Jiang Mu added San Lai’s WeChat. After finishing her meal, she went to the sink on the first floor to wash her dishes and cutlery dried them carefully, and returned them to the table.
San Lai had already prepared a cup of chrysanthemum tea for her. Jiang Mu held the warm glass cup, inhaling the tea’s aroma. She noticed that San Lai seemed to always be holding a cup of chrysanthemum tea whenever he stood by the door.
“Is chrysanthemum tea that good?” she couldn’t help but ask.
San Lai shrugged. “It’s the only tea I have here. I don’t usually drink anything else.”
Jiang Mu took a small sip. It was slightly bitter. Compared to jasmine and rose tea, she preferred the latter two. “Why?” she asked.
San Lai replied seriously, “It helps reduce internal heat.”
Jiang Mu asked earnestly, “Do you have a lot of internal heat?”
San Lai broke into a full laugh and said teasingly, “Next time, ask You Jiu if he gets overheated in the middle of the night.”
Jiang Mu suddenly understood what San Lai was implying. Her cheeks flushed red as she hastily took another sip of tea and changed the subject, “He’s ignoring me now…”
San Lai leaned back lazily in his chair, looking at her. “If he ignores you, just ignore him back. Focus on your studies. It’s not like he can eat you alive.”
Jiang Mu put down her teacup and, leaning on the cushion’s edge, asked, “Was Jin Chao… was it a motorcycle race accident that kept him from taking the college entrance exam?”
It was the most likely scenario she could think of, but San Lai’s expression gradually became serious. “It had nothing to do with that. He hadn’t touched a motorcycle since his second year of high school. The races he did before that… he had no choice.”
Jiang Mu’s expression grew solemn, her eyes filled with urgency. “Why?”
San Lai glanced at her before continuing, “You should know about his family’s situation. His father—well, your father—only gave him money for tuition and meals. There wasn’t any extra for pocket money. You Jiu had lots of friends, and they were always treating him to meals and drinks. He wasn’t the type to take advantage of others.
Plus, he loved visiting bookstores. A few books would cost him a week’s worth of meal money. Everything needed money, but being underage, no one would hire him. Later, some friends who rode motorcycles joined an underground racing circuit. Well, ‘circuit’ is a stretch—it was just young people from Tonggang meeting at Sidang Mountain at night, betting fifty or a hundred yuan per head. Winners, both betters and racers, would split the pot.
You Jiu borrowed money to buy a second-hand motorcycle, modified it himself, and went to Sidang Mountain. Nobody knew him there, and no one expected much, but he became an overnight sensation, winning enough to pay back his loan that same day.
Others raced for the thrill, but You Jiu did it for survival. That’s why he rode fearlessly, intimidating his opponents with just a glance when he mounted his bike.
He started going to Sidang Mountain regularly to earn pocket money. He built quite a reputation, but eventually, the police started cracking down. They’d catch young riders at the mountain entrance at night and confiscate their bikes. They even closed off the mountain for a while. After that, the riders dispersed, and You Jiu never went back.”
Jiang Mu hadn’t realized Jin Chao raced motorcycles in high school for money. Jin Qiang now worked in property management, where the average salary wasn’t high. After insurance deductions, he probably only brought home about three thousand yuan. Zhao Meijuan had to stay home to care for Jin Xin, only occasionally doing promotional work at supermarkets for hourly wages, earning very little. She could imagine how tight money had been for Jin Chao.
In contrast, not long after Jin Qiang left Suzhou, Jiang Yinghan sold their old house, opened a lottery shop with money from her work unit, and used the remaining funds plus lottery shop earnings to buy two apartments.
Later, when property values doubled, Jiang Yinghan sold one apartment to pay off the loan on the other. She had enough money to provide Jiang Mu with a comfortable upbringing. Jiang Mu couldn’t imagine how difficult it must have been for a high school student to maintain his studies while trying to make ends meet.
Was she still angry at Jin Chao? The feeling seemed to dissipate at that moment, replaced by a tightness in her chest. If their lives hadn’t separated back then, would he have had to endure all this? Jiang Mu didn’t know—it was a hypothetical question—but at that moment, her heart ached.
After finishing his story, San Lai took a drink from his large tea mug. Before Jiang Mu could ask more questions, he shifted the topic to himself, telling her about his Yamaha motorcycle. He said that whenever Jin Chao went racing, he would go too, though he never competed. His Yamaha, he claimed, was the most eye-catching bike on the mountain.
For some reason, when San Lai described his motorcycle as the most eye-catching, Jiang Mu didn’t imagine a cool design, but rather a bike covered in flashy LED lights playing dance music. She figured San Lai would do something like that, considering his current Honda was decked out with ambient lights, including ground effects that lit up when the doors opened, as if everyone needed to know he was getting out.
When Jiang Mu asked why he never raced, San Lai gave a straightforward answer: coming in last place would be the least of his worries—he was too delicate and afraid of getting hurt.
He claimed that when he showed up at Sidang Mountain, striking a pose, beautiful women in sexy outfits would come over wanting selfies with his bike.
“No joke, back then I was legendary at Sidang Mountain. Whenever I went, I never lost a bet. Always came down the mountain with my pockets full.”
“How did you manage that?”
“Simple. I always bet on You Jiu.”
“…”
When Jiang Mu had first heard Pan Kai’s information, it hadn’t meant much to her. But sitting in San Lai’s shop tonight, listening to him describe their younger days, everything came alive in her mind. Through San Lai’s voice, she could see their past—the wild times, the passion, the vigor, and most of all, the irreplaceable youth.
However, San Lai would only talk about their time before senior year, skillfully avoiding anything after that.
