Spring has passed and autumn has come, and no one can remember when Fang Pingxi lived under the overpass.
It seems he was there when the overpass was first completed.
He became a spiritual symbol for the homeless. As long as you can still see the mute washing his face with rain in the morning, it means that the world is going on as usual.
Like the world, he is silent and unaffected by anything, minding his own business as the moon rises and sets.
The wanderers discovered that the mute could talk. When he was drunk, he would tell a sad story in a muttering tone.
In the story, there is a man who is very unlucky. He has been very unlucky in his life. His family property was misappropriated and he almost died. While other children were studying in school, he was wandering.
He had been very active in facing his own life and wanted to take control of his own destiny.
But without exception they all failed.
So he exiled his heart. From now on, it didn't matter where he lived or how he lived.
He has become a zombie.
Some among the wanderers speculated that this was the mute's personal experience, and they lamented for him.
Some people don't believe it, thinking that such a wandering life can only be found in storybooks. The mute must have read it in some old magazine.
But no matter what kind of guess it is, it does not affect the story told by the mute very well. In his ethereal narration, the wanderers seemed to have listened to a weeping erhu with the sound of the piano.
For this reason, the mute often gets drinks from the homeless people, because it is only when he is drunk that he remembers that he can speak.
Gradually, in the dark corners of Luzhou, the reputation of Tianqiao Mute spread.
There were even reporters or writers who went to Mute to collect information, but when faced with these people, Mute never accepted their wine.
Although those guys keep claiming that they want to make his experience public and let the society give him justice.
But the mute never believed that he didn't see something he hoped to see in those people's eyes.
All he could see was the ambition to get ahead and the condescending pity for the marginalized.
He rejected such visitors with his silence, the turbid air under the overpass, the flying flies, and the pungent smell.
These visitors can never stay under the overpass for long. Those who can stay for an afternoon are considered to have amazing perseverance.
So the peace in the mute's life continued like this.
Until that person arrives.
It was a scorching morning, and the sweltering heat under the overpass had lasted for a week.
Many homeless people left under the overpass uncomfortably. Before the temperature dropped, they would camp by the reservoir and come back when the heat stopped.
The mute did not go with them. To him, it was the same wherever he went, and it didn't matter if he was sweating profusely.
Anyway, it was like he couldn't feel the existence of his body, letting it get hot and cold.
Even death is insignificant.
The only reason he was still alive was that it would take effort to die, and he was too lazy to do so.
As a result, there was a lot of space under the overpass, except for some old people who were too old to move. The mute could often hear their helpless moans.
Logically speaking, he should do something to help them, at least get some water for them, but he was too lazy to go.
Anyway, you will die in the end. Sometimes you just need to be thirsty.
The mute turned over on the corrugated cardboard where he slept and thought this way.
That's when that person appeared.
He is a boy who looks to be about seventeen or eighteen years old, with an obvious bookishness on his face.
He walked into the shadows under the overpass and looked at the homeless people lying underground.
The mute looked at him. He suspected that this guy had lost his way and was in a place he shouldn't be, because he definitely didn't look like a wanderer.
Although this young man was dressed very simply, his clothes were very clean and starched. It was obvious that he was a very tidy person.
Moreover, he also has a pretty good skin. With such an appearance, he will not become a wanderer.
But what does this have to do with being mute? Under the overpass, it's a place where you can come and go as you please, and he has no control over it.
But after some identification, the young man walked up to the mute and asked: "Are you the Tianqiao mute? I have something to ask you. Are you free?"
Oh, it turns out to be another reporter. The mute turned over and treated such people with his usual indifference.
The young man was left out and showed no sign of discouragement.
He hesitated in place for a while, then turned back and left the foot of the overpass.
Journalists these days are getting increasingly restless. The mute said in his heart.
But he didn't pay much attention and fell into a deep sleep. In the face of such hot weather, sleeping is a good way to dissipate heat.
When he woke up, he found that the boy was back under the overpass.
He found corrugated cardboard from nowhere and laid it out not far from the mute, as if he planned to live there.
This was something Dumb didn't expect. No reporter had ever done this before.
But he didn't care. To be honest, he didn't believe how long the boy could last.
Maybe after being harassed by a mosquito as big as a thumb tonight, he would run away immediately.
However, to his surprise, the young man did not lose as he thought.
Instead, he slept one night under the overpass.
The next day, he asked the mute the same thing again, "I have something to ask you. Are you free?"
The mute still ignored him.
The young man didn't bother. He followed the example of the homeless people, washing his face with the rainwater collected from the eaves of the overpass and brushing his teeth with his fingers.
He helped an elderly homeless person pick up water. He had to walk four or five kilometers to a park with free public toilets.
He also used the broom he picked up to clean up the garbage piled up by homeless people under the overpass.
At night, he burned mugwort collected from nearby bushes to smoke it to repel mosquitoes.
The young man's diligent work won the recognition of the homeless people, who regarded him as one of their own.
The next day, early in the morning, the boy asked the mute question again, "I have something to ask you. Are you free?"
The mute turned his back to him, staring blankly at the wall in front of him, speechless.
The young man still didn't bother. He went to buy some medicine and apply it to the homeless people who had all kinds of strange sores on their bodies.
He got needles and thread from nowhere and mended the clothes of the homeless people.
Just another busy day.
The next day, the boy asked the mute the same question again.
The mute responded to him this time, "What do you want to ask me?"
The young man seemed a little happy. He told the mute that he came to him after hearing the story of the mute at Tianqiao.
The boy wanted to sue the Sheriff's Department, and he hoped that the mute would be willing to identify the Sheriff who beat him into submission.
