My old man, riding an electric scooter with me in tow, hadn't reached the National Bridge when we noticed the gathering crowd. People were there to witness the spectacle, police were present, and amidst it all, we heard the mournful cries of a middle-aged couple.
Dismounting the electric scooter at the bridge's entrance, my father and I made our way through the throng towards the center. Two vehicles were parked on the right side of the central part of the bridge – a white BMW 530 sedan and a red Volkswagen taxi. Beside the BMW, a middle-aged woman knelt on the ground, wailing as she gazed at the river. Next to the sedan, a middle-aged man leaned against the car, also crying in despair. The two of them were in utter anguish.
As we approached, the surrounding crowd buzzed with speculation. Many had the complete video of the girl jumping into the river on their phones, footage originating from a car's dashcam. My father and I watched the video, which clearly captured the BMW racing to the right side railing of the bridge. Subsequently, a girl pushed open the car door, bypassed the front of the vehicle, and leaped into the river. The taxi driver following the BMW witnessed the girl's leap. He stopped his car behind the BMW, hastily got out, shed his upper garments, and followed suit, jumping into the water. The video concluded at this point.
"I heard that whoever retrieves the body of the taxi driver gets a reward of fifty thousand, and for the girl driving the BMW, it's a hundred thousand. Is this true?" My father inquired among the onlookers.
"It's indeed true. The girl's father confirmed it himself," a man in his fifties standing beside us pointed at the sobbing middle-aged man and replied.
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Excitement bubbled within my father upon hearing this news, though he kept a poker face. To verify, my father approached the grieving middle-aged man.
"You...," my father intended to start with a polite greeting, but considering the circumstances, he held back the second half of the phrase. Instead, he went straight to the point, "Introduce myself, I'm He Kuidong, a fisherman and body retriever on this river. I'm quite familiar with these waters. I'd like to know if what they're saying is true about a fifty-thousand reward for the taxi driver and a hundred thousand for your daughter?"
The middle-aged man, appearing around forty-seven or forty-eight, sported a trendy crew cut, shaved on the sides. He was a bit on the heavy side, dressed in a black shirt and gray casual pants, with orange leather shoes on his feet. He wore a necklace around his neck, about the thickness of a pinky finger, and a gold bracelet on his left wrist, complemented by a Longines watch on his right wrist. At first glance, he looked like a nouveau riche. The middle-aged woman kneeling on the ground wore a long floral dress, her hair disheveled and covering her face. I couldn't make out her features, but she, too, was adorned with gold and silver.
Upon hearing my father's question, the middle-aged man was too grief-stricken to articulate a response. Instead, he nodded while suppressing tears, acknowledging the veracity of the situation.
Witnessing the middle-aged man's admission, my father's face momentarily revealed a mixture of joy and excitement, as though the hundred and fifty thousand had already found a home in his pocket.
My father didn't say anything more. He stood by the bridge, squinting at the flowing river, silently calculating where the girl might have drifted after leaping from here last night. My old man dropped out of school at thirteen to fish these waters with my grandfather, making him intimately familiar with this stretch of the river.