After returning home, Pei Yan turned down several variety shows and commercial appearances except for the jobs he had already signed and absolutely had to attend.
He had his own reasoning. I’m just not built for entertainment. Do you people really think I’m the type who can clown around?
Other people went on variety shows and entertained both the audience and themselves.
If he went on a variety show, with that sour face of his, he would entertain neither anyone else nor himself.
Several assistants gathered around the studio and looked at Comrade Old Pei, who was doing the splits across the sofa with a sugared fried pancake still hanging from his mouth. In perfect unison they said, “Master, all of us agree that you’re actually pretty funny in everyday life!”
“Fuck… quit stirring things up!” Pei Yan extended a palm, drew his stance in, and regulated his breathing. “I’m a very serious person.”
The whole group answered him with boos and clicking tongues. You’re just pretending to be serious.
Zhang Huan said, “Young Master, how are you unsuitable? Go on a show, appear happily, you’re young and you can run, so just sell some physical labor and run! Keep Running or Go Fighting!, pick one. We can definitely get you screen time, at least two episodes as a guest. We need some topics around you or you’ll cool off again.”
Pei Yan kept stretching his split and rolled his eyes at Zhang Huan. “What is this, training monkeys?”
Zhang Huan rolled his eyes right back and sneered. “If you’re capable enough, you can make monkeys out of other people.”
“Who actually lets you make a monkey out of them? Once you walk through that door, who’s the monkey?” Pei Yan pushed himself up on both hands, changed position, propped his feet on the sofa, and shook his head. The show’s whole process was already arranged. People got eliminated from smallest celebrity to biggest, from lowest status upward. Who cared whether you could run? The less famous one got torn out first. Did they really think any of it was real?
He had a little of that young man’s cynical contempt for the world. He knew perfectly well that it was a bad habit. He simply hated following the crowd and found it all incredibly boring. He disliked everyone, respected almost no one, and could rarely be bothered to deal with them.
During the free time he had now, he went crazy with fitness and sports alongside his friends and brothers.
Every day: three sets on the heavy bag, fifty strikes per set. Three sets of iron-sand conditioning, fifty per set. Three sets of empty-hand punches, fifty each.
Three sets of kicks: fifty straight kicks, side kicks, and technical kicking drills each.
Wooden dummy, 108-form sequence.
One hour of kickboxing.
On top of that, three cross-country runs and three mountain-bike rides every week.
*
He had trained this way for years. Pei Yan remained extremely confident in what he could do.
That evening, after stepping down from the boxing ring at the training hall, taking off his gloves, and finishing several important calls, Pei Yan sat on a foam mat by the ring and watched sweat fall from his forehead in heavy drops. Then he placed an international call to Zhuang Xiao.
Across the ocean it should have been early morning. The other man sounded surprised too, as though he had not expected Pei Yan to call.
Pei Yan went straight to the point, speaking quickly between breaths. “Mr. Zhuang, here’s the situation. I found two very good specialists and already spoke with both of them. I explained the basic condition, and they’re very interested in taking a look. One is a professor of neurology specializing in sports injuries who just returned from Germany. The other is a famous traditional Chinese medicine doctor who specializes in scalp acupuncture. Neither of them is young, and both are among the very best-known people in their fields…”
“Are you okay? Why are you breathing so hard?” Zhuang Xiao asked over the phone. His own breathing sounded a little heavy too.
“Huh?” Pei Yan was panting like an ox, and the hand holding the phone was slick with sweat. But he had a fierce temperament and an impatient streak. Once he remembered something he wanted done, he would not wait even one minute.
“Kicking the bag?” Zhuang Xiao suddenly asked.
“Finished three bag sets. Forty minutes of sanda.” Pei Yan frankly exposed his daily training routine.
“Not bad. Pretty good,” Zhuang Xiao said.
“You’re breathing hard too, aren’t you?” Pei Yan asked.
“Three kicking sets, sixty-four circle-walking forms, Wing Chun wooden dummy, then solo sparring drills,” Zhuang Xiao said.
“You start training this early…? You’re not bad yourself, heh,” Pei Yan said.
“My energy’s best in the morning. By evening I can’t hit nearly as hard,” Zhuang Xiao replied.
They could hear each other’s heavy breathing through the phone. Somehow the conversation drifted completely off course into training, weight control, and health maintenance. Zhuang Xiao eventually pulled it back. “Those two specialists you mentioned?”
Pei Yan hurriedly said, “Oh, right. I… I just wanted your opinion, to see whether this might help at all.”
Zhuang Xiao understood. “This is about Eriletu?”
Pei Yan said, “Mm.”
