It hadn’t rained for a while. The moon hung clear and peaceful in the western sky, as slanting winds and tree shadows passed through the sparse pedestrians. Chen Luzhou leisurely strolled home, carrying Xu Zhi’s perfume. At this hour, the entire Yifeng Lane was empty. Glossy green leaves hung on the walls, with small cats lounging beneath them to cool off. The cicadas’ crisp, high-pitched chirping created a pleasant atmosphere. Suddenly, Chen Luzhou realized he hadn’t eaten any cicadas yet this summer.
Cicadas are a local delicacy in Qingyi City, rarely eaten by people from other provinces. However, every summer, the outdoor food stalls here mainly serve cicadas. Still, many locals don’t eat cicadas, like Zhu Yangqi. Whenever Chen Luzhou and Jiang Cheng ordered cicadas for late-night snacks, Zhu Yangqi would be devastated, exclaiming, “These are the soundtrack of summer nights!” But usually, no one paid attention to him. He could only try to persuade Chen Luzhou, who seemed to be the only one with some artistic sensibility among them, after all, he was a poet.
“Lu Cao, spring rain, summer cicadas, autumn wind, winter snow – aren’t these common metaphors you poets use? Where’s your romanticism?” Chen Luzhou would respond mercilessly, “Fed it to the dogs.” Do poets not need to eat? After all, when he’s hungry, he becomes ruthless and disowns everyone. Perhaps influenced by Zhu Yangqi, Chen Luzhou thought that girls might not like eating insects like cicadas either, so he never took Xu Zhi to try them. Otherwise, he knew a few places with good flavors where he could have taken her.
So when Chen Luzhou got home, he planned to call Jiang Cheng to see if he wanted to go out for cicadas. But as soon as he entered, four cold gazes instantly fixed on him. At that moment, one hand was on the fingerprint lock, the other holding the perfume bag, and he still had the ice cream stick in his mouth – he had finished eating it but had nowhere to throw it away on the way home…
The atmosphere was tense. Zhu Yangqi kept gesturing to him from the side. Lian Hui didn’t say a word, but her presence was imposing. Chen Luzhou thought it was mainly because of the twelve-centimeter high heels she was wearing. Lian Hui’s aesthetic taste had always been superior, and she dressed very appropriately. Although she was already quite tall, her high heels at home were always ten centimeters or above. So sometimes when Old Chen walked with her, it looked like an empress out for a stroll with her eunuch beside her.
As Chen Luzhou looked at the sky-high heels on Lian Hui’s feet, his mind inexplicably wandered to his first date with Xu Zhi at the mountain resort. She was wearing hotel slippers then, clean and unadorned. Chen Luzhou thought she was trying to hook him, feeling disdainful yet secretly thinking he might never meet another girl who would wear plastic slippers on their first date. But she was really thin, with slender toes and a slim waist. When they kissed, he could easily wrap one arm around her.
“Are you dating someone?” Lian Hui sat on the sofa, her arms crossed imperiously across her chest, asking point-blank. Zhu Yangqi stood beside her like a tattling little eunuch, not daring to breathe.
Chen Luzhou mostly knew he didn’t mean to, so he put the perfume bag on the shoe rack nearby, leaned casually against the cabinet, and sighed. His expression was indescribably sincere, though the ice cream stick in his mouth made him look somewhat nonchalant. “Do you want to meet her? Maybe not. I think she might upset you.”
This wasn’t untrue. Even Zhu Yangqi, standing to the side, thought that if his brother ended up with Xu Zhi, Lian Hui would indeed be very upset. This son was at most verbally defiant, but Xu Zhi had rebelliousness carved into her bones.
Lian Hui was already quite upset, but she always remained calm. Even when furious, she rarely lost her composure. Her eyes pointed to a stack of documents on the table. “Your study abroad visa has been approved. I heard from Zhu Yangqi that you’re planning to go to the Northwest the day after tomorrow. Cancel that trip. Next week, we’re going to London for a shoot. Chen Xingqi said he wants to come play, and your father also said it’s been a while since we’ve traveled as a family since you started high school. Pack your things, and you can fly directly from London to Liverpool.”
“You don’t need to include me in your family trip. I can go at the end of the month,” he said, standing there with his shadow stretched long by the ceiling light in the entryway. His profile was delicate yet sharp, his head lowered, the vertebrae on his neck visible, and his shoulders broad yet thin. How mature and composed could an eighteen or nineteen-year-old boy be? At that moment, Zhu Yangqi felt he must be quite lonely. Zhu Yangqi had once seen a sentence from a movie review Chen Luzhou wrote, which was later reposted by many film bloggers:
“After so many years of going it alone, what I want might be a bit greedier – a passionate and never-retreating love, something unique, something that only I can have.”
