Hearing his gentle voice on the phone, Shu Dong suddenly felt a deep sense of grievance. It felt as though a ball of cotton was uncomfortably wedged in her throat. She remained silent for a moment. "I went home tonight."
Hearing this, Yu Zhiyi frowned. When they had first gotten together, he had satisfied his curiosity by learning a bit about her family situation. "If going back makes you unhappy, try not to go back from now on."
Shu Dong smiled. Sometimes, certain things couldn't simply be avoided just because one disliked them. "Mm, I know."
Yu Zhiyi walked toward the east side of the grandstand. "Don't think about these unhappy things. I'm coming back this Friday, and I'll take you to the movies."
Go to the movies? It had been a long time since Shu Dong had been to one. But thinking about going with him, she suddenly felt that life wasn't all that bad, and she just wished the weekend would hurry up and arrive.
"Okay, I'll wait for you." Under the hazy, dim moonlight, the smile on the girl's face was indistinct.
"If there's anything that upsets you in the future, you must tell me. You're not by my side; if you don't say anything, I won't know either. Keeping things bottled up inside will make you sick." The light refracted a cold glint across his glasses. As Yu Zhiyi said these words, there was neither warmth nor detachment on his face—he merely spoke pleasantries in an even, flat tone.
Yet these paper-thin, bloodless pleasantries took root in Shu Dong's desolate heart. She raised a hand to touch her eyes; they were slightly damp.
"Zhiyi, thank you."
"There's no need to say things like that between us." Hearing the choke in her voice and her uneven breathing, Yu Zhiyi smiled, waiting for the answer he wanted.
"Then come back early this weekend, and I'll go to the station to meet you." In the darkness, Shu Dong sat up and rested her chin on her knees.
Yu Zhiyi, however, frowned. The answer he wanted to hear never came. After a brief pause, he said, "Alright, I'll call you beforehand."
"Mm, then you should get some rest soon. Goodnight," Shu Dong said.
"Dongdong, wait." Under the streetlamp, the young man's expression was far from the tenderness of his words.
"Mm?" Shu Dong asked, puzzled.
"Next week, my classmates and I are moving out to rent a place together... I might need to borrow some money from you first. I'll pay you back as soon as I get my salary." An arrogant top student, perhaps borrowing money from someone for the very first time in his life—and from his own girlfriend at that—felt a certain measure of awkwardness.
Yet hadn't he meticulously plotted for this all this time precisely for this reason?
Therefore, it wasn't quite as difficult to bring up as he had imagined.
For a moment, Shu Dong stood there in a daze, not knowing how to respond to him. Why did these things have to collide all at once? And she had already promised Yu Zhiyi quite some time ago.
When she didn't speak for a few seconds, Yu Zhiyi tentatively asked, "What's wrong? Is it inconvenient?"
"No." Shu Dong hurriedly denied it. Her throat felt a bit dry, and she licked her lips. "I'll give it to you over the weekend."
"Thank you, babe." A smile appeared on Yu Zhiyi's face. "Then go on back to sleep. Call me if anything comes up."
"Okay, goodnight."
"Goodnight."
People who hold themselves in high esteem do not mean they are incapable of doing sordid things. They often look bright, clean, and respectable on the surface, but the more they appear this way, the more they must resort to dirty and despicable means in unseen corners to maintain their false facades and achieve their goals.
Shu Dong had no idea what kind of tender yet heart-piercing trap she had fallen into; she simply tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep.
Meanwhile, just as Yu Zhiyi hung up the phone, he saw someone standing three meters away—his roommate. Yu Zhiyi's heart skipped a beat, wondering if the other had heard anything.
"Who are you on the phone with?" Zhang Chao strode over to Yu Zhiyi casually.
Without changing his expression, Yu Zhiyi replied, "My cousin."
The afternoon sun in August was still scorching. Song Feng was once again woken up by the crackle of a keyboard and mouse. He pulled off his sleep mask, squinted into the room...
Chen Hui was sitting in the front row, and judging by his expression, he was playing QQ Xuanwu.
