"There are visitors this early in the morning?" Chen Ge headed toward the amusement park gates. The gatekeeper was a good-natured man, but Chen Ge had never seen him get into a dispute with anyone before.
"This isn't a matter of whether you buy tickets or not. The park isn't open yet, the staff haven't arrived, the rides haven't been started up—even if you go in, you won't be able to do anything!"
Even from a distance, Chen Ge could hear the gatekeeper's voice. He jogged over and found a little girl and a middle-aged man with a blank, lifeless expression standing in front of the gatekeeper's booth.
The middle-aged man held money in his hand, saliva seeping from the corners of his mouth. His nose and eyes were crooked, his speech halting and strange-sounding: "Play… my daughter… always… wanted to come… play."
"Brother, the park opens in half an hour. Just wait a little. If I let you in now and something happens, I can't afford to take that responsibility!" The gatekeeper's reasoning was perfectly sound, but the man shook his head stubbornly, as though he couldn't understand a word the old man was saying.
"Money… saved up enough money… we want to… play."
The man's tongue seemed beyond his control. Every word came out forced, the muscles across his entire face trembling.
He seemed not to understand why the gatekeeper wouldn't let him in. He clutched the money tightly and thrust it forward.
"Why can't I get through to you?" The gatekeeper pressed a hand to his forehead. "Strange things first thing in the morning. There have been more and more odd incidents in Jiujiang lately."
"What's going on? Are they… visitors?" Chen Ge stepped out from inside the park and sized up the two people at the gate.
The middle-aged man had facial paralysis and slightly lower intelligence than an average person. The girl was quiet, her features somewhat awkward-looking, but her eyes were clear, carrying a faint trace of fear and apprehension.
She seemed to suffer from a similar condition as the man beside her.
"These two insist on going in. I explained that the park opens at nine and told them to wait a bit, but they won't listen. They think I'm deliberately giving them a hard time. Do I look like that kind of person?" The gatekeeper was simply doing his job.
After hearing the gatekeeper out, Chen Ge roughly understood the situation. He stopped in front of the middle-aged man and the girl.
The man thought Chen Ge was someone in charge of the park. He mumbled something unintelligible, then held out the money to Chen Ge.
Seeming afraid Chen Ge didn't understand, he specifically pointed at the Ferris wheel inside the park, gesturing repeatedly.
"Leave this to me." Chen Ge smiled at the gatekeeper, then took the money from the man's hands. It was a mix of bills and coins—exactly enough for two park tickets. It was clear that scraping together the money for two tickets hadn't been easy for them.
"You've overpaid. Children are half price. You don't need this much." Deliberate sympathy could itself be a form of disrespect toward people with disabilities. The most courteous way to treat them was to treat them as ordinary people, without looking at them through tinted lenses.
Chen Ge tried to return the extra money to the middle-aged man, but the man not only refused to take it—he grew agitated, a loud sound wrenching from his throat, though it was impossible to make out what he was saying.
"See? There's just no communicating with him. He thinks we're out to hurt him." The gatekeeper was at his wit's end.
"It's fine. I'll take them into the park for a stroll. Their ticket money's on me." Chen Ge didn't insist. He gently patted the man on the shoulder, signaling for him to follow. "All the rides won't officially start running until nine, but until then, I can walk around with you."
"Xiao Chen, take it easy. We've taken their ticket money, which makes them official visitors. Whatever you do, don't let them wander into your haunted house!" The gatekeeper was genuinely worried about something happening to the man and the girl. Sometimes Chen Ge gave off an air of utter trustworthiness, and other times he seemed completely unreliable.
"Don't worry." Chen Ge waved him off and entered the park with the three of them.