◎ New Year’s Eve Dinner (with seven hundred additional characters) ◎

The snow outside the window fell in soft, tumbling rushes.

Luo Peiyin thought of winters in Singapore during his childhood — there was no snow there, only the northeast monsoon sweeping in from the South China Sea and soaking the entire city in a deep, clinging dampness, long and sticky. In weather like that, he would ache for home with a particular intensity, longing even for the dry cold, for skies full of snow. What he longed for was not quite his actual home — it was closer to a concept of home assembled from words and images, something abstract.

Later, after the breakup, when he returned to Singapore, all of that abstraction had taken on a very specific shape. At the edge of the equator, he would find himself thinking of the half a sweet potato Gu Qiao had once held out to him, the dry wind against his face coarse as sandpaper, the small cloud of white breath that half-covered the smile at the corner of her mouth. In the tropics, there was no use for the scarf she had wound around his neck on her toes, no place for the gloves she had given away in packages. In a tropical winter where coats were never needed, every moment of longing felt distant and futile.

Gu Qiao lay against him, pressing the warmth from his body slowly into her own. She was not a passive person by nature — this kind of initiative was entirely new for her. At first Luo Peiyin had only been teasing: “I’m older than you, and I’ve just driven for over ten hours — didn’t you say you wanted to help?” But Gu Qiao, for once, did not go back on her word. She suppressed the instinctive shyness and leaned up to kiss him, the kiss very gentle, as though she were comforting a small lost creature in need of her care — a cat, perhaps, or a dog — and certainly not someone with a very considerable physical advantage over her.

Her fingers were gentle too, moving quietly across his face, only the ring pressing with its own small hardness against his cheek. The warmth and kisses he returned were entirely different — full of heat. He spoke close to her ear: “Do you want me?”

She did — in every sense of the word. But she didn’t quite know how to want him when he was already this tired.

Under his gaze, there was no concealing her nervousness, her first-time uncertainty. She frowned, the tip of her nose damp with perspiration, and gradually, tentatively, drew their closeness deeper, working to settle the expanding heat inside her.

—

In a voice low enough for only her to hear, he told her that inside her he felt something like peace — like coming home. He looked at her, and time seemed to stop. In that stillness, every sensation was magnified; the slow-burning core inside her grazed the deepest part of her, stirring a warmth that could not settle, a warmth that grew and spread and moved through her until it seemed to reach every inch of her and leave it flushed.

Gu Qiao shook her hair forward to let it fall across her face, covering what showed there, keeping her expression from him. His arm came out and combed the curtain of hair back from her face, leaving every faint shift of her expression exposed and unguarded. His hand moved from her hair down to the nape of her neck, along her shoulder and slowly down to the curve of her waist; when his palm had warmed the skin there to a heat of its own, he guided her into a slow, rocking movement.

She rose and fell with his guidance, the long drop of her earrings swaying in rhythm, dark hair spread across her skin, and in the amber glow of the lamp her skin was almost the color of the snow outside. But snow feels no shyness. Snow does not change color from it.

The snow outside fell without ceasing. The glass held the cold at bay, and inside her, the slow heat went on turning, until she felt she might dissolve entirely into it.

She tilted her head and swept her hair forward again, trying once more to cover her face. Again it was brushed aside; he had to see.

She heard the low sound of his breathing. He had always made such effort to draw sounds from her, yet when it came to himself, he refused to let even the smallest one escape. Flushed, she bit her lower lip and met his eyes — curiosity and a streak of competitiveness together overcoming the shyness. She suddenly wanted very much to hear what he sounded like when he lost control.

But he gave her no such opportunity. When that competitive impulse in her was at its peak, he pulled her close, pressing her against him. Having shaken off the exhaustion of ten-odd hours of driving, he no longer needed her to take the lead, even with her on top.

