29 Game of Love

 

The person who changed the plan was naturally Gao Rui. Gao Rui did not dismember Headmaster Zhang’s body but instead preserved it. If you wished to prevaricate a body’s actual time to death, you had to keep the carcass at a fixed temperature of 37 degree Celsius and move the limbs often so that rigor mortis would not set in so easily. This was not something easily done and to be able to do something like this required a deep knowledge of the human body and as a biology teacher, Gao Rui definitely had that knowledge. But why would Gao Rui do this? It was much easier to mutilate a body than to preserve it. Similarly, it was easy to die but it was so much harder to prevent death. We often hear people say that the most fearless man fears not even death but sometimes, to die required the least amount of courage because it was sometimes the easier thing compared to to live.

Gao Rui evidently chose the harder path. After Gao Rui dragged Zhang Mingliang’s body into the sewer, he dropped the murder weapon inside the sewer. Then he dropped the knife Zhang Mingliang used to commit suicide on the mountain and buried Headmaster Zhang’s body there as well. Then Zhang Mingliang purposely returned home late and all covered in mud to have Wu Jiajia as his witness and then kept his shirt instead of throwing it away to have the evidence. Zhang Mingliang created a lot of fake evidence to prove that Headmaster Zhang had killed him while Gao Rui created a lot of fake evidence to prove that he had killed Headmaster Zhang.

Every incident was linked to each other. Gao Rui thought that he had calculated everything but he misjudged one thing, the depth of love Wu Jiajia had for him.

“So why did you do the things that you did?” I lit a cigarette and studied Gao Rui opposite me. Gao Rui frowned deeply. He followed the wisp of smoke and then said, “Why? Because it was Mingliang’s wish. Do you know how I felt when I saw Mingliang in a woman’s body, do you know how I felt when I saw the note Zhang Mingliang left for me, do you know how I felt when I saw Mingliang’s headless body fall beside me?” The veins on Gao Rui’s arms popped and his face was purple from suppressed rage. He growled in a low voice, “I know, no matter what I did, I will never have Mingliang’s heart! But I don’t understand, why Mingliang would be willing to die for this Wu Jiajia whom he had not even spoken a word to?! Why? I don’t get it! I cannot get it!” Gao Rui’s eyes watered but before Wu Jiajia, he refused to show any weakness, “But I love him, no matter the decision he made, I will always love him. As long as he wished it, I would do it.”

I took a deep drag of the cigarette. “Therefore, you added another plan onto Zhang Mingliang’s plan?”

Gao Rui blinked to stop his tears from falling. “Yes, if the police’s focus is always on Mingliang, eventually you’ll find something suspicious about his death considering the haste by which he had done everything. Therefore, I needed to pull the police attention away from him and onto Headmaster Zhang instead. That way you would pay less attention to Mingliang’s death but focus more on investigating Headmaster Zhang.” Gao Rui looked into my eyes and said slowly, “In that case, Mingliang would be the victim and Headmaster Zhang the rapist and killer. Mingliang’s murderer was already dead so now you would have to focus more energy on capturing Headmaster Zhang’s killer.”

At this point, Guan Zhenglin couldn’t help but cut in, “So you’ve planned all this from the beginning?”

“Of course not!” Gao Rui hissed through his teeth. “If I knew the full scope of his plan, do you think I would let Mingliang die for the sake of this bitch? When I saw the note that Mingliang left for me in my bedroom, I hurried out. If I had arrived sooner, perhaps Mingliang would still be with us. The bitch should have died! Who is she that she deserves Mingliang to die on her behalf?!” Gao Rui glared viciously at Wu Jiajia.

I nodded and flicked at the cigarette. “The note was for you to go and collect his body.”

Gao Rui turned back to me and nodded solemnly. “Indeed, the note revealed to me the full extent of Mingliang’s plan, including his intention of killing himself. However, when I arrived at the building site, I was tangled in an old man’s snare! If I could have run up earlier, then perhaps Mingliang wouldn’t have died.”

“Then why didn't you shout to stop him?” Gu Chen asked, “Since you already knew the plan, you could have easily stopped him. If you got the old man’s attention and had him to look up as well, Zhang Mingliang’s plan would have fallen apart. There would be a witness to prove that he wasn’t really murdered.”

