"By the way, Tom, your painting is very interesting, interesting, very interesting."
Look for opportunities and do what you like. What do children of this age like the most? The answer is undoubtedly praise, especially when your work is praised by others, it is hard to refuse.
Sure enough, as soon as Will spoke, Tom, whose hobby was painting, immediately smiled and was extremely happy. He first glanced at the paintings on the coffee table, then turned to the new neighbor and asked curiously: "So what do you think of my paintings? "
“Great! Very Picasso style!”
"Picasso? Who is Picasso?"
"A world-class painting master, and also a master of abstract painting."
"What is abstraction?"
"Well, um, the so-called abstraction refers to the relative concept of concreteness. To put it bluntly, it is an alternative style of portraiture that is different from the realism style. You can understand it as random drawings, but the paintings are often full of the author's thoughts, which is a kind of through An unconventional art genre that uses painting to express certain meanings.”
"Although I don't understand what you are talking about, you seem to be very powerful."
As expected, when he heard that his work could be linked to Naruto, the boy scratched his head and became even more happy. Seeing that the fire was almost done, his mind was spinning. Will also saw the opportunity and continued to speak. Now he was on the right track and hurriedly asked the question. The key issue that has been troubled for a long time:
"So...who is this person in your painting?"
(Tell me, tell me the identity of the man in the painting, tell me what the hell this is!)
Using the flattery technique, Will originally thought that the boy would tell him the identity of the faceless man when the question was raised, but who would have thought...
As the question entered his eardrums, for some reason, the boy did not answer or respond. He just looked down at the painting in silence. After looking at the painting for a long time, Tom broke the silence and instinctively shrugged. He shook his head slightly while shrugging his shoulders, and finally stared with a blank expression. Will replied:
"have no idea."
"What? Don't know? You said you don't know?"
"Yeah, I really don't know.".
"Didn't you refer to anything? For example, books, images, movies or videos?"
"No."
His expression was frozen, his expression was astonished, and his whole person was stunned on the spot as if he had been coated with a layer of cement.
Obviously, Tom's answer undoubtedly exceeded Will's expectations. He had considered the other party's answer, and even imagined that there were several answers. He might answer that it was based on his personal imagination, or he might answer "Yes". There were a lot of guesses about something in a book or a movie or TV show, but he only expected that the other party would simply and directly answer that he didn't know?
have no idea? It is neither a personal imagination nor a reference to movies and books. Since it is nothing, how did you draw this thing?
As for Tom…
At this moment, looking at the sofa opposite and the brown-haired man in front of him staring at him with a puzzled expression, he perhaps realized that his answer was indeed a bit strange. The boy suddenly realized that he scratched his head first, and his face showed a strange expression. Recalling his thinking state, it took more than ten seconds for the boy to add to the above answer:
"I mean I don't know who the man in the painting is, but I have seen this man once."
………
"Hey, man, are you sure you want to quit your job and move here?"
"Yes, I am tired of this busy life. I don't want to continue this kind of life for a moment. I can't wait to leave New York by plane and go elsewhere. Of course, I will give Tamiflu as much as possible before I leave. If that bastard likes to cause some trouble, such as deleting the survey data I recently compiled from the folder, he will not be allowed to use my results to claim credit from his superiors under any circumstances!"
"Haha, it's not just you. It's really in line with your personality to do this. Well, Duffell is not a good guy anyway. There are many people in the company who hate him. Let's get back to the topic. Now that you’re leaving New York, where are you going to live?”
"I've thought about this a long time ago. How about California?"
"California? That's the west. In my personal impression, there are not only small towns but farms, and there are endless fields of bookmakers. It must be fun to run on horseback. Is it possible, you...don't tell me what you plan to do. Go there and be a farmer?”
"Yes, you are indeed my friend, John, you guessed it right, I plan to live there exactly, and as early as three days ago, I had entrusted an agent to buy a small farm in a remote location locally, which means that after getting off the plane I don’t need to stay in a hotel, I can go directly to the farm to start a new life. Now, here are the photos of the farm sent by the agent.”
"Well, it's not bad. Although the location is a bit remote, the surrounding environment is beautiful. If possible, after I retire, I would like to herd sheep leisurely on the entire farm in the west. I can also dress up as a cowboy if I have nothing to do. It's a pity that my aunt doesn't look like a cowboy." Your aunt left you a million inheritance like that, allowing you to live a retired life decades early, huh? Wait, what is this?"
