Chapter 24: The Long Journey (3)
The people who had just sat in the chairs consciously lined up, and the group of people who did not know each other recognized each other's order of arrival, and this process lasted less than a minute, and the order of getting on the bus was determined. Everyone waited quietly at the bus door, and the last two young girls stood at the end of the line.
The doors opened, and people got into the car one by one. Everyone nods to the flight attendant at ticket check-in. Chen Ying also followed John up the high steps. She saw that the female flight attendant, who was about fifty or sixty years old, wore eyes and looked at her with a smile on her face. John later told her that the flight attendant only ran this line every day and knew almost everyone in the car. She has two adult children, one of whom works in Copenhagen.
"Here's my ticket." Chen Ying nervously handed her the ticket. Watch as she plugs the ticket into the timer and returns it to herself after hitting a few numbers.
"Thank you." The flight attendant said. This is one of the few Danish that Chen Ying can understand.
John was in the last row with two seats next to each other. As soon as they sat down, the vehicle started. Even though it was getting late, Chen Ying could still tell that they were walking on a country road. The asphalt road has only two lanes, one coming and one going, with a white dividing line painted in between. The trees along the road are luxuriant, and you can see the branches full of fruit under the dim street lamps. Chen Ying could make out that some were pomegranates and apples, some were hawthorns, and others were like chestnuts dressed in tough, thorny coats. Most of these trees are planted in the homes of roadside residents. The houses here are all two-story small buildings, one family at a time, and some of them have name signs hanging outside the yard fence at the entrance and mailboxes. Separated by gardens and gravel paths, these detached houses have no tall facades or barbed wire fences, and the windows reveal information about the rooms, where families are having dinner and the occasional barking of dogs can be heard from the gardens as buses pass by.
After passing through this community, the car drove onto a wooden bridge across the sea, and the car walked on the bridge and made a creaking sound. John told Chen Ying that this is a very small strait, because there are many islands in Denmark, and there are many wooden bridges like this. He assured that the quality of the bridge was fine, and that there was a steel frame under the planks, which was enough to support a considerable weight. Including the head and tail, there are only eight lights on the bridge. The waves under the bridge rose and fell, constantly washing away the foundation stones of the piers, and a large flock of white seagulls was awakened by the reflection of passing cars, and hovered over the sea with loud screams.
On the other side of the bridge is a pasture. Probably to ensure the quality of the livestock, there are not even street lights around. The flight attendant turns on the headlights to illuminate the road ahead. Through the afterglow of the headlights, Chen Ying vaguely saw that there were still a few horses grazing in the pasture. The pasture used to be a forest path. On both sides of the road are tall ferns, unmanipulated, growing freely. The dead branches and leaves they leave accumulate at the roots of the tree, and after accumulating as adults, they become a saprophyte paradise. There are quite a few white mushrooms gathered at the base of the tree, one in the east and one in the west, like an elf that has appeared by chance. At the end of the path, the scenery opens up again, as if you have experienced Dante's "Divine Comedy" and returned to the stars. The vehicle continued forward, passing another neighborhood. Most of the houses here are only flat floors, and through the lighted windows, Chen Ying saw a girl reading a thick book. Everything was so quiet, and the occasional sound of the waves at the end of the woods could be heard. The car stopped in front of a convenience store with lights on, and a third of the passengers got out of the car consciously. Then the vehicle lifted itself and continued on its way. John pressed the red stop button on the handlebar, and the name of the next stop was lit up at the very front of the car.
"Let's get off the station and get off the train." John said. He walked to the door of the car with the suitcase, and the person next to him silently gave way.
Only the two of them got off at this stop. They dragged the boxes and hurried past a row of small flat-story houses. The houses here are all white with white walls and dark gray-blue roofs. There is no lighting other than a light at the entrance of the complex. As with the neighborhood you just passed by, every garden here is not fenced. They used the light from someone else's house to find their way, their shoes rustling on the gravel pavement. In the dark, Chen Ying couldn't see the surrounding scenery clearly, and only vaguely felt that there were many plants planted on the square land in the middle. The air here is humid, but there is no smell of seawater.
Finally, when Chen Ying was exhausted, they came to the house around the corner. It is the only house with a light in front of the door, as if waiting for their arrival. John pulled out the key in his trouser pocket and turned it in the keyhole. With a click, the silver glass door opened. Chen Ying struggled to help John carry his suitcase into the house, taking care not to stain the carpet at every turn. No sooner had they put the box into the house than they heard heavy footsteps coming from the kitchen.
"I think you must be hungry, right?"
A woman slightly taller than John stood at the door of the room with a smile. She had short red hair and a glow of enthusiasm in her blue eyes. She had a thin and pale face, and was wearing a red men's T-shirt and a pair of long gray pajama pants. Chen Ying immediately knew that this was Yona.