Zhuang Xiao said, “…”
Pei Yan said, “I don’t want to upset anyone or make things worse, so I wanted to ask you first. They really are reliable doctors, national-treasure-level experts. People in my family have dealt with them before, or I wouldn’t dare recommend them. They’re among the best in the country. Usually even finding them when they travel for consultations is difficult… if you can trust me.”
*
Really, why should Zhuang Xiao trust him?
Even Pei Yan began to feel he might be flattering himself, being too naive. The other side might not care about the goodwill, or apology, he was trying to offer. It had all come too late.
After the accident, he had never seen the injured man again.
It was not because he had not wanted to. It was not that no one had arranged it. As a public figure, whether the remorse was sincere or performative, at minimum he was expected to show a contrite attitude, visit the injured man, and try to make amends. Pei Yan had simply never been given the chance. He could not get through the hospital entrance. Frankly, the fact that the Zhuang team’s stuntmen had never come to beat him up afterward already counted as mercy.
He had gone twice back then. Both times things were thrown at him until he left, and both times reporters and paparazzi arrived at the scent of blood and surrounded him with cameras. They photographed his face, his expression, whether he knelt outside the ward and cut himself open in repentance, whether the injured man’s family slapped him across the face.
Pei Yan refused to satisfy that kind of morbid appetite. He believed he had not been in the wrong to begin with, so he never went a third time. It was partly sheer stubborn pride. Everyone already knew he had a terrible temper, acted arrogantly, and lacked tact. His reputation was bad enough. The bottom of the pot carrying his blame was already black enough.
Some things had been bottled inside him for two years, resentment knotted with nowhere to go. He had not felt good either.
Pei Yan prepared himself to be treated coldly over the phone, or perhaps to receive a long, earnest lecture from Mr. Zhuang.
Zhuang Xiao said, “I happen to be coming back home for business in a couple of days. Let’s talk in person?”
Pei Yan said, “…”
Pei Yan said, “All right. We’ll talk in person.”
On the day Zhuang Xiao made the temporary trip home, Pei Yan personally drove to the airport to pick him up.
Normally an assistant should have handled that kind of work. If it had been anyone else’s business, Pei Yan was busy enough that he would not have bothered. But according to the social graces Johnny Wu had drilled into him, if Zhuang Xiao was coming personally, then Pei Yan ought to meet him personally at the airport to show sincerity.
Night had fallen over the capital’s airport. Lights reflected across the crowds of arriving travelers and people waiting to receive them, and the air carried the dust stirred up by long journeys.
Fortunately, this was not an appearance on either man’s public schedule. No outsiders knew Pei Yan or Zhuang Xiao would be at the airport, so no organized armies of fans had descended. Pei Yan stood in an inconspicuous corner and raised a hand toward someone. Zhuang Xiao picked him out of the crowd almost instantly.
They saw each other at the same moment.
Pei Yan had not expected Zhuang Xiao to come completely alone. No assistant, and naturally no bodyguard either. Dressed entirely in black in the night, he had no suitcase and skipped baggage claim altogether. An old canvas travel bag hung from one shoulder as he walked in long, hurried strides.
The black clothes made his body look even more compact and capable. People who trained martial arts tended to be lean. Nothing about them necessarily announced itself from the outside, and in a crowd he did not stand out much.
There was fatigue on his face, but his eyes were bright. Zhuang Xiao nodded to Pei Yan. “I happened to have two free days in the schedule. I came back to see the patient, check on my brother.”
“Mm.” Pei Yan followed Zhuang Xiao all the way out of the airport and could practically feel the wind from the other man’s stride. “You came back alone? None of your people came with you?”
Zhuang Xiao looked at him and said mildly, “If all of them came, would you still be able to get your plan done?”
Pei Yan had nothing to say.
Zhuang Xiao asked, “Where are the doctors?”
Pei Yan said, “They’re already settled at the hotel by the hospital. I’ve spoken to everyone involved, and they can consult anytime. Tomorrow morning works. Is that okay?”
Zhuang Xiao said, “Thank you.”
Pei Yan said, “It’s what I should do.”
*
They spent that night in the ward, staying with the patient.
More than two years had passed. It was the first time Pei Yan had seen the injured man since the accident. The person lying motionless and silent on the hospital bed looked like a piece of wood.
There were other people sitting in the room. From their faces and expressions, they were obviously relatives and close family of the injured man. Their features carried the particular exhaustion and numbness that came from caring for a patient over months and years. No one spoke.
Zhuang Xiao introduced Pei Yan to them naturally. “A brother from my team. He came with me to visit.”
Pei Yan covered his easily recognizable bald head with a baseball cap, then pulled the hood of his sweatshirt over most of his face. He stood in the ward like another wooden post.
It was difficult to describe the complicated feeling. In that moment he could not produce any dramatic expression or agitated reaction at all. He simply stood, remained silent, and watched. The oppressive sadness seemed to seep slowly from the corners of the ward’s pale walls.