"Do you mean?"
"I mean what is that dark patch of land south of the farm?".
"Do you have bad eyesight? That's a forest. According to the agent, there is a dense forest near the farm I bought. It should be this forest. What? Is there a problem?"
"There's a problem, of course there's a problem, and as an amateur paranormal enthusiast, I find the woods slightly odd."
"Oh? How do you say this?"
"Judging from the brightness of the photo, I guess the shooting time should be around one or two o'clock in the afternoon, and this time period coincides with the brightest time of the day. Otherwise, the farm and the surrounding environment would not be so clear, but the problem is exactly that. Here, since the surrounding environment including the farm is all bright and well-lit, why is it that only the woods to the south are dark overall? At first glance, I thought it was a dark cloud falling to the ground, don't you think Feeling weird?"
"John, your old habit of being suspicious has happened again. I strongly protest against this. Isn't it just a forest? And it is reasonable and reasonable that larger woods can often block the sun. What's the fuss? of?"
"No, no, you seem to have misunderstood what I meant. What I mean is that this forest is a bit too dark. It is in sharp contrast with the nearby farms and surrounding wilderness wheat fields. It feels a bit incongruous, unless it is deliberately Photoshopped. Otherwise, it would be impossible for the woods to be so dark in broad daylight in reality. Also, the last one of the photos you showed me was rather blurry, with a little something similar to video snowflakes mixed in. Could it be that the camera malfunctioned during the shooting?" .
"Hey, hey, hey, why do you care about this? A dozen photos aren't enough for me to see everything clearly? It's not a big deal if an occasionally unclear photo appears due to a shooting error. Okay, okay, John. Just shut up, I came to you to drink, not to chat with you about your meaningless personal hobbies, go, go to the bar, I'll treat you!"
………
California, in a remote wilderness, in the living room of a farm.
"I mean I don't know who the man in the painting is, but I have seen this man once."
As soon as the boy said this, Will's confused face immediately changed. It became surprised and shocked. He was eager to know the identity of the faceless man, so before Tom could explain, the man seemed to be possessed by some kind of Controlled by his emotions, he asked impatiently: "You said you have seen the man in the painting? Where? Where have you seen him?"
No one would understand Will's current mood, and the same was true for others, and the same was true for Tom. Although the description was correct, but after noticing the nervous urging tone of his new neighbor at that moment, Tom could only tell the truth truthfully in the following time, Then he gave a complete account of his recent encounter:
"Last week, yes, last week, that day happened to be the weekend. At the beginning, I was walking alone in the woods in the south. After the sky got dark, I was hungry and planned to go home for dinner, but just as I was about to walk out When I was in the woods, I felt something. I vaguely felt that something seemed to be following me behind me. I was very scared at the time and thought it was a beast in the forest. Thinking of this, I quickly turned back, but when I turned around, I found that there was nothing behind me. , let alone wild beasts, not even a hare was seen.”
"Seeing that there was no wild beast behind me, I was worried and quickened my pace and continued home. Strangely, not long after I walked, the feeling of being followed emerged again. I naturally turned around to look behind me again. The result was that there was nothing. It was still nothing. None. When I saw this, I panicked, so I ran. Anyway, I finally managed to run out of the woods..."
As the saying goes, you can only understand the current situation through personal experience. This statement is really true. On the surface, the above description is not a big deal. In the eyes of adults, it is nothing more than being nervous and scaring yourself. But that time, I was followed by an unknown thing. The experience was truly bizarre for a child like Tom. It was precisely because of the strange experience that the boy's expression gradually changed during the narration, gradually revealing a strange expression that was confused, nervous, and mixed with suspicion. As the narration came to this point, he paused, After taking a deep breath, the boy continued: "In order to avoid the constant tracking, I ran out of the woods. However, just when I successfully ran out of the woods and reached the opposite road, I turned around and saw a person. "
"At that time, I was standing on a road near the woods, and there was another person standing on the edge of the woods about a hundred meters away. A man, that was a man in a black suit. He was standing on the edge of the woods facing me. He stood motionless in the direction he was in. Due to the long distance and the dark sky in the evening, although I saw that the man was wearing a suit, I couldn't see his appearance clearly. In addition, I also found that the man had a good figure. Tall, its height is almost as high as a small tree. After all, the many trees around the man in the suit are the best reference objects. The man is tall and slender, and even his arms are much longer than normal people. So, I was very curious at that time. After all, I had never seen such a strange person. I opened my eyes wide and tried to see the other person's face clearly, but the result was that I still couldn't see clearly. No matter how hard I tried to open my eyes and stretched my neck, I couldn't see clearly from beginning to end. After trying hard for a long time to clear the man's face, I could only vaguely see a hint of white. Yes, white. His head seemed to be white, as if... it was as if all the hair and facial features on his head had been erased by an eraser, so blank... "
"I thought I was blinded at the time, so I reached out and rubbed my eyes vigorously. But, strangely, when I finished rubbing my eyes and looked back to the woods opposite, the man in the suit disappeared. He disappeared in just a short time. Inexplicably disappeared in an instant? Just when I was stunned and stunned, my mother happened to run from behind and called me to eat, and then took me back home regardless of anything, because that day I came home too late and my mother beat me up after dinner.”.
