The next morning, after having breakfast with Mi Cai, we had to get busy with our respective jobs again. We said goodbye at the station platform and headed in two different directions across the city—one bustling and lively, the other quiet and peaceful. Her advertising company lies in the heart of the city’s hustle and bustle, while my coffee shop sits at the city’s edge, far removed from the noise and chaos.
But this doesn’t prevent fate from connecting us. At dusk, she still returns to my side with her favorite roasted chestnuts, and we enjoy a relaxing moment sipping coffee together.
Today marks the day my coffee shop officially reopens. Along with Qin Yan and our waitress Xiao Nuo, I arrived early. Actually, since the Lunar New Year is approaching and we will soon be taking our annual leave, this reopening is more of a trial run, with the formal grand opening to be held next year.
After opening, we each got to work. Qin Yan cleaned the coffee brewing equipment, Xiao Nuo repeatedly wiped the large, bright window of the coffee shop, and I used my tablet to post promotional threads on local Xuzhou forums popular among women. The photos in these threads were taken by a photography studio for customers in recent days. I asked the photographer for some samples, of course only after obtaining the customers’ consent to use them as promotional material. I hoped to gradually raise the coffee shop’s profile by leveraging this free advertising platform.
Sure enough, throughout the morning, several forum users expressed interest in the photography services offered by our coffee shop. This was the benefit of posting both pictures and text, as showing potential customers the actual results of previous photo sessions had a strong guiding effect. Moreover, the photos I posted featured some particularly attractive women. While women expressed envy, men began asking if visiting our artistic coffee shop would give them a chance to meet these beautiful women in the photos. Judging by their enthusiasm, they seemed eager to instantly meet a stunning beauty in my artistic coffee shop and experience a romantic Korean drama-style love story. To this, I sincerely replied: You’re really overthinking it! My coffee shop is not a love-making machine.
After finishing the forum promotion work, I picked up my guitar and sang a few folk songs I liked. However, we regretfully did not receive a single customer throughout the morning. This extreme lack of business made our waitress Xiao Nuo feel anxious and uneasy all morning, fearing she had chosen the wrong place to work and might not be able to receive her salary at month’s end. I had to calm her down, telling her to be patient—bread would come. The reason no photography studio had brought customers to shoot personal portraits today was because the weather in the morning was poor, and without sunlight, the photos would have been unsatisfactory.
With nothing else to do in the afternoon, I sat near the window with our barista Qin Yan and chatted. After some casual conversation, he suddenly turned very serious and said with great deliberation, “Brother Yang, could you give me Yan Yan’s contact information? I don’t mean anything by it!”
His bringing up the topic again troubled me. I replied, “If you really didn’t mean anything, you wouldn’t be asking me for her contact info. Qin Yan, I advise you not to be impulsive. Suppose I only told you about Yan Yan’s story without letting you see her face, would you still feel attracted to her? You’re only infatuated with the visual impact she gives you, but that kind of impact is actually the most unreliable.”
“Brother Yang, it’s not like that at all. I like her for her genuine devotion to men. You know I’ve been hurt by women who judge men by material wealth, so I naturally long for a pure relationship more than most people…”
I interrupted, “Her purest love has already been given to that man. She can’t give you anything now—you understand that, right? You’d better treat her as a legend and absolutely don’t think about pursuing her romantically. You’re only attracted to her looks. Admittedly, she is very beautiful, so it’s normal for you to feel a little flustered, but please try to control yourself!”
Qin Yan remained silent for a long time before replying, “Then, Brother Yang, may I ask if your girlfriend is as beautiful as Yan Yan? According to your logic, should I be flustered by her too?”
“Damn it, you dare!”
“There’s no question of daring or not, because I haven’t been flustered by your girlfriend at all. I’m just trying to tell you that Yan Yan’s beauty only deepens my admiration for her, while her true appeal lies in her character. These two aspects complement each other rather than contradict one another!”
“Now you’re arguing with me logically?”
“That’s really how it is…Brother Yang, just give me her contact information. She must be an independent woman. If she has no feelings for me, she’ll naturally refuse me, so you don’t need to worry. If there’s a chance she might like me, why would you break up a potential match? That would be really unethical!”
“Damn it, now you’re bringing morality into it! Can you stop giving me this kind of mental pressure?”
Qin Yan begged with a pained expression, “Brother Yang, please, please! I’ll just chat with her. If she really doesn’t like me, I absolutely won’t bother her. I swear!”
