When I turned my spear of attack towards Mi Lan, she remained indifferent and didn’t even fight back, which was completely different from her former self. This woman seemed to have changed; I sensed in her a temperament similar to Fangyuan’s, adept at appealing to both emotions and reason… At this moment, her friendliness seemed to be driven by a fear of something.
Mi Cai had not reached out to take the bank card containing 200,000 yuan as dowry money. As Mi Lan received no response, she placed the card on the coffee table. She then picked up her handbag and said to Mi Cai, “Sis, you’ve already received the wedding invitation. I hope to see you at our wedding tomorrow… Oh, and the car you used to drive—I’ve arranged to have it transferred from the company. It’s now your personal property. I’ve already had someone drive it downstairs… Here are the keys!”
Saying this, Mi Lan also placed the set of Audi Q7 keys on the coffee table, then turned and walked out. Mi Cai and I just stood there, no one seeing her off. She left simply, but my and Mi Cai’s moods had become complicated on an invisible level.
I stood at the back balcony and looked down; sure enough, I saw the red Audi Q7 that Mi Cai had once driven, as brand new as when I first saw it!
Mi Cai sat on the sofa, seemingly unfazed, flipping through a magazine on the coffee table, but she was hiding some emotion inside, which she wouldn’t reveal to me, probably related to her family ties with the Mi family.
I returned to the kitchen to continue preparing dinner for tonight. When only a soup was left, the door was knocked on again. This time I opened the door and was surprised to find Tongzi and Xiaojun standing outside, hand in hand.
Though surprised, I was very happy to see them and warmly invited them in. Mi Cai also put down the magazine and poured them two cups of tea. Tongzi looked around the room, noticing the furniture already covered with dust cloths, his voice full of reluctance and sadness: “Yang Ge, you’re really going back to Xuzhou, huh?”
“Yes, I’m leaving tomorrow afternoon… How come you’re still in the country? Haven’t you gone back to school yet?”
Tongzi was no longer sad and began to laugh again, gripping Xiaojun’s hand tighter, he replied, “Well, the holiday still has a few days left, I wanted to spend more time with Xiaojun… Yang Ge, how come you decided to go back to Xuzhou? I was even thinking that once I finish my studies and come back, we could start a company together, become someone important… That was your teaching all along! Now you’re leaving like you’re hiding in Xuzhou, if Xiaojun and I didn’t come looking for you, I wouldn’t have known you were leaving tomorrow!”
Tongzi’s joking words touched me. I recalled that in Xitang I had indeed told him, who was then a bit aimless, that he should become someone important. At that time, I was eager to achieve something, so I successfully managed the guesthouse in Xitang and took over Zhou Zhaokun’s guesthouse, turning it into a cultural guesthouse with a good reputation in the industry.
I somewhat avoided this topic, but Mi Cai smiled and said to Tongzi, “It seems you have your own plans for the future. Can you tell us about your plans after graduation?”
Tongzi replied without hesitation, “Originally I was going to work at your Luku for some training, but now I can only start my own business… I want to start a mobile game development company. The initial investment cost is low, mainly relying on technology. Once successful, the return rate can be very high!!”
Mi Cai nodded approvingly, “Your goal is clear. Keep it up…”
Rarely receiving approval, Tongzi became talkative. Looking at Xiaojun with a proud expression, he said to us, “Yang Ge, Cai Jie, you probably don’t know yet, but during this time I helped Xiaojun expand the scale of her store, then applied for the qualification of an online mall, stocked up on goods, and invested 100,000 yuan in promotional activities, which significantly increased our visibility. Now our daily sales exceed 20,000 yuan, and we’ve hired six staff members just for customer service and packaging. We’ve already gained a certain reputation in the gift sales industry!”
I knew Tongzi had the ability to achieve all this because when we initially established our company Luku, Jian Wei had given him a large sum of money as compensation, and he lived up to expectations by investing that money wisely. I should be happy for him.
…
It was dinner time now, and Mi Cai invited him and Xiaojun to stay for dinner, so the four of us continued chatting around the dining table. Although I was happy for them, Xiaojun’s special circumstances made me worry for them. I subtly asked, “Tongzi, you still have two years left in your studies. Won’t you miss her when you’re apart in the future?”
