In the middle of September 2018, when University A celebrated its 70th anniversary, I returned to my Alma mater after 12 years of absence.
Autumn is coming, the air flowing light peony incense. We this age group to put the shirt into the belts of the middle-aged, with envious eyes stared at the campus wear white sneakers, with the big boys of basketball, is a commercial bank LaoXiao, a BMW 530 li machine cover, the carrying value me a monthly salary of silver thermos flask, tea the water could not help but sigh: “let’s go to school are so XX silly to look forward to an early graduate and go to jobs.”
The students gathered one after another. Yue Gang was the last one to show up. He took A taxi to the north gate of A University and trotted in, trying to calm down and breathe. After years of not seeing him, he has grown fat in figure but still looks the same.
As a student, Yue Gang was not very sociable. To be honest, I was a little surprised that he could come to attend the school celebration.
I offered him a warm handshake. “How are you?”
“Not in the following branch, transferred to the direct bank customer department when the general member.”
“Oh, it’s very nice.” I pretended to know, nodding my head in appreciation — I knew he had misunderstood me, so I asked in a different way: “Still playing?”
“… Yes, of course.” He paused for a moment, then quickly responded with a smile.
1
Yue Gang is one year older than me. He was my classmate in the same year, in the same department and in the same apartment building. Our bedroom was two stairs away and we had only a nodding acquaintance until we struck up a friendship.
At the beginning of college life, our dormitory long spent thousands of dollars to save a 15-inch “big head” display, Windows98 system computer – in 2002, taking out a color screen mobile phone can attract a look of envy, this is enough to cause “north 6 apartment” 6 floor a small sensation.
However, in the era of dial-up Internet with telephone lines, slow Internet speeds and high rates, all the roommates pooled more than 100 yuan to buy monthly data to plan to use, using this computer to play the popular online game “Blood legends” or CS (counter strike) is not a firm choice. But there is a “big”, also can’t let it sit idle, I went to the computer city, bought a stack of pirated game CDS.
In many games, xiong’s arcade fighting game “Fist Emperor 97” conquered our hearts with many characters’ gorgeous and dazzling “killing skills” and smart “conjusion”. For a long time, “a fight between the Fist Emperor” became a social activity in the dormitory apartment building. After many battles, I was invincible. After I took down my brother, who was known as “the number one fighter of A Big Fist”, I was challenged by many boys who had never met each other in daily life — most of whom later became my loyal fans.
Because I could not meet opponents with equal strength for a while, After the freshness of “cruel dishes”, I would rarely “make a move”, but enjoy the fun of watching and instructing others “conjoined forces”.
However, I did not wear my crown for long, because Yue Gang appeared.
Yue’s dormitory is at the other end of the dormitory apartment stairs. He is surrounded by several classmates to challenge him. That day, I was often “one pick three” of the men defeated, next door bedroom “old three” will Take Yue Gang into our bedroom, proudly shook his head: “I find you a master, destroy your prestige.
Mr Yue wears a black T-shirt, dark blue jeans and a leather mobile phone case pinned to his belt. Eyes like two cracks, smiling appearance. The first time he came to our dormitory, he obviously could not let go.
“Not a good one! Look at the power of this own fans, must be a master!” Everyone put the mentality of watching a big war heckled.
“Are you using main rudder or secondary?” “I asked him in a home-court pose.
“Either way, take your pick.” He gave way.
At that time, the use of more than 10 yuan of film keyboard, digital keyboard area is easy to conflict with the primary key area, “hair” will be affected. Confident of my success, I took the initiative to choose the underdog.
As a result, just a battle, I secretly complain. Yue Gang was not in a hurry. He soon played my two roles and successfully won the first game. After more than 20 games, our dormitory has been heard to watch the students crowded. The fierce battle between Yue Gang and me gradually turned the comments into complete silence. Until the dorm leader reminded me that it was time to turn off the lights, my hands were reluctant to leave the keyboard — the overall record, I lost more win less, and Yue Gang about 30.
After Yue Gang left, everyone saw my former arrogance was beaten out, very some taste of gloating, more exasperating is that the monitor of lower shop told me: Yue Gang is not just a game obsessed nerd, in addition to the game technology “peak”, someone else has a beautiful girlfriend.
