crying was just a fuss to him. Without even looking at me, he leaned over, stepped the shovel into the mud, then pulled the wooden handle back hard, lifted up a piece of soil, and threw it into the ground next to him.

I was irritated by Jia Yiren's cold attitude, so I blamed all the pain in my body on his irresponsible remarks, so I sat on the ground and cried loudly, trying to attract the attention of others and force Jia Yiren to care about me. Although I haven't learned how to express my feelings correctly, I already know how to use the means correctly without a teacher. My crying and weird words soon attracted the attention of others. However, they didn't care about the wounds on my body and the grievances in my heart, but were attracted by my words with laughter.

"He said he was in pain..."

"He's just a child."

"He's so young, he knows what pain is."

I was so proud of my vivid performance, but I was ignored and laughed at. This was something I didn't expect.

Jia Yiren, holding a shovel, jumped out of the low mud ditch with his hands and feet, and walked to me with a sullen face. He did not tolerate my willfulness, but used his strong right hand to pull me up from the ground.

"Go home!"

The performance ended in a mess. I came with a body full of pain and grievances, and left with a body full of pain and more grievances. The pain of falling, the grievance of being ignored, and the shame of the failed performance made me lose interest in "flying" for a while.

As Jia Yiren said, at that time, I didn't know what real pain felt like, so I could yell and cry without scruples. When I experienced the pain myself and suffered from it, I couldn't speak. I also realized that real pain cannot be expressed in words. It is a kind of self-abuse feeling hidden in the heart, and it is unconscious self-torture day after day. It pulled me out of reality and distorted my time. Because of it, my past was infinitely stretched, the present disappeared, and the future was suddenly compressed. Because of it, I left time far behind, growing up and aging at once.

I also gradually understood that grasping time does not make a person grow. Only by grasping pain can a person truly grow up. This kind of growth is not reflected in the outside, but in the heart.

Dragging my wounds home, I complained to the crazy woman with grievance, hoping that she could help me vent my anger. I knew that Jia Yiren listened to her very much. As long as she stood on my side and said a few words for me, Jia Yiren would definitely realize that he was wrong and might even apologize to me.

However, the crazy woman did not intervene in the conflict between Jia Yiren and me. She just gently helped me apply iodine on the wound, then took out the sketchbook and brush and taught me to draw to divert and dispel the grief and anger in my heart.

She drew flying butterflies and birds, lifelike flowers, a bicycle and a car, and many things I didn't recognize on the sketchbook. While she was drawing, she told me about the people and things that happened in the city. However, I was immersed in self-pity at the time and had no time to pay attention to what she said. Moreover, I thought I was very familiar with the things in the city because I had heard Jia Guangtou talk about it countless times before. So, I soon lost my patience and walked out of the house in frustration.

Thinking back on this incident now, I still regret not staying at home and listening to the mad woman's story. Because what Jia Guangtou described to me was the city he saw, while what the mad woman showed me was the city she experienced.

Unable to find the comfort I wanted at home, I began to look for it outside.

I went to Jia Guangxin's house next door, leaned against the tree at the door, secretly observed the house, and after confirming that there was no movement from the adults, I opened my throat and shouted Jia Ying's name. Hearing my shout, Yingzi responded crisply in the house, and then jumped out. The two small braids hanging by her ears swayed happily. We walked side by side to the grass by the river. After sitting down, I told her what happened in the morning and angrily accused Jia Yiren of being cold-blooded.

After listening to my long speech full of resentment, Yingzi laughed out loud.

"What are you laughing at?" I said sullenly, feeling very uncomfortable.

"You can fall down while running, are you stupid?"

I said so much, but she only noticed that I fell down while running, and laughed at me by the way. As she was laughing, she suddenly stopped laughing, frowned, raised her elbow, and found a small mosquito biting her.

"Don't move."

She ordered, then raised her other hand, saw the right moment, and slapped it quickly. I held my breath and huddled aside like a puppy, not daring to move at all.

"Slap it to death."

Yingzi opened her small palm and found the body of the mosquito. She raised her eyebrows at me proudly, and suddenly stretched her hand in front of me and pressed it on my face.

"Here, eat it." She laughed and made a noise.

"How can people eat mosquitoes?" I turned my face away and protested in a low voice.

"My father said that mosquito legs are also meat."

"Ah? Really?" I was half-believing and half-doubting.

"Yes. Haven't you heard adults say that? Mosquito legs are also meat."

I shook my head, leaned back, stared at the mosquito that was flattened in Yingzi's palm, and hesitantly stretched out my hand.

"You really believe it!" When my fingertips were about to touch her palm, Yingzi quickly retracted her hand and slapped it on her clothes, "Don't eat it! Are you stupid?"

She was amused by my silly and serious look, and laughed with her shoulders shaking. Although I felt embarrassed to be laughed at by Yingzi, her laughter and smile were so beautiful that I forgot my troubles and laughed along with her.

My vague love for her originated from her support for me a year ago.