Xu Ye deliberately waited twenty minutes before heading back over.

Seeing Qin Zhiwei eagerly assembling the last tower, Xu Ye walked up and said, “Five towers plus five monitors — one taxi isn’t going to hold all that, is it?”

Jiang Wei realized the problem too. She looked up. “So what do we do?”

Xu Ye sighed and muttered to himself, “Shame Huolala only entered the mainland market this year — it hasn’t caught on yet.” [TL: 货拉拉 (Huolala/Lalamove), an on-demand freight and van-delivery app founded in 2013 that would later become ubiquitous in China for exactly this kind of “I need a van right now” situation — Xu Ye’s aside is his future knowledge quietly surfacing.]

Jiang Wei frowned. “What did you say?”

Xu Ye shook his head. “Nothing. I’ll go ask the stall owner — they probably deal with this kind of thing a lot.”

He went and inquired. The stall owners sometimes took delivery orders themselves, so the bosses here all knew a few van drivers. Xu Ye asked the price, found it reasonable, and had the owner connect him with a driver.

Half an hour later, Qin Zhiwei had all five towers assembled, and the driver the boss had arranged arrived. Xu Ye and Qin Zhiwei each made three trips to carry the computers down to the van. By the time the three of them got back to campus, it was already past twelve.

Zhang Xinzhou and Yang Fei were both at the gym, and helped haul the computers up to the office. While Qin Zhiwei installed the operating systems, Xu Ye grabbed Zhang Xinzhou and the two of them went to the cafeteria to pack up five meals.

“Everyone make do for lunch for now — there’s still some stuff being delivered this afternoon. We’ll all go out for a proper dinner tonight.”

Many hands made light work. Once the five of them had eaten, they gave the office another thorough cleaning inside and out. By mid-afternoon, the printer, filing cabinet, chairs, and everything else had been driven over by the vendors, and once it was all arranged, an office that had been completely bare suddenly looked like the real thing.

Jiang Wei surveyed the room, a deeply satisfied smile on her face. As one of the company’s shareholders and the person who’d applied for the office, she was brimming with a sense of accomplishment.

Zhang Xinzhou smiled. “Feels like we just went from a little backyard workshop to an actual company.”

Yang Fei asked, still a bit uncertain, “So this office is ours from now on?”

“That‘s right!”

Jiang Wei crossed her arms and nodded with a smile. “Xu Ye, tomorrow you go get a sign made to hang on the door. From now on, everything about our company needs to be done properly.”

“Aren’t we already pretty proper?”

Jiang Wei said immediately, “I don’t care about the rest, but from now on all expenses and income on the finance side have to go through me and be recorded — otherwise tax filing later is going to be a nightmare.”

“Fine, you’re the professional, we’ll follow your lead on all that.”

Yang Fei scratched his head. “So can we head back to the dorm now? I haven’t had a chance to chat with my girlfriend all day.”

Zhang Xinzhou frowned. “Where’d you get a girlfriend?”

Xu Ye said cheerfully, “The internet girl he added on Saturday.”

“You absolute mutt~”

Yang Fei was about to fire back when Xu Ye stopped him. “Alright, since we’re all here, let’s hold a meeting and talk about where the company goes from here.”

Jiang Wei thought a meeting was very much warranted, and quickly followed Xu Ye into the conference room.

Xu Ye pulled out the chair at the head of the table and sat down. Jiang Wei and Zhang Xinzhou took the seats to his left and right, and Yang Fei and Qin Zhiwei sat down beside them.

“Here’s my current thinking.” Xu Ye got right to it. “From now on, the company is divided into four departments. A business department, responsible for expanding to more channels. A procurement department, mainly handling orders for machines, drinks, and snacks. A customer service department, to liaise with the campus agents at each school and use the machine backend to remind agents to restock. And finally a finance department, handling the company’s overall financials.”

“Finance is obviously Jiang Wei’s to lead. Business goes to Zhang Xinzhou. Procurement, Yang Fei, that’s yours. As for customer service, I plan to hire someone separately.”

Zhang Xinzhou asked, “And you?”

“As the boss, I obviously plug whichever department is short-handed.”

Xu Ye continued, “The vending machine business is going to get a lot of eyes on it soon. I’d estimate we’ve got no more than six months of runway before that happens. Which means if we haven’t scaled up to a big enough size in these six months, then any future growth means competing with countless others. The more competition in a market, the thinner the profit. So whatever you do, do not get complacent.”

“Going forward, we can’t just fixate on the campus market. Hotels, motels, internet cafés, training centers, office buildings, plazas, commercial streets, supermarkets — in short, anywhere with heavy foot traffic, we go after a partnership.”

Zhang Xinzhou said, “Then we’re definitely going to be short-handed.”

“So we hire. We recruit a batch of salespeople on a high-commission model — as long as they close a deal, we pay a thousand yuan reward for every machine installed.”

Jiang Wei suddenly cut in. “Then don’t we also need a receptionist? For all the miscellaneous odds and ends.”

“Mm.”

“I‘ll handle the hiring.”

“Sure~” Jiang Wei had volunteered, and naturally Xu Ye had no objections.

The five of them talked in the office for the better part of half an hour. Qin Zhiwei, sitting beside Jiang Wei, had been sneaking glances at her at first — but as Xu Ye kept talking, he started to feel like this childhood friend he’d grown up with had suddenly become a bit of a stranger.

How has this guy changed this much in under half a year?

