Chapter 3 (1/2)

Ch.3 The Strange Bride-picking-up Party

I paused, the groom? Why didn’t I see the groom before! Among the people who came earlier, none of them looked like a groom. Did he come later? I wanted to ask, but no one was talking in the room.

Even my father didn’t say anything when I left the house. The silence was frightening. I could only see the small patch of ground around my feet, because the veil on my head isolated me from my surroundings.

“We’re leaving the house, the groom be careful of the threshold!” I had just reached the yard when I heard the voice of that old lady behind me. I panicked, a blind man! I’m marrying a blind man! Or why would that old lady warn him about the threshold! I bit my lip hard. Although I knew from the start there was something wrong with the marriage my father arranged, I didn’t think it would be a blind man.

Whatever, let him be blind. That’s even better, because getting a divorce would be easier! I let out a breath, and Granny Liu reminded me it’s time to get in the carriage. This was really a traditional wedding, but I wasn’t in a mood to enjoy all this.

After getting into the carriage, Granny Liu whispered into my ear: “Zhaodi, this veil must be taken off by the groom at his family. Don’t take it off yourself, it’s not lucky.

I nodded, and after a while the carriage was lifted up, and set somewhere else firmly1 . I felt like I was on a car, so when it was moving at a constant speed I lifted up an edge of the veil, and found that they had put the carriage in some sort of truck. The good thing was that the truck was open, the ones where there isn’t a roof. The truck rolled forward slowly.

The wind was blowing, occasionally lifting up the curtains of the carriage. This was a small town, so we didn’t meet a lot of cars on the way. But the sound coming from behind wasn’t quite right. Maybe it was because I was too far away and couldn’t hear clearly, but I’m sure it was music, and the kind of a flute. It didn’t sound like a tune you would play on a happy occasion, but rather one usually heard on funerals.

Out of curiousity, I couldn’t help sticking my head out, lifting the veil and searching for the sound. Only when I looked did I get a fright, because not far behind me, I saw people in a car continuously throwing out white paper money, covering the whole road! The sound came from the trunk of that car. My heart started beating faster.

What was going on? Wasn’t paper money only for the dead? And that funeral music was sounding very creepy in the darkness of night. The wind was cold, almost icy! It penetrated down to my bones, and I suppressed the urge to scream while watching the paper money thrown out by the car behind.

I pulled my head back into the carriage, feeling uneasy. What’s going on, what’s this all about? I repeated this sentence continuously to myself that I didn’t even notice when the truck stopped, until Granny Liu called from outside: “Zhaodi, don’t fall asleep, we’re here.”

The carriage was lifted up again, and then set on the ground.