Tom's narration ends here, and the narration process is very smooth. As for Will, who has been sitting on the sofa and listening carefully...
The man frowned with a surprised expression. He was silent at first and thought deeply. After a moment, the man lowered his head and glanced at the pictures on the table and then looked at Tom: "So, then, this picture..."
Without the need for Will to continue, the boy nodded naturally and replied: "Well, the person in the painting was drawn based on the impression in my mind after I returned home."
In fact, the key clues have been revealed at this point in the conversation, and Will already has a general understanding of the whole thing.
First of all, it is certain that Tom did not lie. As a young child who has not been polluted by society, the possibility of the other party lying is extremely low, and the above description is also very likely to have actually happened. Let’s not talk about who the mysterious man in the suit is. Who, just what Tom just said is enough to scare others, enough to make any adult's hair stand on end after listening to it! At this moment, Will himself felt exactly this way. Yes, Tom was very young. At only seven or eight years old, he would naturally not feel too scared when encountering such a thing. On the contrary, he was more afraid at that time. Most of them are curious, which can be clearly seen from the doubtful expression on the boy's face throughout the narration. Of course, the above is not the focus. The focus is on the mysterious man in a suit in the boy's mouth. The boy was remembered by Tom because of his strange appearance and even painted it. The faceless man on the paper, if Tom is not aware of the fear because of his young age, then Will, as an adult, seems to be unable to calm down, or in other words, Will has already had a chill down his spine from the moment he heard the narration. He was sweating all over his body, and he could not help but shiver as if he had been blown by a sudden cool breeze. .
The reason was none other than the scene he saw with his own eyes within a few minutes. He could swear that he saw the faceless man in the suit. He had witnessed him appear at close range in the living room at the scene, whether it was his clothing, appearance or behavior. The appearance is almost the same as what Tom described!
(What's going on? Is the faceless man real? This, this is not common sense? Is there such a person in the world? Is there a person with a head as big as a small tree and no hair or facial features? Could it be that the other person Lying? No, from Tom's narration, I really can't hear any signs of the other party lying. That's true, but the problem is... if the other party really didn't lie, then the faceless man in the suit that Tom described before What exactly is it? After all, it is impossible for humans to grow up like that, and it is completely impossible to exist in reality. Let alone other things, it cannot be explained from a scientific perspective alone.)
(There is also the dark woods to the south. According to Tom, the faceless man once appeared at the edge of the woods...)
(The dark forest and the faceless man in a suit. What is the connection between the two?)
The scene became silent, and his thoughts were surging. At this moment, looking across the coffee table, looking at Tom whose expression did not seem to be fake at all, Will continued to be silent for a long time. It was not until a minute passed quietly that the man finally stopped thinking and guessing, and then In as calm a tone as possible, he asked Tom again: "Have you ever told your parents about what happened to you?"
"Of course I did. In fact, before I even got home, I told my mother what I saw and heard on the road. I also told my father when I got home."
"Then what?"
"Well, then I was first beaten by my mother, and then my father called me to the bedroom and gave me a scolding. I was forbidden to go to the woods to the south. I was afraid of being beaten, so I had nowhere to play. Within a few days, the place of play was moved to another abandoned farm nearby. No, it should be playing in your yard."
"call!"