In this northern snowstorm, the memory of Singapore’s winters surfaced again. What stayed with him most clearly were the rainy days — thick cloud cover pressing down on the city, always on the verge of releasing a downpour. That kind of long, fine drizzle had a way of eroding the will, letting loneliness seep through. But now, the two of them were like one person.

Just when Gu Qiao thought it was nearly over, he turned them both, covering her again.

Her voice came loose from her in waves, scattered from ceiling to carpet, spilling in all directions; not wanting him to have the last word, she bit down on his shoulder and swallowed the sound back. Her hands, with nowhere else to go, tightened around him until the ring pressed close to breaking the skin. The sweat that ran between them belonged to neither one of them alone.

—

After the heavy snowfall, the whole world lay in brilliant white.

Luo the Fourth was up early, building a snowman in the courtyard. Luo the Third watched her brother’s creation and held her opinions to herself — it was New Year’s Eve, and cheerful words were the order of the day.

The Fourth himself was not entirely satisfied with his snowman, though his dissatisfaction lay elsewhere entirely. “Third Sister — do you remember when Cousin Qiao was staying here and she built me a snowman? That one was so beautiful. I forgot to take a picture of it.”

The Third had a vague memory of a snowman her cousin had made, though she could not quite place it. “I always thought that snowman looked more like Second Brother.”

The Fourth rejected this at once. “That’s impossible. You must be misremembering. Cousin Qiao’s snowman was me.”

On the morning of New Year’s Eve, Gu Qiao and Luo Peiyin ate plain boiled noodles again — different from the night before only in that this time he was the one who cooked them.

Gu Qiao said generously, “Your noodles are really very good,” and immediately thought to herself that the two of them probably looked quite pitiful from the outside — two consecutive meals of plain boiled water noodles, each complimenting the other as though they’d eaten some extraordinary delicacy, like people who had never tasted anything good in their lives.

“A new supermarket opened last month — different from the old self-service shops, where everything is paid at the exit all at once…” Gu Qiao stopped herself, remembering that Luo Peiyin had spent enough time in developed countries not to need her to explain what a supermarket was. The supermarket brought her shop to mind — something far more everyday than a software specialty store, it would obviously spread faster through ordinary life. Before long, supermarkets would be nothing remarkable to anyone.

Without waiting for her suggestion, Luo Peiyin said, “Your family is on their way. There’s still nothing in the house — let’s go to the supermarket early and get some things for the New Year.”

It was exactly what she had been about to propose. Today, Gu Qiao didn’t give him the chance to drive — she was in the driver’s seat first. Her back ached faintly, but not enough to affect the steadiness of her driving. When they hit traffic, she sighed, “The number of cars just keeps growing.”

Never one to waste time that could be spent more productively, she let her eyes sweep over the vehicles around them, cataloguing the models. After a full sweep, she asked Luo Peiyin, “What kind of car do you like?” She’d keep it in mind — for later, she could give him one.

“A yellow Da Fa.”

Gu Qiao snorted. “You’re teasing me.”

When he had been abroad and caught in traffic, he had often found his thoughts drifting to her yellow Da Fa, and from there, to her.

The supermarket was packed. Some people, like them, were there to stock up for the New Year; others had come simply out of curiosity about this new kind of shop, and to warm up while they looked around.

Shopping together like this, Gu Qiao and Luo Peiyin experienced for the first time the feeling of two people building a life together. He pushed the cart; she loaded it, and in no time it was full.

For just a moment, she thought: wouldn’t it be something if he weren’t in Shanghai but here, in the same city — they could live together, shop together, eat together, plan together for a house and talk about how to furnish it.

Still, anything was better than different countries. With the thought of separation looming at the end of the holiday, she swept everything she knew he liked off the shelf and into the cart.