Further back, at some point, two more students had appeared. They looked quite familiar; Chen Hui had mentioned their grades were pretty good.
Song Feng closed his eyes and dozed a bit longer. Half an hour later, he got up, went to the washroom to splash some water on his face, pulled a bottle of iced mineral water from the fridge, and polished it off in one breath.
A few stray drops spilled from the corner of his lips, looking somewhat alluring in the sunlight. He brushed them away with the back of his hand, then walked toward the back of the room. With a graceful parabola, the empty plastic bottle landed with a *clack* into the trash can.
Song Feng stopped beside the two boys. "Last round."
The chubby boy currently playing the game looked at Song Feng's expressionless face and felt a bit too intimidated to speak freely. He only whispered, "We swiped our cards. We saw you sleeping earlier so we didn't wake you."
Song Feng smiled. "What nonsense about swiping cards? Are you even of age?"
Seeing him smile was a rare sight, and the chubby boy was somewhat mesmerized, though he dared not disobey. "Got it, Brother Feng. Just the last round, then."
Good attitude. Satisfied, Song Feng patted the chubby boy's cheek, then turned back toward the counter. The moment he turned around, however, he spotted Chen Hui sitting nearby, holding his precious handheld game console.
They were all like sons, so he supposed he could indulge them this once.
Song Feng slumped back down into his chair, glanced outside, and continued to slouch, putting on his sleep mask with a great deal of ritualistic flair.
"If it weren't for Yu Zhiyi, you'd probably be in college right now."
Chen Hui suddenly dropped this out of nowhere. In truth, he wasn't actually playing Boss Song's handheld console; he was simply bored and browsing through the save data of those brainless games, but the more he looked, the worse it felt.
And every time Song Feng chased people away, Chen Hui felt equally uneasy.
All this time, Chen Hui had deliberately avoided mentioning that incident, but today, for some reason, he couldn't hold it in any longer.
With the sleep mask on, Song Feng's expression was unreadable, but the lazy smile at the corner of his mouth vanished. His arm lay diagonally across the chair, and the pulse at his wrist beat quietly in the sunlight.
"Who knows? I might have gotten expelled for fighting."
Still carrying that lazy tone, Song Feng pulled off his sleep mask, tossed it onto the desk, and snatched the game console back from Chen Hui. "I'm going downstairs to stretch my legs."
Chen Hui called out, "Go on then. Go race Grandpa Li from the barbershop across the street in the fifty-meter dash."
Song Feng replied, "That's a bit of a challenge."
Chen Hui watched his retreating back, then pulled back his gaze and slumped back into his chair... Who knew?
Still, anything would have been better than this.
Boss Song's name was well-known across several schools, and his reputation relied on more than just his prowess in fighting. What was just as formidable as his fighting skills were his grades.
His grades were stellar—exceptionally good, even better than Yu Zhiyi's.
Yet he had been broken. And Yu Zhiyi was the one who did it.
Though Chen Hui was carefree and spent all day grinning foolishly, he often couldn't help wondering: If it weren't for Yu Zhiyi meddling back then, what would Boss Song be like right now?
Would he be wearing a white lab coat, dissecting mice in a laboratory?
Or would he be wearing a white lab coat, holding a graduated cylinder and an alcohol burner in a lab?
.
"Little Feng, coming for a haircut?" As soon as Song Feng stepped downstairs, Grandpa Li spotted him.
Song Feng rubbed his crew cut and smiled. "Not cutting it today. It hasn't grown out yet."
"Alright, next time I'll give you a different style," Grandpa Li said cheerfully.
Song Feng smiled back. The sun was blazing right outside the internet cafe, and just letting one's feet touch the ground felt searing hot, so Song Feng sat down right in front of Grandpa Li's shop.
Grandpa Li's barbershop was exceptionally small, and he only knew how to cut flat tops and crew cuts. It cost a mere five yuan, and he had never raised his price in all these years.
Song Feng simply relied on his good looks to push his luck to the limit.
Yet someone had been coming here even longer than Song Feng: Shu Dong. That head of black hair of hers was either chopped off halfway down by her own hand or trimmed right here at Grandpa Li's.