Zhu Yangqi had always felt that Chen Luzhou should have studied liberal arts. He and his brothers had all thought before that the most suitable profession for him would be a teacher, especially a university professor. He’d probably be a cultured scoundrel, not just because of his looks, but with that mouth of his, his classes would likely be packed. So, Zhu Yangqi had always looked forward to shining in the field of imparting knowledge and solving doubts for others. But looking at it now, it seemed he would probably have to go back and work ineffectively for Mr. and Mrs. Chen.
After Lian Hui left, Chen Luzhou tilted his head back on the sofa, resting his eyes. Zhu Yangqi sat down quietly beside him and asked, “That hickey on Xu Zhi’s neck, you did that, right?”
Chen Luzhou, with his eyes closed, frankly admitted it with a low “Mm.”
The air conditioner wasn’t on in the room, and Chen Luzhou’s forehead was covered in sweat, trickling down his temples. After all this commotion, the football match on TV was nearing its end. Zhu Yangqi had no idea that the usually clean-living Chen, the campus heartthrob, had already stepped down from his pedestal and secretly crossed the line, becoming a kissing tool. He turned off the TV in shock, staring straight at him. “Damn, what’s going on?”
Chen Luzhou didn’t answer. His posture is unchanged, and his phone vibrates in his pocket. He fished it out, mostly guessing it was Xu Zhi.
Xu Zhi: I want to get my ears pierced tomorrow. Want to come along?
Cr: No tutoring?
Xu Zhi: Mm, that middle schooler said he has to go to the dentist tomorrow, so he’s taking a day off.
Cr: Okay, I’ll pick you up tomorrow.
Xu Zhi: Cai Yingying just asked me a question about you guys. I don’t understand, can you help me think about it?
Cr: Go on.
Xu Zhi: Suppose a guy has liked a girl for a very long time, but then he suddenly realizes that the girl isn’t what he imagined her to be, so he stops liking her. He even likes someone else in between or has already fallen for someone else. But then one day, the original girl jokingly says she wants to be with him, and the guy agrees. What’s the psychology behind this?
Cr: Let me give you an analogy. It’s like going to buy a pancake, but after queuing for a long time, you realize you’re in the wrong line – it’s a bun shop. Just as you’re about to go next door to buy a waffle, the shop owner suddenly says it’s your turn. Would you leave with an empty stomach? The psychology is simple – he’s just hungry. He wants to be in a relationship, regardless of who he’s with.
Xu Zhi: … Impressive.
Cr: Is the unlucky one Cai Yingying?
Xu Zhi: Shh, keep it a secret. She was almost in an online relationship with a guy recently, but then a girl that guy used to like suddenly told him she wanted to be with him, so Yingying…
Chen Luzhou instinctively glanced at Zhu Yangqi. This fool was still curiously concerned about his gossip, not realizing his wall was being undermined. So he silently put away his phone and asked, “Haven’t you been in touch with Cai Yingying lately?”
Zhu Yangqi, cracking sunflower seeds on the sofa, said innocently and ignorantly, “Oh, it’s a long story. A few days ago, I criticized her a bit while we were gaming. She got upset and said she was going to participate in that city-wide Joint Cup competition to win an award and show me. I told her that with her skill level, she couldn’t even get into the Kids’ Cup, let alone the Joint Cup. The competition is coming up soon, right? She’s been practicing hard at home. Hmph, I bet she won’t last three days before coming back to beg me to carry her.”
“…I suggest you contact her more often recently,” Chen Luzhou could only hint this much, as Xu Zhi didn’t allow him to say more.
Zhu Yangqi responded with an “Oh,” his mind elsewhere. Cracking sunflower seeds, he asked curiously, “What’s going on between you and Xu Zhi?”
Chen Luzhou interlocked his hands behind his head, lazily leaning back on the sofa, looking at the ceiling with a somewhat world-weary expression. He recalled a line from “One Hundred Years of Solitude”:
“Wherever you go, you should remember that the past is false, memories are an endless road, all the springs of the past no longer exist, and even the most tenacious and craziest love is, in the end, just a fleeting reality. Only loneliness is eternal.”
Back in the orphanage, when someone gave him candy, he would always think about whether to eat it and if he could keep eating it after trying it. If he couldn’t keep eating it, he’d rather not eat it at all.