She was so absorbed in choosing that she didn’t notice someone watching them from a distance. It was hard to say whether it was Zhou Zhining who spotted Luo Peiyin first, or Zhou Zan who spotted Gu Qiao — but in any case, this father and daughter’s gazes converged at the same point. Zhou Zan confirmed it: the person loading the cart alongside Gu Qiao was indeed Luo Peiyin. Gu Qiao was tossing in toothbrushes and toothpaste without so much as glancing at the prices — quick, unhesitating, the two of them together exactly like a married couple running an errand.

Zhou Zan encountered Gu Qiao again at the checkout line, with three people standing between them. Gu Qiao had bought so much that checking out took quite a while. Zhou Zan watched as Gu Qiao took out her wallet to pay, while Luo Peiyin made no move toward his own — as though it were simply understood that she would pay. He had no respect for a man who went shopping with a woman and let her foot the bill, and he could not think of a single reason Luo Peiyin would behave that way. Zhou Zhining beside him looked even more visibly surprised than he felt. He very much wanted to ask Gu Qiao why she was back with that man — but on what grounds? By what right could he ask? Not only did he not approach her, he actually stepped back, afraid she would see him.

Luo Peiyin fit three large shopping bags into the trunk. Time was short — there was no chance to go back to the apartment first. He said to Gu Qiao, “Let me drive this time. If your parents find out you drove to pick them up, it’s not going to help my standing with them.”

“They won’t know from the station. Besides, you drove all day yesterday — today it’s my turn.”

He was already in the driver’s seat. “Don’t be polite about it. You put in a fair amount of effort last night — you should rest…”

Gu Qiao turned her face away and refused to let the memory of the previous night come creeping back. The silence inside the car only thickened the atmosphere of recollection.

Her mobile rang. It was Chen Hui — his mother had also put together some New Year’s provisions for her, and he wanted to know if she’d be home so he could drop them off.

“That’s so kind of her, please tell her I said so — but my boyfriend and I just went to the supermarket and picked everything up. We’re actually on our way to the station right now. Pass along my regards to your mother, and once the holiday’s over I’ll come see her.”

Chen Hui didn’t ask who her boyfriend was. They exchanged a few quick words and hung up.

Gu Qiao watched the snow scene outside the window and said to Luo Peiyin, smiling, “My parents actually think very highly of you. They were both very happy when we got together.”

Luo Peiyin didn’t believe a word of it, but he said nothing to contradict her.

Gu Qiao’s memory was long. She still remembered everything he liked to eat, and she had swept all of it into the car in generous quantities — enough for many meals to come.

She listed off the finished dishes as though imagining them already plated in front of her.

He laughed at her. “You’re in such a good mood you’ve forgotten everything else. You’re going to be working this holiday, and spending time with your family — when are you going to find time to make all of this?”

“Everyone in my family cooks. My dad has gotten quite good at it these days — he just never has a stage to perform on. If I’m too busy, he can cook instead, and if his father has no objections, you’re welcome to come and eat at our place every day.”

On the train, Lou Deyu sneezed. He had no idea who was thinking about him. Gu Qiao had phoned him early that morning, voice low as though someone were listening in. She said she and the Luo boy were back together, and asked him to be warm to Luo Peiyin when they met — not like that last visit to her place.

Lou Deyu had groaned inwardly on hearing this. Was fate really going to put him in the same room with the thrice-married man and his little sister-in-law at another wedding? Truly, the universe had a narrow imagination. Still — a daughter’s happiness came first. He hadn’t entirely worked out his feelings from that last encounter, and if the Luo family dared to invite Zhou Zan again this time, he would make a scene, blood relation or not. Between the boyfriend and her father, a daughter should still stand with her father, shouldn’t she?

Lou Deyu sneezed again.

His youngest daughter looked up in concern. “Dad, are you coming down with something?”

“Not at all — I’m perfectly fine!” He added, “We’re about to see your sister. Aren’t you excited?”

“Do you even have to ask? I’ve been looking forward to this for so long.”

Lou Deyu sighed and said, “Your sister has a boyfriend now — the same one as before, who came to our house that time. Since she’s chosen him, we’ll just have to find it in ourselves to accept it. If we don’t, it’ll only make your sister unhappy.”