Zhuang Xiao moved in and out for quite a while, speaking with doctors and negotiating with caregivers. The previous caregiver had gotten tired of the job and quit, so they had hired someone new. They arranged a consultation on neural-cell therapy for the next morning and a two-week course of scalp acupuncture, after which they would decide on a longer-term plan according to the response.
Someone sobbed. Someone wiped tears. Someone held onto Zhuang Xiao and told him about how hard the past few years had been.
Their accent was heavy. Pei Yan could not understand most of what they said, or deliberately tried not to understand, thinning his own presence inside the awkward atmosphere.
Zhuang Xiao translated a few things for him. “He has an older brother too. His father and brother are still working in their hometown city, trying to earn more money for his treatment. His mother stayed here to care for him, and life has been very difficult… Recently something else happened at home. His father was in a serious traffic accident where he works… His mother has to go back and care for him too, so they want to move him back to their hometown and stop keeping him here.”
Pei Yan listened with a heavy expression and said nothing. He did not know what else he could possibly say.
Zhuang Xiao had not been idle in the room. “There’s no hot water left. I’ll…”
Pei Yan said, “I’ll go.”
When Pei Yan came back, he carried the three basins kept in the room for the patient. He crouched on the floor adjusting the water temperature without raising his head while Zhuang Xiao and the relatives turned the patient and wiped his body.
Many photographs were taped around the head of the bed, probably in the hope of waking him. Pei Yan recognized the smiling faces of many stuntmen in them. Sa Risheng and Fatty Bao were certainly among them.
The patient had become very thin, his skin pale. The muscles he once trained were probably gone too. He used to be even more solidly built than Pei Yan, almost like an iron tower.
Once, he too had been a vigorous, high-spirited young man on film sets and in the ring. No one knew whose head fate would drop its suffering on next. The thought was complicated enough to make anyone without the courage to face it want to retreat or give up.
At that moment, Zhuang Xiao was down on one knee near the foot of the bed, adjusting the height and angle of the iron frame. He frowned and grunted. “Fuck. It’s stuck.”
Pei Yan went over to help pry at the screws on the iron bed.
The two of them knelt there for a long time with their heads close together, wrestling with the bed frame.
“Long-term bed rest causes muscle atrophy. He’s so thin it’s hard to look at,” Zhuang Xiao explained quietly. “Urinary infections happen easily too. The color isn’t right…”
Pei Yan turned and rummaged through the cabinet, finding a clean spare urine bag and catheter. He certainly did not know how to change them. He watched Zhuang Xiao crouch on the floor and handle the replacement with practiced ease without even calling the night nurse.
They spent the night in the ward. Each man slouched in an armchair with his legs stretched out, talking intermittently through exhaustion and drowsiness.
Pei Yan listened while Zhuang Xiao mentioned a few things beside him. Zhuang Xiao said calmly, “The Dark Prisoner crew had an accident too. A stuntman was doing a building jump when the safety wire snapped. He died on the spot. On the Thunder Breakthrough crew, they say someone stepped on a blasting detonator by mistake during blocking before filming. The explosives supervisor and two other stuntmen were involved. One died, two were injured… The producers said they were lucky it happened during a rehearsal and not during the real take with the two leads standing there. That would have been a major disaster.”
Pei Yan answered, “I heard about those too.”
“They were all young. It’s a terrible waste, and they don’t even get much compensation. Productions have big names and little names, people with high market value and low market value, but every one of them is still a human life.” Zhuang Xiao turned his head to look at him. “Can you understand now why Xiao-Sa wants to cut you down the second he sees you? If it were someone you cared about who was hurt that badly, or died, you’d suffer too. You’d blame someone too.”
“I understand.” Pei Yan lowered his eyes. “I deserve it.”
Zhuang Xiao said then, “These people have it hard too. They’re the ones who make it possible for us to stand there as male leads. If we make money and become famous, we can’t forget what we owe them.”
Pei Yan said very solemnly, “I am very, very sorry.”
It was the first time he had ever admitted fault and apologized for that incident in front of an outsider. He had never done it before. He had also never listened when anyone tried to pour earnest life lessons into his ears face-to-face.
Zhuang Xiao stretched out an arm. Perhaps he was simply too accustomed to being the ge of his team. The gesture looked like the countless times he must have thrown an arm around one of his own brothers. He patted Pei Yan on the back of the shoulder.
*
Thinking about it afterward, Pei Yan realized that he and Zhuang Xiao really were not close. They had merely met two more times than strangers.
This was the first time he had ever spent time with the man at such close range in private, and Zhuang Xiao was completely different from what Pei Yan had imagined. Completely different.