Time flew by as they chatted. Before they knew it, an hour had passed. Jiang Mu was captivated by the stories. Without a doubt, if San Lai was an unreliable and endless storyteller, then Jiang Mu was his most devoted listener.
It was only through San Lai’s words that Jiang Mu could catch glimpses of what Jin Chao was like during the years she wasn’t part of his life.
Of course, most of it was San Lai’s mysterious descriptions of his appearance. To be honest, having known San Lai for over three months, with his full beard and often disheveled hair, Jiang Mu couldn’t tell what he looked like. Whenever he described himself as charming, Jiang Mu felt like he must be talking about someone else entirely.
This led her to stare at San Lai carefully, examining him before asking, “If you’re so devastatingly handsome, why do you make yourself look like this?”
San Lai jiggled his leg lazily, asking, “Look like what?”
Jiang Mu felt awkward saying it directly, so she gestured at her chin diplomatically. “You know, all the… facial hair.”
San Lai stopped jiggling his leg and leaned in conspiratorially. “Your Brother San Lai has too much romantic appeal. I’m afraid if women see my true handsome self, they won’t be able to walk away, and it’ll hurt business. So I deliberately keep people guessing about my real looks.”
“…How thoughtful of you.”
San Lai nodded in agreement.
Seeing his serious expression, Jiang Mu couldn’t help but cover her mouth and laugh, telling him, “But seriously, if you shaved and got a haircut, you’d probably look quite fresh.”
Seeing her finally laugh, San Lai’s expression softened.
As they were laughing, someone knocked twice on the pet shop’s glass door. They both turned to see Jin Chao standing there. San Lai smiled and called out, “Weren’t you going to close up? I thought you’d gone to sleep.”
Jin Chao opened the door and walked in, staring at Jiang Mu. Her laughter hadn’t completely faded, and her face was still relaxed. He then gave San Lai a cool look and said, “Never-ending chatter. How can anyone sleep with all this noise?”
San Lai responded flippantly, “Then don’t sleep. If you’re really tired, you could sleep through a tractor next to your ear. This proves you’re not tired.”
Jiang Mu checked the time—it was indeed late. She stood up, shouldered her backpack, and said to San Lai, “I should head back.”
San Lai got up slowly: “This late, you’re still going home?”
Jiang Mu turned to look at Jin Chao: “Yeah, no one’s offering to let me stay.”
San Lai’s eyes curved into a smile, while Jin Chao gave her a bland look: “If you know that, you should leave earlier.”
Perhaps chatting with San Lai had strengthened her psychological resilience. Facing Jin Chao’s cold attitude again, Jiang Mu had developed some immunity. She responded just as casually, “I’m leaving now. No need to see me out. Goodbye.”
She then unhurriedly opened the door, moved to the garage entrance to pat Shandian’s big head, walked to the roadside, and hailed a taxi.
Sunday morning, the red packets that Jin Chao hadn’t accepted were gradually returned to her digital wallet. Jiang Mu rarely got up early, but today she rose at dawn, went downstairs to find a clean breakfast shop to fill her stomach, and bought some meat-filled pot stickers to take to Tongren Lane.
The garage door wasn’t open yet, still rolled down, so she could only knock on San Lai’s shop door. San Lai seemed to have just gotten up, his long hair casually tied in a small bun, wearing slippers and pajamas, diligently performing his duties as a cat litter box cleaner.
November in Tonggang had already entered winter mode. Jiang Mu wore a warm white cotton coat with a fur-trimmed hood pulled up, her face wrapped so only a palm-sized area showed as she peeked inside.
San Lai turned his head to see a cute girl dressed all fluffy and smiled as he put down the litter scoop to open the door for her. As Jiang Mu carried in the warm pot stickers, the pet shop immediately filled with the aroma of meat filling. All the animals became excited, and Jiang Mu felt she had instantly mastered San Lai’s summoning code.
She put the bag on the glass table and said, “The garage isn’t open yet today?”
San Lai closed the cabinet and told her, “There are few customers in the morning, so they usually open after ten. After you left, You Jiu went back to normal hours.”
“Mmm… so he’s not up yet?”
San Lai washed his hands and said, “That freak doesn’t need much sleep, usually wakes up before six or seven.”
Jiang Mu wiggled her finger outside the glass cabinet to play with the cats and asked, “Then what does he do after getting up?”
San Lai turned around with a paper towel, wiping his hands while smiling at her.
Seeing him not respond, Jiang Mu turned and asked again, “Do you think he’ll chase me away again when he sees me?”
San Lai walked over, picked up a pot sticker, and asked, “What will you do if he chases you away again?”
Jiang Mu declared righteously, “What can I do? Sing for him? Tell jokes? Do magic tricks? How about I dance for him?”
“You can dance?”
“Not really, I learned ballet when I was little. I could try. If I dance for him, how could he still have the heart to chase me away?”
San Lai looked at Jiang Mu dressed like a bear, unable to imagine how eye-searing it would be to see her attempt ballet in such a bulky outfit. The pet shop was filled with San Lai’s unrestrained laughter, and seeing him so amused, Jiang Mu laughed along.
Amid their joyful laughter, San Lai suddenly looked up and called out, “Did you hear that? Why don’t you come down and watch the little swan?”
Jiang Mu’s smile instantly froze, her face turning pale as she stared at the stairs in shock. There was movement upstairs, followed by a pair of long legs casually walking down. Jiang Mu’s heart began to race faster and faster until Jin Chao fully appeared in her view.
He stopped at the bottom of the stairs, slowly leaned against the railing, and cast a languid look their way: “Go ahead and dance.”