Yue’s girlfriend, A tall, comely girl with A crisp ponytail, was also A high school classmate. In contrast to Yue Gang, who likes to stay indoors and play video games all day, his lively girlfriend, a keen traveler and photographer, always runs away with her camera on her back whenever she can.
“It’s too similar. We complement each other better.” Yue Gang talked with pride about his girlfriend. Later, we would see Yue Gang’s girlfriend holding his arm to eat malatang in a stall outside the school, go to the college students’ activity center to watch a movie, even if we had a quarrel over the dim stone path, which made us “single dogs” envy, jealousy and hate.
2
After that contest, Yue Steel received a dozen in succession “apprentice”. Thanks to him, a few months later, I had two guys who could play 4-6 with me. But really enough level with Yue Steel contest, or only one person I. Therefore, after getting familiar with, Yue Gang came to our dormitory to find me to fight the number of times gradually increased.
It is unreasonable for boys to be crazy about games. Even compared with the computer games like “Red Alert” and “StarCraft” that came out of the blue in those days, the “stickiness” is very small. But when playing hard, most boys would not bother to answer the phone calls from their girlfriends and would not listen to the constant ringing of the bell.
Unlike most game players, Yue sometimes realizes that “something’s not right” when his girlfriend calls him so hard that he rushes to an appointment with the prospect of victory behind him. Every time I caught such an opportunity, I would grab his sleeve and ask him: “who is more powerful? Who’s the first person in Big A?”
“You’re good, you’re first!” Yue Gang was so anxious to get away that he had to answer helplessly — so, later there was the “allusion” that the first person of “A Big Fist Emperor 97” was actually Yue Gang’s girlfriend.
Once, Yue Gang said to me: “In fact, I was famous for playing Boxing emperor 96 in high school. At that time, there was no Internet and I learned by buying game magazines. After several months of hard practice, I had no rivals in the arcade hall.
“Did all this money end up in game money?” I laughed — an average wage earner couldn’t make that much a month.
“Ha ha, yeah, at that time a dollar to buy four coins, to catch up with the challenger ‘keep up with’ a day, is not a small fortune.” Yue Gang stopped smiling quickly, “But the good times didn’t last long. The young people rushed to play the game instead of playing the old one. The machines of the King of Boxing were not available, so I had to try to ‘transform’. Fortunately, in that year’s boxing Emperor 97 competition, he won the third place in the city, which is also a disgrace to his reputation!”
Yue Spoke of his “glorious days” with pride. I knew then that he was one of the top three “semi-pros” in the city and that I was, at best, an amateur. It made perfect sense to beat him.
However, I never imagined at that time that this “transformation” of Yue Gang, after a sudden accident from the sky, would be the “biggest change” he had voluntarily made in his life for the next 20 years.
3
Unlike Yue Gang, who only played boxing in his dormitory, I actually only treated boxing battles as a pastime in my spare time.
After 2000, it was the decline of arcade halls and the rise of Internet cafes. Our whole dormitory often turn nest to go out to the Internet bar “package” CS — that exciting immersion, I do not know how many streets dumped arcade games.
Unexpectedly, such a pleasant crazy play, suddenly stopped. At the turn of spring and summer in 2003, the scene of more than 20 Internet cafes coexisting outside the south gate of A was put out by A cold shower of water — the outbreak of “ATYPICAL pneumonia” spread and raged in the south.
In May, A University began to implement strict measures to close the school, and students complained that it was A storm in A teacup. Later, I felt A sense of tension when I saw the numerous arms of parents at the gate pass the isatillanen root and thickened masks to the children inside the gate.
Our dormitory building has staff wearing masks to spray disinfectant every afternoon, which makes the building smell like a hospital. The Student Union organizes outdoor activities such as basketball, volleyball and feather at an unprecedented frequency to shorten the time students spend in the dormitory. Many students began to wear masks in crowded public places, and anyone who coughed a bit more would attract passersby.
My five aunts in the city infectious disease hospital to work, at the expense of internal channels to buy imported immunoglobulin, came to me to inject. But the school police said that no one was allowed in and out, and I could not help but five aunt’s resolute attitude, had to find a less position, shamelessly take off half of the pants, through the iron fence to let the butt get a needle, for a time to become the laughing stock of classmates.