Aside from elderly folk coming in for a haircut, you rarely saw any young people here. Without looks like Song Feng's and Shu Dong's, nobody would dare step foot in this place.
Song Feng took out his handheld console. Today he had switched to a different game; he was hooked on Tetris.
.
Over at the tattoo parlor, Shu Dong was sketching drafts in the first-floor lobby. There were two clients scheduled for this afternoon, but Brother Lin handled them both by himself, leaving Shu Dong with nothing much to do.
Yet an entire afternoon had passed, and Shu Dong hadn't managed to draw a single thing. Today was Thursday; Yu Zhiyi would be back on Saturday, and she still hadn't thought of a solution.
She unlocked her phone and checked the balance of her other bank account in the mobile banking app.
Fourteen thousand.
But after just a single glance, Shu Dong exited the app.
This money could not be touched. From childhood on, by saving her allowance, handing over the remainder of Aunt Zhang's salary, and secretly hoarding every penny without ever daring to spend it carelessly, she had managed to accumulate this sum.
This was something more important to her life itself.
Feeling rather unsettled, Shu Dong grabbed a cigarette and went outside. Stepping out, she leaned against the wall, not walking toward the old willow tree. For the past few days, she had been deliberately avoiding him.
After seeing a customer down from upstairs, Lin Feng didn't see Shu Dong inside. Catching a glimpse of her smoking outside through the window, he paused for a second without saying a word. Once he had seen the client off, Lin Feng walked over to Shu Dong, pulled a cigarette from the pack on the windowsill, and lit it.
"What's wrong today? You've been spacing out." Lin Feng, wearing a black tank top and loose shorts, lowered his gaze to look at Shu Dong.
She hadn't even realized when Brother Lin had walked over. After a momentary start, Shu Dong smiled. "It's probably just the heat."
That familiar voice made Song Feng's fingers pause. Yet because of that split second of distraction, the fast-falling blocks quickly piled up and filled the entire screen.
GAME OVER.
Since Shu Dong wasn't saying anything, Lin Feng didn't intend to pry. After all, the girl was growing up, and having a few private worries was completely normal.
Shu Dong was torn with indecision. If there was still someone who could help her, she couldn't think of a second person besides Brother Lin. Yet precisely because Brother Lin was already so good to her, she didn't want to keep troubling him.
The cigarette was quickly smoked down. Lin Feng stubbed out the butt against the trash can and prepared to head back inside.
"Brother Lin."
Just as he turned away, however, Shu Dong called out to him. Lin Feng turned his head and saw Shu Dong wearing a hesitant, words-dying-on-her-lips expression—a rare sight indeed.
Perhaps the air was too dry, as Shu Dong's lips were slightly chapped. "Brother Lin, could I borrow some money from you?"
At the street corner, Song Feng's eyebrows twitched almost imperceptibly. The blocks of various shapes were descending very slowly, and a straight bar would have been the perfect fit to fill the gap, but whether his brain was offline or his hand was too slow, Boss Song let it slide right past, followed immediately by a chaotic pile-up.
Another round, GAME OVER.
"How much do you need?" Lin Feng lowered his head to look at Shu Dong for two seconds, then lit another cigarette.
"Two thousand." Shu Dong leaned against the wall and looked at the old willow tree ahead.
She knew two thousand yuan definitely wouldn't be enough. The rent in the provincial capital was probably several times that of Hecheng, but Shu Dong was too embarrassed to ask Brother Lin for that much. She knew very well how much this shop made in a month, and besides, Brother Lin was married now and had plenty of places where he needed money. She would figure out a way for the rest.
Without another word, Lin Feng took out his phone and transferred two thousand yuan to Shu Dong, without even asking what she needed it for.
"Thank you, Brother Lin. I'll pay you back next month." The words "thank you" felt rather thin. Over the past four years, she owed Brother Lin far too much, but other than saying thank you, Shu Dong didn't know what else she could say.