As the conversation between the two parties came to an end, Will, who was increasingly chilled, forced himself to take a deep breath. Then, before Tom on the other side could say anything, Will, who was enveloped in an inexplicable fear, had already left the sofa and walked straight away. He stood up, walked around the central coffee table, and finally walked up to the boy. He put his hand on the boy's shoulder and stared down at his eyes. Then he told him in an unquestionable tone: "Listen Tom, your parents are right. Don't go there again from now on." You can play in the woods to the south. If you want to play, you can come to my place, I’m always welcome.”
"Huh?"
Staring at the serious expression of the brown-haired man in front of him, and listening to the man's solemn words, Tom was puzzled. In addition, he was still young and didn't think deeply. As expected, as soon as Will's words fell, the boy instinctively raised his hand to scratch his head with doubts on his face. After a moment, he asked casually: "Why?"
Adults don’t understand the world of children, but similarly, how can children understand the world of adults? It is true that Tom is much smarter than his peers and has quite a talent for painting, but after all, the other person is still a child, just a child of seven or eight years old. From the worldview of a child of this age, it is impossible to understand the meaning of that encounter. What? Children can't detect deep-seated terror. Faced with Tom's confusion, Will, who had some kind of guess in his mind but couldn't explain it, could only force out a smile and immediately answered with the most intuitive external threat. : "Because there are wolves in the woods!"
"Wolf? Really, really? You didn't lie to me?".
Sure enough, the child's simple way of thinking made the boy in front of him show a double expression of surprise and fear after hearing Will's answer. That's right. If it is difficult for children to be afraid because they cannot understand some things that are terrifying to think about, then in the end, The best solution is undoubtedly to change the means, from complex explanations to security threats, and to intimidate the other party with things that can be fully understood. What kind of things are both easy to understand and extremely threatening? The man-eating wolf is undoubtedly the most direct and effective deterrent to Tom, so Will using the wolf to scare Tom will actually make the other person more afraid than explaining it in detail. After all, Will understands children, and his purpose is nothing more than hope. The other party should be obedient and stop going to the woods to the south.
"Of course it's true! I've seen a gray wolf at the edge of the woods when I drove through that forest before!"
"Gray wolf?"
"A large carnivore that is twice as big as the wolf you see in the zoo. It can kill a sheep with one bite. Even adult shepherd dogs don't dare to confront it head-on, and humans don't. You can only face them if you are carrying a gun. Well, since you want to hear it, let me tell you how many people that thing has eaten in the past..."
With his rich knowledge, Will completely dominated the conversation, easily changing the topic in the chat, avoiding sensitive topics and returning to normal chat.
It is said that time often flies very quickly when chatting. It is true. As time goes by, the sun gradually sets in the west. Not long after, the originally dazzling sun gradually turns red, and its position becomes farther and farther west from the top of the head at noon. Slant until the sunset appears in the western sky, until the sky gradually darkens and evening comes.
Inside the farm living room.
"Huh? It's getting dark so soon? I think we should go over there. My father and mother believe that dinner has been prepared by now. Will, let's go quickly!"
After drinking 3 bottles of Coke, he put down the water glass and suddenly came back to his senses. He watched the sky outside the window gradually darken. Tom did not forget his father’s original instructions. He stood up and left his seat and started greeting. As for Will, to be honest, although he personally He was reluctant, but due to Father Tom's previous kind invitation and the fact that he was actually a little hungry at the moment, the man finally agreed. At the urging of the boy, they both left the farm and rushed straight to the north of the farm while it was still dark. Tom's family rushed to another farm not far away, talking and laughing during the process, but...
During the walk, the two people talking and laughing in the middle, whether it was Will or Tom, neither of them noticed any details, or in other words, when they were rushing to the farm halfway, something happened nearby, and something happened. What……
The sun was setting, and darkness shrouded the sky. Under the increasingly gray sky, on both sides of the silent road, if I looked closely, I saw a person appearing inexplicably under the tree on the roadside about a hundred meters away from Will and the two of them.
A man in a black suit and a man with a slender figure and a pure white face.
At this moment, this tall, thin man in a suit with no facial features was standing under a big tree motionless, staring at the two people in front of him. Not only that, as the faceless man suddenly appeared inexplicably, his ears pricked up as if he was close to the distance. If you listen quietly, you can further discover that there are sounds around the man. The sounds are ups and downs and intermittent, very similar to the signal noise released by FM radio:
Blah, blah, blah...