Such strict guard, students can not take a step out of the school gate, let alone go to the Internet cafe. In theory, Yue Gang, who never participates in outdoor sports, should come to our dormitory more often — this is a good time to play boxing emperor, but I haven’t seen him for three weeks.
One night after we turned off the light, I lay on the bed and asked, “Why didn’t Yue Gang come to our dormitory and report to our dormitory?”
“His girlfriend went to Beijing and developed fever after returning to school. All eight girls were quarantined.” The monitor of the lower bunk said, “I heard that they had planned to go together, but for some reason, only he and his wife went alone. After quarantine observation, the other seven girls in their dormitory had no fever or cough, and only his wife was transferred to the outside hospital. When Yue Gang got the news, he stood on top of the student union patrol and pulled over the western wall, which was more than two meters high. He was afraid that he would be punished.
“Than (fist Emperor) 97 also sharp operation!” We are “not afraid of heaven or earth” age, dormitory no one think this is a serious problem, but also so jokingly way.
A few days later, I suddenly received a phone call from Yue Gang: “I heard that your aunt works in an infectious disease hospital?”
“Yeah.”
“My object is there in the isolation room hospital, the mobile phone call is blocked, the hospital also does not allow to go in to visit, can you let your aunt help to accommodate?” Yue Gang said eagerly.
When I called my fifth aunt to ask for help, I got a very shocking reply: “The isolation room of the hospital can only be entered by medical staff wearing sealed protective suits. Even the director dare not allow non-staff to visit.”
I relented to Yue Gang, who was silent on the other side of the phone, breathing for a long time.
“Their 308 other girls in the dormitory are nothing serious, if my object really got ‘SARS’, why is a person not infected?” He spoke at last.
Young people without experience do not know how to fear fate, let alone closed A big like A fortress of isolation, people feel dangerous and far away from their own. I follow his meaning comfort way: “that elucidation isn’t ‘SARS’ bei.”
4
When news broke that His girlfriend had died of SARS half A month later, everyone was shocked — she was the only person at the university of 30,000 students to have died in the epidemic. Although I and Yue Gang’s girlfriend is not familiar with, but the probability of one in a million of the tragedy happened to know people, or feel quite terrible.
This made Yue once a topic of conversation on campus, and people were careful to comment on the matter behind his back. Some lamented the misfortune of the dead, others lamented the sorrow of the living, and still others said that Yue Gang had been lucky enough to save his life. “If he had gone to Beijing with his girlfriend, I’m afraid both of them would have been infected.”
In late June, when the SARS epidemic gradually subsided and A University lifted its ban, Yue Gang returned to school without being investigated for jumping over the wall without permission.
When I saw him again, I felt a little sorry and asked cautiously, “Did you see him later?”
He looked away and shook his head slightly in reply. I didn’t know what to say, so I gave him a reassuring pat on the shoulder.
“It’s just as well not to, so I feel like she hasn’t gone…” He seemed to talk to me, or to himself.
I can’t recall how long it took before Yue Gang came to our dorm to see me again. After losing his girlfriend, he was not interested in anything and had the habit of playing truant. Occasionally, being in the classroom was just a fantasy. Only in front of the computer and I was at a fierce battle, to reproduce the past laughing and cursing, but also a flash in the pan.
After more than a dozen battles to the lights time, the crowd of students dispersed, But Yue Gang is still “lean” not to go, by the dim light of the corridor lights, pester me Lao “trick” and “play”.
Although Yue Gang was fond of playing games before, he still had to spare a lot of time to coaxing his girlfriend. However, everything broke off in the summer of 2003. His mobile phone no longer rang frequently, and his brothers in the dormitory would not tell jokes about his “hen-in-charge” any more.
Can’t get out of the fist 97 man
Though I understood his pain, I could not help getting tired of being kept by him for so long. At that time, I was no longer interested in studying the fighting methods of The Fist Emperor, and my mind was full of the new game “Warcraft 3” operation skills and troop cooperation. Naturally, I began to perfunctorily in the chat.