They say a girl transforms dramatically as she grows up. [TL: 女大十八变, “a girl changes eighteen times as she grows” — an idiom about how much young women’s looks and temperament shift with age.] You’re a guy — how did you end up changing this ridiculously too?

…

Five-thirty in the evening. The sky had already gone dark. At least it wasn’t raining now.

The five of them walked to the school gate, met up with Xu Wanying and Li Tongwen, and Xu Ye led everyone to a restaurant.

Seeing how many of them there were, the owner set them up with a private room.

Today was this group’s first dinner together, and the company office had come together the same day — a day worth celebrating. So Xu Ye splurged, ordering a good spread of dishes. Yang Fei, seeing that Jiang Wei and Xu Wanying were there and eager to show off, even asked the server for a case of beer.

Once the food and drink arrived, the group ate and chatted amid all the laughter and talk. Yang Fei, anxious to prove his tolerance, chugged a whole bottle of beer before he’d eaten more than a few bites — and his face flushed red instantly.

“Xu Ye, you drinking soda? I’ve lost respect for you.”

“You’ve lost respect for me? Go look in the bathroom mirror — your face is as red as a monkey’s ass.”

“I always flush when I drink, but my tolerance is definitely better than yours.”

“Yeah, sure.”

“Li Tongwen and Zhang Xinzhou aren’t drinking, and Zhiwei’s got to head back to school so he’s not either — so I have to drink all this myself?”

“You’re the one who ordered it. Nobody else did.”

Yang Fei, who hadn’t even finished two bottles, was probably already a bit drunk — his voice louder than usual, his gestures broader. But nobody paid him much mind; it was the weekend tomorrow, and a drunk could sleep it off fine.

The solid fuel under the alcohol burner was still burning, the broth in the pot bubbling up a thin veil of steam. Listening to their chatter, looking at these young faces through the mist rising off the table, Xu Ye suddenly felt himself drift…

He thought of many things from before — or perhaps things yet to come — and his gaze grew distant and unmoored…

“You dog, Yang Fei, you took all the fish head. What are the rest of us supposed to eat?”

“I love fish head. You can eat the fish meat.”

“Are you kidding me, this dish is chopped-chili fish head — you took the fish head, so we eat the chopped chili?”

“…”

“My mom’s calling me.”

“Hey Mom, I’m eating right now. Yeah, with my roommates.”

“…”

“The radish stewed beef is good — Senior Xu, try some.”

“I’ll get it myself.”

“This is kind of spicy, is there any more soda?”

“All gone, I’ll go grab a bottle outside — what do you want?”

“Coconut milk, I guess.”

“…”

“Xu Ye… Xu Ye… what are you spacing out for?”

“It’s nothing, what?”

“Twist this cap open for me.”

Xu Ye twisted open the cap of the coconut milk, handed it to Jiang Wei, and, seeing that Yang Fei had already slumped over the table asleep, took one of the remaining bottles of beer, poured it into a cup, and started drinking.

As cup after cup went down, Xu Ye felt the alcohol taking effect in his stomach. His head was foggy. His mind was still clear, but his body had gone soft and loose.

Seeing that everyone had more or less eaten their fill, Zhang Xinzhou got up to settle the bill. When he came back, Yang Fei was still passed out on the table, and Xu Ye was bracing himself against the table, swaying to his feet.

Zhang Xinzhou hurried over to steady him, then said to Li Tongwen, “Li Tongwen, you support Yang Fei — I’ll get Xu Ye.”

“Oh.”

Qin Zhiwei asked, “Can you two manage? Want me to help?”

“Your school’s far, head back first.”

“Alright, I’ll get going then. Bye-bye.”

“Bye~”

Zhang Xinzhou and Li Tongwen each shouldered one of them and set off toward the dorms. Jiang Wei and Xu Wanying could have gone straight back to their own dorm, but seeing that Xu Ye and Yang Fei were both drunk, they followed along behind.

Xu Ye hadn’t passed straight out like Yang Fei. Halfway there, after the wind blew on him for a while, he draped one arm over Zhang Xinzhou’s shoulder and pulled his phone out of his pocket with the other.

He hadn’t messaged Chen Qingqing all day, and figuring she was surely waiting for him, he opened WeChat and started a voice call. But everything looked doubled to him right now — Chen Qingqing was pinned to the top of his contacts, yet he accidentally tapped the second one down.

The call connected anyway.

Xu Ye put the phone to his ear and said, “Hey, Qingqing, I thought about you all day today… I’ve realized I love you more and more.”

On the other end. Jiang Meilin sat stunned for a long moment, then frowned. “Xiao Xu? Did you dial the wrong number?”

Hearing that the voice wasn’t Chen Qingqing’s, Xu Ye rubbed his eyes. Seeing it was Jiang Meilin, he still didn’t hang up immediately — just said, reeking of alcohol, “It’s fine, Auntie, I love you too.”

Zhang Xinzhou heard that, and goosebumps rose all over his body.

He hurriedly snatched the phone from Xu Ye and jumped in to explain. “Auntie, I’m Xu Ye’s roommate. Xu Ye had a bit to drink, he’s kind of drunk right now — he’s talking nonsense.”

“Mm. Have him get some rest soon.”

“Okay~”

Beep beep beep…

The call ended. Jiang Meilin looked down at her phone, sat there dazed for a good long while, then suddenly shook her head and laughed.

This guy, talking without any sense of propriety.

Looks like I’ll have to have Qingqing tell him to drink less from now on.

(End of Chapter 139)