"Didn't you just get your salary a few days ago? Did something happen?" Asking after giving her the money was purely out of genuine concern.
She wasn't someone who squandered money, nor was she a troublemaker, so Lin Feng was quite surprised by her borrowing money today.
Shu Dong gazed ahead, though what exactly she was looking at, even she didn't know. Brother Lin was probably the person who understood her best, so there was nothing left to hide.
Shu Dong said, "A few days ago, my aunt said Zhengyu's grandfather needed surgery, so she took some money from my card."
The moment Shu Dong finished speaking, Lin Feng's anger flared right up, though he still kept his patience and asked, "She took *some*, or she took it *all*?"
One had to admit, Lin Feng understood Zhang Yueling and Shu Jianzhou all too well.
Shu Dong didn't speak, but seeing Brother Lin so angry made her feel a warmth in her chest. She smiled. "It's fine. They probably really needed the money urgently; an old person's health is what matters."
Shu Dong had already repeated these words to herself several times. Even though it wasn't her own grandfather, when it came to an elderly person's health, she wouldn't be so cold-hearted. Perhaps if Aunt Zhang had just handled it differently and not left her feeling so disheartened, she might have gladly handed the money over.
In the shade of the opposite corner, Boss Song was ending his games at a rate of no more than twenty seconds per round.
Song Feng casually tapped at the handheld console. He half-understood the conversation drifting over from nearby—or perhaps he didn't understand it at all. He wasn't clear on the relationships between the people, but in any case...
She was being bullied.
"How urgent could it possibly be?" Lin Feng choked out a breath of air. "Urgent enough to demand money from a child like you? With all the relatives and friends they have who could lend money, do they honestly think your money grows on trees, or what?"
Lin Feng spoke with a hint of agitation, primarily because that couple's brazen greed was simply too unsightly.
"Brother Lin..." Shu Dong's voice choked up slightly.
Song Feng froze, shut off the game console, and clutched it to his chest. He had never heard her use that tone of voice before. Just hearing her voice, he could easily picture her expression...
She was about to cry, wasn't she?
The corners of Shu Dong's eyes were slightly red—partly because of Brother Lin's kindness toward her, and partly because of the lingering sorrow of failing to fit into that family after all these years.
Lin Feng also realized he had been too hot-headed. Pausing for a moment, he lit another cigarette. "Xiaodong, actually, you can afford to be a bit more ruthless. Whether it's moving out completely or going to another city, you should draw a clear line with them."
Without almost any hesitation, Shu Dong shook her head. Since she had already considered this question, the answer was already set in her heart.
Perhaps they treated her just so-so, but they really had raised her for over a dozen years. Without them, Shu Dong had no idea where she would be right now.
Lin Feng gazed at Shu Dong. Ordinarily, this girl looked quiet and subdued, but deep down she was fiercely stubborn, yet utterly innocent, which made her terribly easy to bully.
Without continuing to persuade her, Lin Feng told her to stay outside and calm down for a bit, while he headed back inside the shop.
Although they were in the shade, the air outside was still stiflingly hot. Shu Dong didn't want to go indoors; the air in there felt too oppressive. She leaned against the wall, letting the cool sensation help quiet her mind.
"Brother Feng!"
The sudden cry startled Shu Dong. She looked up and saw Chen Hui at the window of the internet cafe's back row, calling out to someone. Shu Dong swept her gaze across the third floor, but didn't catch sight of him...
"What is it?"
The sudden voice made Shu Dong look up in bewilderment. The voice hadn't come from the third floor at all, but from the very nearby street corner.
His voice was lazy and low; Chen Hui couldn't possibly have heard it, but Shu Dong could.
Chen Hui looked at the positioning of the two people downstairs, unable to figure out what was going on, and simply shouted across the gap, "Are you two playing hide-and-seek?"
Hide-and-seek?
The corners of Song Feng's mouth twitched into a smile as he picked up the handheld console again to start a new round of Super Mario. Meanwhile, the little mouse around the corner stubbed out her cigarette and went back inside the shop.
Neither of them made a move to turn around and look.
.
