Going back to the dining hall where we had our meal, Li Xiaoyun and Mom, among others, were still engrossed in the intense discussion about the concluded Mahjong game. Mi Cai, who didn’t seem to share much common ground with them, appeared somewhat quiet. I sat beside her and softly asked, “Are you really that bored?”
“Not at all. I’ve just been chatting with Uncle. He said tomorrow he wants you to take me fishing!”
“Do you know how to fish?”
“I can learn. Is fishing really that hard?”
“It’s not difficult per se, the key is to have patience. Someone like me, who lacks patience, simply cannot do it. You’re different though, anyway, you don’t mind being bored.”
“If you lack patience, you still have to keep me company.”
I looked at Mi Cai with wide eyes, only then realizing that she could be quite clingy sometimes, but this suited me just fine. If every day she maintained that calm and detached demeanor, our lives would lose much of their fun.
After dinner, we went to the parking lot, only to find that Mi Cai’s CC was blocked in by a Chevrolet. I decided to have Li Xiaoyun drive Mom and Mi Cai back to their place, while Board Dad would take those two Mahjong aunties home. I lit a cigarette, somewhat troubled, waiting for the owner of the Chevrolet to come and move the car.
Fortunately, I didn’t have to wait long. As soon as I finished my cigarette, the car owner arrived, repeatedly apologizing to me. I felt a bit awkward about holding a grudge and simply said, “It’s okay,” before driving off. Once again, I was freely weaving through this long-missed city in my solitary car.
Passing the Third Ring North Road, I suddenly noticed that eye-catching red Audi R8 parked by the roadside. I slowed down and saw the woman in red anxiously sitting inside, making a phone call. Looking at the wheels, I realized the tire had been punctured. I pulled over and approached her car, tapping on the window. She turned her head to look at me, startled at first, then hung up the phone, rolled down the window, and said, “My tire’s flat. Quickly help me change the spare tire. I have an urgent matter!”
Wiping the sweat from my forehead, I asked, “Is this your car?”
She looked at me with confusion and said, “Of course!”
“Didn’t you know that the R8 doesn’t come with a spare tire?”
“Who cares about that? As long as it can drive. Where is this damn rescue service!” She angrily tapped the car’s center console with her fingers and looked back impatiently, clearly in a real hurry.
I wiped the sweat off my forehead again, half-amused and half-frustrated, and said to her, “Miss, this car might not have a spare tire, but it does have an emergency tire repair kit. You can fix it yourself.”
“I don’t know how to use it.”
“Just get out first, I’ll help you fix it.”
She opened the car door and got out, looking at me with doubt and asking, “Aren’t you the one who runs the inn? How come you know how to fix cars?”
“This is common knowledge, you know?”
I said this while opening the trunk of the car, lifting the cover plate, and finding the emergency tire repair kit inside. After roughly checking the instructions, I was about to help her fix the tire when she couldn’t wait any longer. Looking at Mi Cai’s car, she asked, “Is that your car?”
“Yeah.”
“Lend it to me first. I can’t wait anymore. Once you fix this car, we can exchange them back tomorrow.”
Feeling that she really was in a hurry, I didn’t say much, just took the car keys from my pocket and handed them to her. She took the keys from my hand and quickly walked toward the car behind, but suddenly turned back, took out several hundred yuan from her wallet, and handed it to me, saying, “This is the service fee!”
“Do I look like the kind of person who would take advantage of someone in a crisis? I don’t need your service fee. If you have an urgent matter, just go quickly. Don’t let it be delayed!”
Her expression finally softened as she looked at me, then she said, “You talk too much and are annoying, but actually you’re quite nice. Come to Lijingxuan tomorrow at noon. I’ll treat you to a meal, and we can exchange the cars back then.”
I nodded and didn’t stop working, continuing to fix her tire, while she didn’t say anything else and hurried toward Mi Cai’s car with the keys. Soon she drove off north along the road. However, she drove more cautiously this time. Perhaps the flat tire had scared her, and with her usual driving habits, maintaining such a high speed with a flat tire and still managing to stop the car safely was quite impressive.
It took me about fifteen minutes to temporarily fix the tire. Worried about safety issues, I drove her car to a repair shop and replaced the tire with a new one. This whole process took over an hour. When I returned to my residential community, it was already 11 PM, but Mi Cai had been waiting for me downstairs. During that past hour, she had called me twice out of concern.
I parked the woman in red’s R8 on an empty lot, got out of the car, and walked toward Mi Cai. She curiously asked, “Whose car is this you’re driving?”
“A friend’s. On the road, her tire got punctured, and she had an urgent matter, so I lent her your car first and drove hers back.”
Mi Cai looked at the car with confusion, which was understandable. After all, no one in my circle of friends could afford a car like this. I smiled again and explained, “Remember that woman in red we met last time in Xitang?”
Mi Cai nodded.
“I met her again in Xuzhou, and this car is hers.”
Mi Cai didn’t speak and didn’t look at me.
I smiled and asked, “Are you afraid I have feelings for her?”
“You’re confessing without even being asked, aren’t you?”
“Come on, with her fiery temper, if I had feelings for her, I must have a masochistic tendency. Don’t worry, she’s definitely not my type!” I added after thinking for a moment, “Although she is really beautiful!”
Mi Cai replied with a hint of jealousy, “You’ve always been shallow. Just because someone is pretty, you get all confused!”
“Even if what you said were true, there’s no way any woman could be more beautiful than you. Besides, I’m not as shallow as you think!”
Mi Cai hooked her arm with mine, smiled, and said, “So I’m allowed to joke with you, but you can’t joke with me?”
“This joke is quite a big one,” I said, pulling Mi Cai toward the stairwell, and added, “Tomorrow I’ll go exchange cars with her. She said she’d treat me to lunch, and you should come too!”
Mi Cai shook her head and said, “No, I’ve already made plans with your Dad Ban tomorrow to go fishing outside the suburbs. You go by yourself. But remember to accompany me in the afternoon. That’s what we agreed on earlier.”
“Of course I’ll go with you, but are you really okay with me meeting her alone?”
“Even if I’m not okay with it, following you around would just be a self-inflicted annoyance. Why bother? The air outside the suburbs is so nice; I’d rather take advantage of this good weather to go fishing.”
I smiled. In reality, she wasn’t as magnanimous as she described herself to be. It was just that the person I was meeting was that woman in red. If it had been Leyao or Jianwei instead, could she still remain so nonchalant?
As we climbed the stairs, my phone rang again. I let go of Mi Cai’s hand, took out my phone from my pocket, and saw it was from Fangyuan. My heart involuntarily tightened because in recent days, we rarely contacted each other for personal matters. Therefore, this time he was calling me, most likely still about Zhuo Mei’s business. Perhaps he had learned some insider information again, which prompted him to call me at this time.
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