Tongzi, seemingly forever carefree, laughed and replied, “Of course I will miss her, so I specially developed a chat application just for the two of us, which can compile our daily chat records and shared pictures into a book-like format… So our separation becomes a storybook. Just thinking about how our book will become richer makes the pain of parting less painful…”
Mi Cai sighed, “That’s really romantic…”
I also nodded in agreement. Tongzi’s thoughtfulness was enough to prove that his love for Xiaojun was unshakable. Probably just designing this software alone took more time than can be counted in days.
As Tongzi spoke, Xiaojun looked at him with shyness and love. I realized that perhaps this Tongzi, who could easily be lost in a crowd, was using his ordinariness to enact a great love story. I finally felt a bit reassured and said to him, “Xiaojun is like a blooming rose by your side, awakening you from your slumber as a lion. You’ve already heard the voice from your heart… So, please, fight for her against life!”
Tongzi was stirred up by my words, raised the glass of white wine in front of him, and drank it in one gulp, almost wanting to smash the glass to show his determination. He said to Xiaojun beside him, “Yang Ge said I’m a lion that’s already woken up, so you must believe that I will become the most successful man for you, standing in the business world, commanding the winds and rains, overlooking the land for you…”
Xiaojun was moved by his words. She took out her phone from her pocket and communicated with him in this unique way. To my surprise, after only glancing at the words he typed on the phone, Tongzi shed a tear of a man in front of us, choked up and told us he wasn’t weak, just too moved!
Xiaojun had already erased the previous text and typed another line for me to see: “Brother Zhaoyang, thank you. You changed my fate… I will always remember your kindness to me. You are my benefactor, and also Sister Jianwei…”
Xiaojun deliberately tilted the phone towards me, so Mi Cai couldn’t see the words… I was reminded of that night when Jianwei and I crazily poured gasoline over ourselves to scare away the gangsters who were harassing Xiaojun… On that day, we faced life and death, and even now, recalling it still makes my heart race. I can’t forget Jianwei’s eyes, can’t forget her expression that could shatter everything in this world… She seemed like a warrior fighting side by side with me, touching my soul.
We went through the stormy night, yet each found our own dawn… Each walking on opposite paths, growing further and dimmer, although we were under the same sky and weathered the same storms, we really couldn’t see each other anymore…
…
After Xiaojun and Tongzi left, Mi Cai and I tidied up the dishes on the dining table, but we hardly exchanged any words, probably both immersed in the shock brought by Tongzi and Xiaojun. I couldn’t help but examine myself, falling into confusion. I couldn’t see clearly what kind of person I am now, and whether the future of Mi Cai and me will grow as we imagined?
Thinking and thinking, I suddenly became afraid, afraid of myself. It seemed I had fallen into a vicious circle. Originally, going back to Xuzhou with Mi Cai was to live a simple and pure life, but what I wanted was more and more. I wanted Mi Cai to truly adapt to that kind of life, I wanted the understanding of Bada and Mama, I wanted to enter that state of life before Mi Cai did, I was afraid that I wouldn’t have the ability to guarantee her life… and even more afraid that when she was wronged in this ordinary life, I wouldn’t be able to stay by her side all the time… just like what happened on the bus back to Suzhou today, if I wasn’t by her side, she would have had to endure it silently!
I felt suffocated… I felt an indescribable weakness… so the weakness turned into loneliness! Loneliness then became a heart ailment…
…
This night was our reunion after two weeks apart. We slept in the same bed, but I didn’t mention doing anything intimate between a man and a woman. It wasn’t until Mi Cai kissed me in the dark that I hugged her in response, then took out a condom from the cabinet on my own. I seemed to no longer be in a hurry to have a child… I felt like I was a burden to Mi Cai, ever since the day we met.
But could I still turn back and do something for her?
Mi Cai noticed my unusual behavior and softly asked in my ear, “Zhaoyang, do you have something on your mind?”
“No…”
“You do.” Mi Cai said, then turned on the bedside lamp and sat up to look at me.
“Lie down, don’t catch a chill!”
But Mi Cai didn’t care about my concern, shaking her head, she said, “Tell me, what are you thinking?… Is it because you feel you’re a burden to me?”
I also sat up from the bed, took out a cigarette and held it in my hand, but didn’t light it immediately, and said to Mi Cai, “Before I answer your question, there’s also something I want to ask you.”
“Okay?”
I wasn’t ready to face everything right now, so I tried to divert her attention and asked the question that had long puzzled me: “Tell me, where did you actually use that one million yuan I transferred to you last time?… I asked the village chief, and he didn’t know that you used this money to improve the medical conditions there. If you really spent it on that, how could he not know?”
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