The dazzling “great hero” halo from the screen was gone. In ordinary life, no one had three heads and six arms, and even a person’s voice lost that layer of mystery. Mr. Zhuang was simply an ordinary man who happened to be better-looking than most.
Something beneath the great hero’s outer skin had seeped through the veil, letting Pei Yan see the actual flesh and blood inside.
Early the next morning, Pei Yan gave Zhuang Xiao directions and the two went to a restaurant two streets from the hospital for breakfast. It was an old-established Beijing shop that served breakfast punctually year-round, with authentic local flavors. Arrive late and everything would be sold out.
Zhuang Xiao was puzzled. “You’re not from Beijing, are you? How are you this familiar with the area?”
Pei Yan said, “I’m always coming here to meet people and talk business. Everyone in the industry works around here too. I practically count as a resident.”
Pei Yan queued up and bought two bamboo baskets of buns, four sugared fried pancakes, six tea eggs, and two bowls of chao gan. He figured that should be about enough for the two of them.
Elio’s Notes: Beijing chao gan (炒肝) literally means “stir-fried liver,” but the classic breakfast dish is actually a thick, garlicky stew made mainly with pork liver and intestines.
“Aren’t you the local native? You know the roads even less than I do?” he asked.
Zhuang Xiao said, “I haven’t stayed here regularly for years.”
“Good.” Pei Yan swallowed a whole bun and spoke while chewing. “You can still eat chao gan? Haven’t you gotten unused to the stink of garlic and large intestine?”
“Sure.” Zhuang Xiao smiled. “I can finish this entire table.”
His experience and state of mind might have changed, but apparently his tastes had not.
Within twenty minutes, the two of them swept through the buns, fried pancakes, tea eggs, and chao gan like a storm, dividing the food almost exactly in half. Their work burned enormous amounts of physical energy, so large appetites were unavoidable. Yet both men stayed lean. None of what they ate ever seemed to become fat.
At the next table, a mother and son were also eating breakfast. The little boy was primary-school age and kept glancing at the two men while biting into a bun.
Pei Yan wolfed down the last half of a fried pancake and signaled with his eyes: Move. We’re about to get recognized.
Zhuang Xiao mouthed back: You’re the one getting recognized. You leave. I’ll eat a little longer.
As he said it, Zhuang Xiao poured half a bowl of chao gan down his throat.
The little boy unconsciously began humming a theme song. “Deng-deng-deng, da-la-la-la… The long road stretches on, I roam it as I please, with courage and a warm heart…”
Pei Yan had sunglasses on and his hood pulled around his head, and he still nearly choked on the last bite of sugared fried pancake.
His mouth was shiny with oil.
A smile burst across Zhuang Xiao’s face. That sounded like the ending song from Pei Yan’s Su Qier movie.
They licked the plates and bowls clean and bolted from the restaurant.
The morning streets were the most ordinary, bustling picture of human life. Two men who had barely known each other had simply happened to meet at one crossing point and pause together for a moment beside the road…
That day brought two consecutive consultations with Western-medicine specialists. Everyone stayed busy. There was no need to recount every detail.
Pei Yan told Zhuang Xiao, “The doctors are absolutely reliable. My dad knows them. They treated my grandfather and other relatives before. With a serious condition like this, no one can guarantee recovery. I told them that too. We can only do everything we can.”
“I understand,” Zhuang Xiao said. “Do what people can, then leave the rest to fate.”
Zhuang Xiao’s schedule was rushed, and he would probably leave Beijing again very soon. Before Pei Yan got into his car by the roadside, something suddenly occurred to him. “Do you need to go home? You have a home in Beijing, right? If there’s anywhere you need to go, I can drive you. It’s easy.”
“I’m not going anywhere. I don’t need to go home.” Zhuang Xiao said, “My flight is tomorrow. I’m heading to Xilinhot for a few days to help that family deal with some things. The traffic accident involving his father might end up in court. They need to fight for compensation.”
Pei Yan said, “…”
Pei Yan instinctively wanted to say, “I’ll go with you,” but abruptly remembered his own schedule. “I’m supposed to be in Shanghai tomorrow for a promotional event. I could catch a red-eye flight…”
“No need. I appreciate the thought.” Zhuang Xiao waved at him. “Everyone has work. Go handle yours.”
Pei Yan truly felt guilty now. There was absolutely no trace left of that earlier thought that the man lying motionless in bed wasn’t the only one whose future was ruined. Fuck, that had deserved a beating.
Before leaving, Zhuang Xiao added one more thing. “Don’t worry about whether he gets better. If he recovers even a little, I’ll tell people it was the doctors you brought in who woke him up. If he doesn’t improve and stays like this, then we don’t say anything at all. You and I know what you did. That’s enough.”
Pei Yan gave Mr. Zhuang a clasped-fist salute, sincerely this time.
*