To become a “master” of a new game requires a lot of effort. Besides enjoying the “battle” in Internet cafes, daily research on strategies and tactics is also essential. Wu Qiang and I each paid 50 yuan a month to rent a second-hand computer for watching “war reports” and practicing our skills on the campus network platform. After hard training, we soon became the first-class players of A-class Warcraft. The classmates who gathered around to watch the fight of The King of Boxing 97 became the loyal fans of watching the fight of Warcraft.
Five of the eight people in our dorm were fans of Warcraft, and the two computers were either playing warcraft all day long or a huge crowd gathered to watch the game. Yue Gang and I seldom have the opportunity to sit in front of the computer and fight with each other. Often he comes to our dormitory with great enthusiasm and only sits awkily for a few minutes before leaving.
Play games are the benefits of “advancing with The Times” will make many new friends – I’ll find won the WCG national competition of information institute senior to fourth word, and then to join A big team of warcraft, warcraft game explanation – occasionally guest campus, of course, because the obsession of warcraft, I hung in A row for several families, in order not to affect the graduation, had to senior forced himself briefly from warcraft last semester to with homework. Once in a while, I felt sick when I recited the book. I would play two fists and relax myself. But by then, Yue Gang had stopped coming to our dormitory.
Yue Gang is “behind The Times” in playing games and rarely enjoys the cheers of the stars. Listen to others, he more and more “alone”, their own play, their own food, their own shopping.
5
Dusk comes and goes, between breathing, the university life slides to the end.
In the graduation season of 2006, Bank X recruited more than 200 fresh graduates in the branch of our province. There were nearly 20 students in the School of Economics and Management of A University, among whom Were Wu Qiang, Me and Yue Gang. Wu Qiang and Yue Gang were assigned to the jinda branch of the direct bank, and I was assigned to the Xincheng Branch of The City Bank (different systems, both belong to the provincial branch leader).
Although the direct line and the city line are under the jurisdiction of the provincial line, but the benefits are better, known as the provincial leadership of the back garden, it is said that only the “background” of the people crowded into the — Wu Qiang because there are relatives in the provincial line to do accounting section chief, and Yue Gang was also elected, we do not know why, but this kind of thing is not convenient to ask.
Few people who work in a bank are willing to work as a teller. In the past half a year of novelty, eight immortals have crossed the sea to work in other departments. I, who am not reconciled to being a teller all my life, naturally also can do no better. At the end of 2008, I got the chance to go to the branch office when the account manager, out of the three feet counter, the whole person all at once relaxed up. When I was in college, I bought a professional competitive keyboard and mouse that could only touch the pictures of magazines and drool for thousands of yuan. When it was time for a break, I would compete with Warcraft online and offline.
Wu Qiang also jumped out of his position as a teller and became a financial manager. When talking about Yue Gang occasionally, he said, “I heard that Yue Gang neither talks about his girlfriend nor plans to climb up the ladder. When he is free, he always talks about the fighting style of the King of Boxing regardless of whether others can understand him or not. How do you describe it? It’s like — his clock has always stopped at college.”
In 2009, I participated in the selection of sub-branch cadres and became the deputy director of the branch; Yue Gang in jinda branch office as a checker (ex post supervisor). The ticker is a “retirement job” rarely seen among young people. Apart from occasionally authorizing the teller, it is to process the summons and stamp in the background.
Two years later, I transferred to the branch office as deputy director of the office, has its own independent office, busy leisure, and began to play a few fist Emperor. There were already online fighting platforms, and fighting games no longer required two players to face each other, but could be played thousands of miles away, like online games.
Just think of the boxing Emperor this game, I think of Yue Gang. I texted him, exchanged pleasantry for a while, and asked him, “How’s work, are you still playing (97), have you got a new girlfriend?”
In a few words, Mr Yue answered only the first two questions.
I see. He’s still the same, and content as he is.
Maybe it is because I have graduated for a long time and I am busy with my work. Unlike getting along with each other in school, even if I am in the same city, the frequency of contact is gradually decreasing. When Wu Qiang got married, Yue Gang and I all went to the field. We had a good time at the banquet. The old classmates said together that we would all go to Wu Qiang’s house to make a wedding. When we got drunk and hit several cars, we found that even the big president of Jinda branch had joined in the fun, but Only Yue Gang disappeared quietly.
Age growth let me warcraft level decline, on the battle gradually powerless. When the game operation just fierce Wu Qiang more embarrassed, married a wife and children, under the class also have to nurse dad, very not easy to play with me on two, but also by his wife scolded.
