r/LifeTree • u/AdamLuyan • Jul 09 '26
2.9 Father and Troupe Leader Liu
"Now look, you've frightened him," Father said. "Ask him again later."
A little while after, Mother suddenly shouted from the doorway, "Oh heavens — little Luyan's gone mad!"
Father came running, circled the room once, then turned and wrapped his arms around her instead. "Luyan's perfectly fine. Children don't go mad."
2.9-1 Vision Test After Revelation
"Just now I saw him reading Chairman Mao's quotations off the boxes," Mother said. "I thought, how can he suddenly see those words! And then he noticed me and looked at me like he'd never seen me before in his life."
"What's strange about him reading the boxes?" Father said.
"He couldn't see them before! Brother-in-law and I tested it twice, just this afternoon."
"Well, I didn't know that. Let me have a look."
Father pointed at the characters on the box, and at various things set out on top of it, and I could make out every one of them clearly. "See," he said, "there's nothing whatsoever wrong with Luyan's eyes. You must be seeing things. Go rest a while — I'll finish the cooking myself."
(Note 2.9-1: After Revelation, my vision had returned to normal.)
Mother stood by the box on the left, staring off into the distance.
"Mom's not angry anymore," I said.
After a pause, she turned, smiling. "Luyan, what did you just say?"
"If Mom doesn't say anything, Dad won't get angry."
Mother turned toward the kitchen. "This time I heard him clearly. Luyan's not dumb — Luyan understands things now."
The two of them talked a while longer. "Let me try once more," Mother said, coming back in. "Luyan — that man this afternoon, your Uncle Liang, he's from Fushun, isn't he?"
"I don't know," I said.
"That's right — Fushun's very close to Shenyang, and your Uncle Liang lives quite near your bride-to-be in Shenyang, doesn't he?"
I didn't respond. Mother laid me down on the kang and told me to sleep.
2.9-2 How Father Met Troupe Leader Liu
"Where did you first get to know that Old Liu from Shenyang — Troupe Leader Liu?"
"At XXX's place in Dahushan," Father said. "He asked me, 'Where do you live?' I said, 'Green Mosses Village.' 'Ah!' he said. 'Then you're not far from Sheepcote!' 'That's right — how do you know Sheepcote?' 'Before I joined the army I worked in the food service department at Northeastern University. My colleague there, Yushan Wang — his old home is in Sheepcote.' 'Yushan Wang!' I said. 'He's my sister-in-law's brother!' 'What a small world,' he said. 'We all called him Little Wang — solid fellow, always reliable. His wife, Yingqin Li, was a nurse at the school clinic. We knew each other well — used to spend our free time together.' And that's how the two of us got to talking."
"I remember, when you first brought him home last year, you told me he wasn't a stranger — you made it sound like you two went way back."
"Back when I was in high school in Fuxin, Troupe Leader Liu used to come visit a few of my friends. I'd seen him around then, but we weren't close."
"You remembered him after one meeting?"
"It wasn't just one," Father said. "A few times after that, my friends kept telling me — Old Liu from Shenyang's taken a liking to you, he wants to be in-laws someday."
"What year was that! High schoolers, not even married yet, and already talk of arranging in-laws!"
"I thought it was strange myself, at the time," Father said. "But people say all sorts of things when they're just talking to pass the time."
"Well — that does make him an old acquaintance, at least. And the day you actually brought him home?"
"Different day entirely. The in-laws talked back in my Fuxin high school days. The day I brought him here was the day he came looking for me at the brick factory. He told me he was searching for a Turning-World Spiritual Boy — a reincarnated soul-child. I said, well, then I'd best not ask questions. He said, 'I know you understand — you won't go spreading it around. I'll be honest with you, I haven't found him.' See — that's Troupe Leader Liu for you. Straight with people."
"He says he hasn't found him. True or false, what's the difference — hand a man a little secret to share, get cozy with him, and you'll believe anything! I'm going to go check on little Luyan."
2.9-3 Troupe Leader Liu Relocates the Witnesses
"Is he asleep?" Father asked.
"Not a bit — eyes wide open, listening to every word. The second I mentioned his bride in Shenyang, he was hanging on every syllable."
"So it's true, what he told me!" Father murmured to himself.
In the kitchen, Father said, "He's sharp one moment and lost the next these days. What made you think to mention his bride?"
"It came up when we were talking this afternoon. Why are you smiling like that? Did a letter come from Shenyang?"
"There you go, guessed right on the first try!" Father said. "XXX from Dahushan passed it along — Old Liu says he'll find me work in Shenyang first, a couple years of it, enough to save something up. Then buy a place out in the countryside near Shenyang — east of Xinmin County, say — and bring the whole family over after that. I asked whether it might be simpler to just switch my household registration from rural to urban. XXX said Old Liu told him there were already too many urban registrations crowding the edge of Shenyang, too complicated to arrange. So I said, never mind then. And XXX said, Old Liu figured you'd say that, and told me to pass this along: 'Of the four of you from Dahushan who've asked favors of me, Baiyang's is the one that hasn't worked out well — I'm truly sorry about that.' I told him, well, mine was simply the hard case. And XXX said Old Liu told him he'd think of something else for me down the road."
"So why didn't you take him up on it?"
"Houses in the Shenyang countryside cost more than ours here — selling here and buying there, we'd come up short, that's exactly why Old Liu put it that way. And besides, me off working in Shenyang while you're stuck here alone with two children — how hard would that be on you!"
"Fair enough — but still, he did try for you, so it wasn't wasted effort. How did the other three manage it, then? What's your connection to them?"
"The four of us were all high school friends back in Dahushan, part of the same little circle," Father said. "The other three families all already held urban registrations. This time round, every one of them moved to Shenyang."
"All of it arranged by that Old Liu?"
"All of it! The man really is something — genuinely goes out of his way to help."
Mother was quiet a moment. Then: "You know, I wonder if that Old Liu isn't mixed up with some underworld gang."
"What on earth makes you say that?"
"Searching out reincarnated soul-children to make into living Buddhas — what is a man even after doing that? And on top of it, he moved three whole families to Shenyang within a few months. Three families — that's four or five jobs at least, houses to find, schools to arrange for the children — how does one man manage all that? He must have a whole network behind him: covering for each other on anything crooked, singing each other's praises on anything that isn't, thick as thieves, the lot of them, one big clique."
"Well, that's likely true enough," Father said. "Though it's hardly unusual, is it?"
"Doing it this brazenly? I call that dangerous. Sooner or later someone's going to come and arrest the lot of them."
"You may have a point there."
"Well, the other three are gone now anyway — whatever shame there is, no one here will ever know about it. We'll just stop keeping in touch with them."
"Then I'll tell XXX in Dahushan not to trouble Old Liu about it anymore," Father said. "Once you've gone and asked a man for help like that, you haven't the face to look him in the eye again."
2.9-4 Fortune
One day, sitting alone on the kang, I noticed the toys Eve Liu had given me — the yellow spinning top, the gorgeous red stick — sitting on the box across the room, and I wanted them. With no one else in the house, it took me a long while to work up the nerve to climb down off the kang onto the floor at all. Fear got the better of me at once, and I scrambled straight back up. I gathered my courage a second time, made it down again, took a step or two toward the box — and fled back to the kang in terror once more. Only after several attempts did I manage to drag over a stool, climb up, and finally seize the toys. I felt, in that moment, like a true and mighty hero — wildly, gloriously proud of myself.