The youngest nodded. Since watching her sister walk away in sadness after that breakup, she’d felt a small measure of regret herself. Her sister and her cousin hadn’t had much time together as it was, and she had taken up a good portion of it. After the split, there were only photographs.

Father and daughter reached their agreement quickly.

In truth, Lou Deyu took the coming meeting with Gu Qiao’s boyfriend far more seriously than his words let on. He had boarded the train in comfortable clothes — a padded cotton jacket — but when Gu Qiao mentioned that Luo Peiyin would be the one to pick them all up, he changed his mind. As the train neared the station, he pulled his suitcase out from under the bunk and dug out his good coat. Once he had it on, he still wasn’t satisfied — he turned to Gu Jingshu and asked, “Do I look alright in this? I’m not going to embarrass our daughter, am I?”

By the time Lou Deyu stepped off the train, he was in an entirely different outfit from the one he’d boarded in. He owed it to his daughter to look the part. On his way out, though, the crowd jostled and crumpled his fresh ensemble; he found himself at the back of the group, shepherding his family ahead of him toward the exit.

He had the luggage — every bag the family had brought — and was busy counting heads, terrified of losing someone in the rush. He was so focused on this that he didn’t even notice when half the heel of his shoe was trodden off.

Someone reached over and took one of the bags from his hands. A voice said, “Uncle Lou.”

When he heard himself called “Uncle Lou,” Lou Deyu glanced down at his feet and saw his shoe, crushed flat at the heel, more than one footprint across it. He let out a loud, short sound.

It carried both an answer and a sigh. Couldn’t you have waited until I’d fixed my shoe before calling out to me?

—

On the afternoon of that New Year’s Eve, Luo Bo’an had been waiting for his son to come home — but his son did not come.

What he did not know was that his son was at Gu Qiao’s apartment, making a careful good impression on another father.

Lou Deyu’s canning factory had been going from strength to strength. He’d built himself a two-storey house, and since Gu Qiao hadn’t been able to see it yet, he had photographed everything — the exterior, the sitting room, the kitchen, the bedrooms, the furniture inside — and brought the album to show her. He had set aside a large, south-facing room on the second floor just for her. But showing Gu Qiao wasn’t enough; Lou Deyu proceeded to show every single photograph to Luo Peiyin as well, one by one — because it was essential that this young man understand that what he was looking at now bore absolutely no resemblance to what he had seen on his last visit.

For each photograph, Luo Peiyin was required — under the weight of Lou Deyu’s extended, unblinking gaze — to produce at least a sentence or two of commentary.

Gu Qiao took pity on him. “Dad, stop showing him photographs. He can see everything for himself the next time he comes.”

Lou Deyu let his gaze drift to the ring on Gu Qiao’s finger. As long as her household registration was still with the family, there was no danger of her doing anything rash. Besides, not just anyone got to walk through his front door — he would need to assess further. He resolved to have a quiet word with Gu Qiao after Luo Peiyin left, advising her not to rush into marriage. She was still young, and he and his wife were in absolutely no hurry. Besides, the dowry he intended to give her still needed a great deal of earning — he was determined to buy her a home of her own before she married, so she wouldn’t have to move into a household with a thrice-married man as its patriarch.

He was still turning this over in his mind when Gu Qiao’s maternal grandmother spoke first: “Come by whenever you like. Grandmother will make you dumplings.”

Lou Deyu sighed inwardly. That woman.

But that evening’s New Year’s Eve dinner was one Gu Qiao could not share with Luo Peiyin — it was still, after all, a question of two separate families. Luo the Fourth was on the phone again, one call after another, urging his dearest second brother to come home.

Amid the Fourth’s relentless summoning, Gu Qiao walked Luo Peiyin downstairs. She tilted her head back to smile up at him. “Next year — we’ll have the New Year’s Eve dinner together!”

—