Chen Luzhou put his hands down and picked up his phone, glancing at it a couple of times. He noticed Xu Zhi had updated her Moments again. She had a talent for humor.
Xu Zhi: “The first rose I’ve received in my life.”
Below was a picture of someone sending her a bouquet of roses – “You play cards so well,” a screenshot from a game.
He exited and sent Xu Zhi a WeChat message.
Cr: Did your dad ask you?
Xu Zhi: He did. He was about to grab a knife to chop you up earlier, but I managed to talk him out of it.
Cr:?
Cr: Let’s not meet tomorrow.
Xu Zhi: Chen Luzhou, you’re such a coward.
Cr: It’s not that I’m a coward. Murder means jail time. I’m worried you’ll be left without a father.
Cr: Is your family’s legal awareness not up to par? By the way, I have something to do tomorrow morning. I’ll pick you up in the afternoon.
Xu Zhi: … Do you need to go for a follow-up check?
Cr: ????
Cr: Does your dad need some professional ethics retraining?
Xu Zhi: I accidentally overheard it earlier. No wonder you wouldn’t let me see. I was thinking, how could a handsome guy like you be so secretive?
Cr: It’s not what you think.
Xu Zhi: Then what is it?
Cr: … I give up. I’m going to take a shower. If you keep talking, I might get physical when we meet tomorrow.
There was a long pause before she replied.
Xu Zhi: When are you leaving?
Cr: Next week.
**
The next day, when Xu Guangji saw Chen Luzhou show up at his door, he didn’t expect him to come so soon. That anger from last night suddenly flared up, completely different from his kind words in the stairwell the night before: “Didn’t I tell you to use your hand more for a few days before coming back?”
At that moment, there was a female doctor in the office getting some documents. Chen Luzhou instinctively coughed, sat down awkwardly in the chair opposite him, and mumbled, “Um, I did… a few days ago…”
Xu Guangji looked him up and down and said slowly, “Alright, give me your medical card.”
Chen Luzhou handed it over.
Xu Guangji glanced at him and asked casually, “I heard you’re going abroad?”
Chen Luzhou leaned back in his chair, startled, and replied flatly, “Mm.”
The female doctor took the documents, said something to Xu Guangji, and left. Only the two of them remained in the office. Xu Guangji finished writing the prescription and slapped the medical card on the table. Suddenly, he pulled out a video from his phone. “Come here, I want to show you something.”
Chen Luzhou leaned in.
Xu Guangji put the phone on the table. The video showed a little girl with pigtails, bright-eyed and clear-faced. Chen Luzhou recognized her as Xu Zhi at first glance. Her features had hardly changed, especially those eyes – direct and sharp, yet clean and innocent, making her look particularly sincere. She was standing on a podium, eloquently delivering a campaign speech:
“Hello everyone, my name is Xu Zhi. Napoleon once said, ‘A soldier who doesn’t aspire to be a general is not a good soldier.’ Although I’m not as rich as Lin Zixuan, I’m pretty. Lin Zixuan’s money can’t all be spent on you, but my beauty is unreserved, as you can all see. I hope you’ll vote for me, but if I become class monitor, I also hope you’ll cooperate with my work and not make things difficult for me.”
Xu Guangji put away his phone and said with a smile, “Isn’t my daughter very confident?”
“Yes, confident and poised. You’ve raised her very well,” Chen Luzhou said sincerely. This seemed to be exactly who Xu Zhi was, and he could almost imagine that she must have been a proud little swan when she was young.
Xu Guangji’s smile faded: “But last night she cried and asked me, ‘Dad, am I that bad?'”
Chen Luzhou:?
Xu Guangji moved his chair and dramatically clutched his chest, giving Chen Luzhou a performance of anguish: “She said, ‘I can’t even keep a boyfriend. What kind of cookie am I?’ I’m not concerned about anything else, whether you leave or not is fine. I just want to know what this ‘cookie’ means. The culture of you young people is truly profound and extensive.”
Chen Luzhou:?
Author’s Note:
Xu Zhi: I didn’t even know I did that…
Chen Luzhou: I can’t believe I fell for his trick…
Unexpectedly, tomorrow will be a double update. The university part will probably be in about three or four chapters, maybe within five chapters. If I remember the plot in my head correctly.
Cookie – “What kind of cookie are you?” refers to a meme from “The Big Bang Theory.”
The quote from “One Hundred Years of Solitude” doesn’t include the last sentence in the original text.