On Friday afternoon, Shu Dong came down the stairs, but midway down the steps she suddenly froze...
Yu Zhiyi was sitting on the sofa.
"I was just about to go call you, but Zhiyi said he was afraid of interrupting your work so he told me not to," Lin Feng, who had been sitting across from Yu Zhiyi chatting, stood up the moment he saw Shu Dong.
"It's just that I haven't seen her in a while, so I wanted to chat with Brother Lin a bit longer," Yu Zhiyi smiled, playing the part of the perfect, considerate boyfriend to absolute perfection as he looked at Shu Dong. "Finished?"
The moment she saw him, Shu Dong didn't know what was wrong, but a whirl of conflicting thoughts suddenly surged in her heart—initial surprise, followed by happiness, and then, bizarrely, a wish that he hadn't shown up here quite so early...
Because she hadn't prepared the money yet.
"Mm, when did you get here?" Shu Dong slowly descended the stairs.
"Just a little while ago," Yu Zhiyi said.
Lin Feng picked up his phone, cigarettes, and lighter from the table, looking at the two of you—no, the two of them. "You guys chat, I have some things to take care of and need to step out. Call me if anything comes up."
"It looks like there's another appointment shortly," Shu Dong said, worried Brother Lin might have forgotten.
"I know, you can handle it." Before Lin Feng even finished speaking, he was already out the door, clearly placing absolute trust in Shu Dong.
Left alone in the shop together, Shu Dong poured Yu Zhiyi a glass of water.
"Aren't you working today?" Shu Dong sat in the seat Brother Lin had just vacated. If she remembered correctly, today was Friday.
"Things came up at school this morning, so I took a day off." Yu Zhiyi stood up and sat down right next to Shu Dong, instantly closing the distance between them. He leaned in close to her ear. "What, don't you want to see me?"
The sudden rush of proximity made Shu Dong's heart beat a little faster. She smiled and shifted slightly to the side. "I do... but is it really okay with the company?"
"It's fine, I took leave." Seeing the subtle bashfulness on her face, Yu Zhiyi couldn't help the smile rising at the corner of his mouth.
Just as the two of them were talking, the scheduled client arrived.
"You go ahead and get to work, I'll just sit here for a bit or go for a walk outside," Yu Zhiyi said.
"Okay, call me if you need anything." Shu Dong led the client up to the second floor.
Yu Zhiyi sat on the sofa, watching her retreating figure on the stairs, and couldn't help thinking back to the first time he had seen her.
Back in April when he came home, he suddenly felt a strong urge to get a tattoo—well, not suddenly; the thought had actually been lingering in his mind all along, and that day he had finally decided to put it into action.
He had expected tattoo artists to be covered in flashy, exaggerated body art. But it wasn't until she asked him what design he wanted that he realized the somewhat cold, indifferent, yet impeccably clean girl standing before him was today's tattoo artist.
He had seen plenty of girls at school who were strictly well-behaved and dressed up prettily to show off in front of others, just as he had seen plenty of insecure girls hiding in the background of crowds.
Yet Shu Dong at that moment was detached and quiet—pretty without being showy, silent yet brimming with confidence. If he had to use something to describe her, it would be ice water: a very fitting match.
He vaguely remembered that day, the instant Yu Zhiyi looked up, the stud earring in her left ear, the black slip dress, the faint outline of the tattoo at her waist... The room's lighting had been just right. At that moment, Yu Zhiyi admitted to himself that his heart had skipped a beat.
Yet the more he interacted with her afterward, the more he realized that beneath that facade of indifference where nothing seemed to matter, lay a heart—how should he describe that heart?
It was as if she lived inside a cage, or was separated from the real world by a layer of barrier, somewhat sluggish and hindered when it came to receiving messages from others and expressing her own emotions.
In short, within an extremely brief span of time, Yu Zhiyi had already found her rather dull.
Yet Yu Zhiyi did not know that her indifference was real, and the shyness and timidity she felt when falling for someone were equally real. Though Yu Zhiyi discovered she was trapped inside a cage, he had never once thought to reach out and pull her out.