After deep consideration, I finally gave him Yan Yan’s WeChat number and said, “I’ve given you the number. Whether she agrees to add you as a friend now depends entirely on your fate!”
Qin Yan nodded and immediately sent a friend request to Yan Yan using the number I provided. Then he fell into a state of anxious waiting, checking his phone every five minutes. This continued until dusk, when I finally breathed a sigh of relief—Yan Yan had indeed not accepted his request. Judging from her current state, she probably wouldn’t accept it anyway. In fact, whether she even logged into WeChat was a question mark. After all, I had already announced my engagement to Mi Cai on WeChat Moments last night, yet she hadn’t offered any congratulations yet. The only logical explanation was that she hadn’t been using WeChat at all recently.
…
The happiest moment of the day had arrived again, as I saw Mi Cai running toward the coffee shop through the window. She had finally finished work. Lately, she seemed to have developed a habit of combining public transportation with a run to get to me, so she no longer wore high heels, always opting for the pair of sneakers I had bought for her.
Even though I had already seen her, she still knocked on the glass window before entering the coffee shop. Then she pulled out several roasted sweet potatoes from her bag—this was the only change, as she had brought roasted chestnuts the past few days.
She handed the sweet potatoes to Qin Yan and Xiao Nuo, then gave another one to me before sitting down beside me, enjoying the relaxed moment after work. She was so relaxed that she unceremoniously placed her long legs on mine, asking me to help her relax her muscles, while she happily enjoyed her roasted sweet potato.
As I massaged her legs, she told me about the funny things that had happened at work today—how someone had burned their rice, or how another had finally snapped and argued with their immediate supervisor. After each story, she would offer her own opinion.
Watching her gestures and expressions, I couldn’t help but smile. My heart gradually calmed, and I really wished Li Xiaoyun could see this scene right now—would she still suspect that Mi Cai was only biding her time in Xuzhou with a strategy of advancing by retreating?
At this moment, aside from her looks, she was just an ordinary woman—no different from any other.
Night fell, and still no customers had visited the coffee shop. I began to feel discouraged. After all, I had taken over a coffee shop with absolutely no existing customer base. I worried that relying solely on the photography idea wouldn’t be enough to create a positive cycle for the business. This not only meant potential financial loss but also deeply affected my confidence.
Feeling the pressure, my mood darkened, and I began thinking about new marketing ideas to prepare for potential crises.
A moment later, several private cars suddenly pulled up outside the coffee shop. The doors opened one by one, and about ten women, all of elegant demeanor, walked in together. Their close interactions indicated they were likely good friends or at least part of the same social circle. I knew then that the power of word-of-mouth was finally kicking in.
As the women entered the coffee shop, their eyes immediately focused on Mi Cai, but they turned to me and asked, “Are you the owner of this coffee shop?”
“Hello, I’m the owner of this place.”
A tall woman in a red fur-lined coat said to me, “I saw your post on the forum this morning. I thought your coffee shop was decorated quite uniquely, and the photos of the women who had their portraits taken here looked really good. So after work, I invited my girlfriends to come check it out. I didn’t expect your post to actually be true—you really have a beauty here… But… I don’t think I saw this beauty’s photos in your post. Is she your secret weapon, saved for the final promotion?” As she spoke, she glanced at Mi Cai again and exclaimed, “She really does have much more charm than the average beauty!”
Mi Cai simply smiled politely, as she was quite accustomed to such compliments. I explained, “This is my girlfriend. I want to keep her all to myself like a treasure hidden away—how could I bear to share her with anyone else?”
The woman rolled her eyes at me and said, “You sure know how to protect your girlfriend! So the rest of us deserve to be put on display by you, is that it?”
“You haven’t even taken the photos yet, so how could there be an opportunity for an exhibition?…”
The woman was clearly joking with me and added with a laugh, “Alright then, we’ll give you a chance to take the photos. If you manage to capture our style, we’d be more than happy for you to exhibit them publicly. After all, what woman wouldn’t want more people to praise her for being beautiful and stylish?”
I looked troubled. At that time, our coffee shop didn’t have a dedicated in-house photographer, so it was quite difficult to meet this request. However, I was reluctant to let go of such a great opportunity. It was clear that these women had extensive social circles and strong purchasing power. As long as we could satisfy them, they could very well become loyal, regular customers of the coffee shop…
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