“Because I saw him…” Gao Rui’s voice lowered. “Under the moonlight, I saw Mingliang. I couldn’t see his face or expression but I knew it was him. He stood at the edge of the 15th floor and he saw me as well.” Gao Rui’s face colored with loss. “Standing down there, I suddenly understood something. I’ve made the promise that I would do anything for Zhang Mingliang but similarly, Mingliang would also do anything for Wu Jiajia. Through that moment of empathy, I knew I had to keep my mouth shut.”

Gu Chen and Guan Zhenglin looked at each other, not understanding why Gao Rui had given up at the key moment. Gao Rui continued, “The love I had for Zhang Mingliang is similar to the love he had for Wu Jiajia. I didn’t dare to express my love because I am afraid of loss, afraid that I wouldn’t even get to be friends with him anymore. Turns out we are both equally weak and lonely.” Gao Rui chuckled self-deprecatingly. “I understand that feeling very well, how you would do anything and silence the conscience and logic in your mind in the name of love. Therefore, I chose to not interrupt him because this was the man whom I loved. I was already stopped from pursuing my love, I couldn’t apply the same pressure on him. Since I can’t love freely, the very least I could do was to hold myself back so that he could.

“I lost my parents when I was young so I lived with my aunt. I was afraid of the dark and I didn’t dare to sleep alone at night. Then I met a boy at school. We soon became fast friends. He was an adopted child and he was not treated that well by his adopted parents. Therefore, I always had him come over to our house for sleepovers. My aunt didn’t mind it, these were just two boys being very good friends.

“I told him that I was afraid of the dark and he told me he wasn’t and he could protect me. But I knew the sleepovers wouldn’t last. One night I told him, we wouldn’t always be together, what would I do when he was gone? He promised that we would stay together forever.

“Forever doesn’t count if it is missing a year, a month, a day or an hour. This is a quote from a movie, whenever I watch it, I would think of him. He is the first and final love of my life.

“That night at school, he had left on his own. The promise of forever was broken but I didn’t blame him because I knew this would eventually happen.

“My love is confined by fear, fear of loss, fear of humiliation, so I satisfied myself by doing everything I could for him from the dark; that night, standing there, I realized maybe my love and his aren’t so different after all. Our loves are both colored by fear, so who was I to stop him?”

A body fell down from the 15th floor. It landed right beside Gao Rui, this was the body of the man he loved. Gao Rui cried internally because he was afraid that he might catch Ol’ Zhang’s attention. Gao Rui bit on his knuckles as tears rained down his face. ‘If this is your final wish, then I will help you complete it.’ Gao Rui knelt on the ground and stared at Zhang Mingliang’s body for a long time before he picked it up. Following Zhang Mingliang’s instruction, he moved the body into the sewer. He wanted to caress his lover’s face but the head was left on the 15th floor.

Sitting inside the dark and smelly sewers, Gao Rui suddenly understood something. ‘I am willing to do anything for you, death is just a small part of it.’

To completely fool the police, a mere disappearance wouldn’t be enough. Gao Rui had to ensure that the police closed the case as soon as possible. As long as the investigation stayed open, there would always be risks. Therefore, Gao Rui manufactured his motive, time, witness and evidence. Everything went as planned, but similar to Zhang Mingliang, he had miscalculated the depth of human emotions.

Zhang Mingliang just wanted to save Wu Jiajia, he didn’t want to implicate his brother, but he never expected Gao Rui would manufacture the scene where he had murdered Headmaster Zhang to fulfil Zhang Mingliang’s wish. And Gao Rui didn’t expect that after he had helped Wu Jiajia shouldered the blame, she would jump out to admit everything.

“If you had kept your mouth shut, you would have spent the rest of your life in peace.” That was the last thing Gao Rui told Wu Jiajia.

Wu Jiajia was already a mess by then. She croaked, “Just like how you could do anything for Zhang Mingliang, I too can do anything for you…” That was the last thing Wu Jiajia told Gao Rui.

As the poem said, What is love that humans would relinquish life and death for it.

Gao Rui was deeply in love with Zhang Mingliang, Zhang Mingliang was deeply in love with Wu Jiajia and Wu Jiajia was deeply in love with Gao Rui.

“This is such a dramatic love story.” Gu Chen commented.

“What love story is not dramatic?” I shook my head.

Gao Rui was ushered out from the interrogation room. He stumbled numbly ahead like his soul was lost. He looked at least 10 years older. Wu Jiajia followed behind him. Tears stained her face and she was stunned speechless.

I was reminded by a quote by Oscar Wilde, life is one fool thing after another whereas love is two fools after each other. But in our case, we had 3 fools caught in this bloody foolish game of love…