Warcraft has become a thing of the past, has long been difficult to find a happy exchange of playmates. My young colleague dragged me to play the newly popular “League of Legends” several times. I became the “head ATM” of my opponent who did not know the routine. I was sprayed with “chicken” by my teammates.
When I was transferred to the personal finance department as the assistant manager in 2017, my colleagues had already put “League of Legends”, which I had not yet understood, into the cold palace and transferred it to “King of Glory” and “chicken eating”. I finally became like Yue Gang in those days. I lost the desire to dive into a new game and spent less and less time playing games. My pastime gradually changed to watching all kinds of live games.
Although the most popular games are always the ones that occupy the rounds on the major live-streaming platform game channels, to my surprise, “Boxing Emperor 97” still occupies a stable corner as an old arcade game 20 years ago. Several of the country’s most famous “gods” receive daily “gunshots” (sponsors pay a bonus, set a conditional battle, the winner gets a bonus).
I think, perhaps the money, are like Yue Gang infatuated with boxing emperor, now have a certain economic foundation of the middle-aged?
6
In 2018, I went to the branch to host the job. The double pressure of operation and management finally made me give up playing games completely, and even the leisure of watching live games dissipated.
At the beginning of the year, the city held a meeting, all levels of unit leaders attend. During the recess, several of the old classmates gathered together as usual to ramble about. Several students in charge of the network bemoaned the doubling of quotas and shrinking performance-related pay in recent years.
“Early know improper head of this branch!” Branch director Zhang Yu took out cigarettes, expertly scattered to everyone.
“Endure, do not have the minor place that is division which come? Mix a deputy division level, not from the sea of misery?”
“That’s easy to say, we have a lot of this generation of ability, a blink of an eye more than ten years have passed, which climbed up? Wu Qiang in the province when the relatives of the head of the accounting section retired, he began to be unpopular with the president, stand by.
“What about Yue Steel now?” ‘I asked suddenly.
“He’s gone to work as an integrator in the customer department, just the same! I don’t want to make progress in work, I don’t want to talk about my partner. I usually stay at home and play boxing on the platform. On vacation, I carry a SLR camera all over the country.” The wang Ning of city line company department a face sorrow its unfortunate anger its unarguable, the mouth corner all turn down to ear root to go.
“The direct administration, with fewer people, fewer positions and fewer opportunities, is too difficult to ascend.” I said.
“It is difficult for others to climb up, except Yue Steel! Isn’t it just a matter of getting a head start when he goes up? Alas, if he took the official career has played the fist emperor one tenth of the heart, would have mixed on an official post, and then work harder, when a branch president is not difficult.”
“Pure bullshit, hard X line is opened by his family?” I took him for a joke.
“You were right!” Wang Ning said, “It seems that Yue Gang’s uncle is the former head of the city bank. Don’t you know that?”
I was stunned.
Yue Gang and Yue Are the same name, but I have never connected them together. Looking at Wang Ning’s serious expression, I pointed out that When Yue Gang was assigned to the provincial government, Yue Was working as the director of personnel in the provincial government. Yue later became the head of the municipal government and won the position of deputy director. In the seven or eight years before he was transferred, Yue Gang was trained to be a deputy director, which was more than enough.
“La! The boy’s hiding deep!” I couldn’t help but jump out a dirty word, “early know to find him the way, hire what post not!”
“Now I see that it was no use to ask him at that time. I heard that relevant leaders of the directly under the Central government had talked to him more than once, at first hinting, and then more than once asking him directly what position he wanted to take. The boy replied with the unified template: ‘I think this job is quite good now. ‘or yue president after the transfer, I listen to others, send WeChat messages asked him, he admitted. In my opinion, Yue Gang went to the customer department of the central bank, not by himself, but by force. Nine times out of ten, it was the last thing Yue Did before he left office.” Wang Ning said, “If he doesn’t want to climb up the ladder himself, he can do something for his friends. Top good resources need not, do not know this boy is zha think!”
After the meeting, I called Wu Qiang, who had worked with Yue For more than ten years in Jinda sub-branch. Sure enough, he did not know the relationship between Yue And Yue.
