“Perfect timing — let’s go queue for the gate.”
They’d barely reached the waiting hall when the departure board flipped to Now Boarding for their train. The three of them joined the line, and Xu Ye said, “Our seats are all together. Zhiwei, you’re on the aisle. I’m in the middle.”
Zhiwei looked aggrieved. “Why do I get the aisle?”
Everyone knows the window seat is the prize and the aisle seat is the consolation. Xu Ye gave him a look. “If not you, then who?”
There were three of them and one girl. Of course Qingqing got the window. Of course that meant Xu Ye, as her — whatever he was — took the middle. And of course that left Zhiwei to swallow his complaints and take the aisle.
The line moved forward. They filed through the gate and onto the platform.
Xu Ye knew the route well. He had them on the train and settled in their seats in no time.
Luggage up on the rack, everyone seated, and then Xu Ye immediately took on the tone of a responsible older brother: “Message your parents. Tell them we’re on board.”
Zhiwei, without question, took out his phone and sent a photo.
Xu Ye messaged Old Xu.
Xu Ye: Dad. I’m on the train.
Old Xu was at his desk, enjoying his morning tea at a leisurely pace. He saw the message and typed back:
Old Xu: Good. Got it.
Xu Ye: Dad — I keep hearing you cough at home. Now that I’m not around, take care of yourself. Cut back on the cigarettes.
Old Xu read that and felt something warm move through his chest. His eyes went a little red.
He typed back, touched:
Old Xu: Son’s all grown up. Dad’s proud of you. Don’t worry about me, I’ll be fine.
Xu Ye: By the way, I took the three cartons of Furong Wang from the cabinet. So you can’t get to them.
Old Xu: ? [60s voice message]
Xu Ye stared at the sixty-second voice message his father had sent. He did not open it.
He fired off a couple of messages to Zhang Hong next, and when she didn’t reply immediately, he turned his attention to Qingqing.
“You haven’t messaged anyone.”
“Don’t want to.”
“Then I’ll do it for you.”
He raised his phone, aimed the camera at the two of them. Qingqing saw what he was doing and immediately turned her head toward the window.
“Can you work with me for one second?”
“No.”
“If you don’t, I’m going to stand up right now and announce to this entire train car that Chen Qingqing is my girlfriend.”
“You do that and you’re dead.”
“Okay — three, two, one—”
Whether it was genuine fear that he’d actually do it, Qingqing glanced back at the camera at the last second. Photo taken. Xu Ye sent it to Jiang Meilin.
Xu Ye: Auntie Jiang — we’re on the train.
Jiang Meilin: Okay. 👍
Xu Ye: I’ll check in again once we arrive.
Jiang Meilin: Thank you.
Jiang Meilin smiled, closed the chat, and found a string of messages from Chen Hansong that had come in since early morning. She looked at them for a moment, then — after a brief pause — forwarded him the screenshot of Xu Ye’s message.
The train began to move.
Qingqing closed her eyes.
Zhiwei, making his first long-distance trip, was too keyed up to even think about sleeping. He leaned over and glanced at Xu Ye’s phone. “What are you looking at?”
“Stock market news. You wouldn’t get it.”
“Smug bastard.” He dropped his voice. “Come on, just tell me — how did you two actually meet?”
It was a long ride. Sitting in silence was boring. Xu Ye decided to have some fun.
“It’s a long story. You remember the class reunion? The night we had KTV?”
“Yeah — you left early.”
“Right. After I left, I didn’t go straight home. Wanted to walk off the alcohol first. It was a dark night, late, and I was making my way along the footpath — when suddenly I heard it. A beautiful sound. Guitar, coming out of nowhere. Like that line from Pipa Xing — Sorrow finds no comfort in drink, and parting comes with mist upon the river. Then — drifting across the water — the sound of a pipa—” [TL: Xu Ye is riffing on 《琵琶行》, a famous Tang dynasty poem by Bai Juyi about encountering a musician by a moonlit river. A classic romantic setup, which is exactly why he’s using it.]
“Can you please get to the point.”
“So I followed the music down to the lake. She was there by herself, playing guitar. I sat nearby and listened. I was still pretty drunk, head spinning — I wasn’t really looking at her face at first. But after a while the breeze started to clear my head, and I thought — oh. She’s actually really something. Now, I’m a man of dignity. I wasn’t going to make the first move. But then I stumbled over to the nearest bin and threw up, and she came over and handed me a tissue. After that — I guess she thought I had a certain something — and she asked for my WeChat.”
Qingqing was sitting right next to him. Hearing all of this, she had a very strong urge to step on his foot.
This absolute menace. Making up complete nonsense.
Under the brim of her cap, her face had gone red.
Fortunately, Zhiwei looked completely unconvinced. “Sure, man. Keep dreaming. She asked for your WeChat. In what world.”
“Believe it or don’t.”
“If I believed that, I’d be an idiot.”
Xu Ye shifted gears smoothly. “She’s got some pretty good-looking friends, by the way. Want me to ask her to pass along a contact?”
Zhiwei’s eyes went wide. “No way. Are you serious?”
“Depends on how you behave.”
Zhiwei perked up immediately and got to his feet. “I’m gonna use the bathroom. I’ll check if there’s anywhere selling drinks up front too.”
Xu Ye watched him head off down the aisle, and was just about to smile to himself, when a sharp, concentrated pain shot through his side.
Qingqing had reached over, grabbed a pinch of the skin at his waist, and twisted it with feeling.
“OW—”
He choked back the noise, turned to face the culprit. “What was that for?!”
Qingqing raised her head and fixed him with a look that was trying very hard to be threatening. “Say another word of that nonsense and you’re finished.”
Xu Ye rubbed the injured area. “Could you not have just pretended you were asleep?”
“No.”
“Also,” she added, “where exactly are these friends of mine you were talking about?”
“I was winding him up.”
Qingqing spotted Zhiwei making his way back down the aisle and quickly pulled her cap down, going back to looking convincingly asleep.
Zhiwei returned with three bottles of NutriExpress. [TL: 营养快线 (Nǎngyǎng Kuàixiàn) — a popular Chinese milk-and-fruit juice drink, a staple of long-distance train travel.] He handed two to Xu Ye and settled back in his seat, grinning. “So when are you introducing me to her friends? Got to start planning.”
“You can’t rush these things. We haven’t even started school yet. We’ll engineer a natural run-in. Relax.”
“Fair enough.” A pause. “Hey, Xu Ye — I keep forgetting to ask. Train codes starting with K mean express, right? And G means high-speed. What does T stand for?”
“Tèkuài. Fast express.”
“And Z?”
“Zéi kuài. Thief-fast.”
“You absolute — stop lying to me.”
(End of Chapter)