Wu says it was only after he went to work that he learned that Yue’s family’s economic conditions were among the best among his classmates. They had just graduated and bought a house in the center of the city. But no matter who introduces girlfriend to him, he basically does not invite girl to meet, chat at most 3 5, do not have nothing to do, for this and parents make the relationship tense.
However, Yue Gang is a little different from when he was in college. Whenever he has a spare time, he will go all over the country to take photos. “Instead of the usual otaku temperament, he has four or five Laika cameras”. His circle of friends is full of pictures of landscapes from all over the world, except for the people who are black and white and don’t write anything about them — no pictures of himself, of course.
We all know, as someone who has just passed the 40 mark, that he is set on a different path. As others, we can’t say much, after all, all kinds of taste, only he knows.
However, the subsequent experience made me feel more empathy for him. During the reform in key cities in June 2018, the branch where I was in charge of the work was removed, and I, who was the “acting principal”, suddenly lost my position, which meant that I had been climbing the political career for 12 years, but was suddenly blocked by a huge rock falling from the sky.
A person has been thinking about the rest of his life, but in a minute was knocked to pieces by fate. Perhaps, in those days, Yue Steel is the same? However, the cause can start all over again, miss the people, can only regret forever. Back then, we sat in front of the computer screen to fight, no matter what kind of confidence, perhaps never thought: the game lost can start again, but there is no second chance in life.
7
In the auditorium, the curtain of the artistic performance of the school celebration was lowered with warm applause, and the grand event was broadcast on the Internet to entertain the students from all over the world.
Teacher Meng, the instructor in those days, called the students to have dinner in the student two restaurant. We walking across campus north district, after years of baptism time, mesh, past highly artistic teaching building on campus and student hostels, even in those days behind the main building of the weeds desolately, has also been the pavilion and plastic basketball place instead of with chic modelling, all kinds of facilities, are revealed in this city to see the strength of 211 university.
“Everything has changed.” “I sighed.
“But I like the way I was.” “It’s ridiculous,” Mr. Yue said. “When I was in school, I wanted to graduate as soon as possible, away from everything here, but when I started work, I couldn’t help coming back all the time.”
I’m afraid to answer.
“Look,” he said, pointing to A newly built high-rise on the East side of the campus, “When I retire, I’m going to buy A house in A-Big and move back in.”
When I heard this, I couldn’t help but be surprised. I calculated that there would be nearly 30 years until he retired.
In October 2019, the new round of deputy Departing-level cadre selection of The Municipal Government came to an end. When I heard the grapevine news that my classmate Wu Yuanhui had been hired as a deputy Departing-level cadre, I made a phone call to congratulate him. After a while of pleasantries, I suddenly remembered that he was yue Gang’s classmate and had worked as yue’s secretary for several years.
“Did you know before that Yue Gang was a relative of Yue Guang?” I asked.
“I also know after Yue president leaves.” Wu Yuanhui said, “It is a pity that if it were not for the death of his former girlfriend, Yue Gang would have been indifferent to everything. With his condition, he would have got up long ago — men have no family to push them, and the motivation to fight is always insufficient. But I introduced to him several female friends, every time he said no phase, moved out of the dead girlfriend to contrast, not to pick someone else looks height is to pick conversation. Then I was a little worried and said that you are almost 40 now, but it will be more difficult if you don’t find it now. He answered me in a plain way: ‘If you can’t find it, you will forget it. Life is inconstant and things are unpredictable. ‘”
When I put down the phone, I couldn’t help thinking: I have worked in the branch office for many years, and I have seen many colleagues’ husband and wife quarrel with each other to the absurdity of the work unit. All of them were the good impression in love that was tortured by the real life later. But Yue’s wound seemed to be the opposite — what his girlfriend had left him was a silhouette of him who was always young, always beautiful and always lively. Later, it was difficult for a girl to overcome this perfect illusion.
Perhaps in Yue Gang’s subconscious, either he and his girlfriend died together, or the girlfriend is still with him.
“Fist Emperor 97” may be around forever, but where is Yue Gang’s girlfriend?
A verse from ‘John Christopher’ suddenly came to my mind:
I didn’t die. I just changed quarters
I dwell in your heart, you who cry to see me
The beloved becomes the soul of the beloved.
Recent Comments