This was the kind of thing Xu Ye had only ever seen on television before.
He hadn’t imagined anyone in real life would actually do it.
He was stunned for a long moment before he managed, “Isn’t that making a game of it?”
Zhao Ming laughed. “You don’t know how it works. Every résumé that reaches me is from somebody outstanding. At a minimum they’re top graduates out of the 985s and 211s. But at a big company like ours the positions are very limited, and even if you interviewed every one of them, in the end you’d still be cutting more than ninety-five percent. So don’t hold it against me. I’m only saving time.”
What Zhao Ming said wasn’t untrue.
Interviews at a big company ran through several rounds, and anyone who got as far as an interview at a firm like Lisheng Capital would be strong on both credentials and caliber. Even so, Xu Ye found Zhao Ming’s method fairly absurd.
Xu Ye glanced into the wastebasket, then went over and fished the résumés back out. He leafed through a few of them at random and sat back down on the sofa with a laugh. “You go ahead with your work. I’ll just have a look through these. I’m mooching lunch off you at midday.”
“No problem at all.”
Zhao Ming clipped on his staff badge, laughing as he did it. “A few years abroad, and when I came home nothing felt right anywhere — except the food. That I adjusted to instantly. Let me tell you, the stuff they serve at the high-end restaurants over there only looks good. It actually tastes worse than Shaxian Snacks. When I had no appetite abroad, I ate rice with Lao Gan Ma.” [TL: 沙县小吃, “Shaxian Snacks,” is a ubiquitous chain of cheap Chinese fast-food shops; 老干妈 is a jarred chili sauce, the standard way of getting a bowl of plain rice down.]
“I know a few street stalls that make good stir-fries. Someday when there’s time, my treat.”
“Ha, you’re a good man.”
Going through the résumés in his hand, Xu Ye asked, “Didn’t you have a girlfriend abroad?”
Zhao Ming shrugged. “Went out with one my first year there. Broke up not long after.”
“Why?”
“Couldn’t handle her. The students studying abroad are all far too wild. She seemed pretty innocent at the start, and it was only later I found out I was her seventh boyfriend, so I broke it off straight away.”
That got Xu Ye’s interest, and he asked with some amusement, “Seriously? There’s a woman even young master Zhao can’t handle?”
“I look like a player, but I’m actually pretty careful about that side of things.”
“My ass.”
Zhao Ming rolled his eyes. “Then don’t believe me. I don’t give a shit.”
Xu Ye pressed straight on. “So what about after that? Don’t tell me you haven’t been with anyone since.”
“I really haven’t.”
Zhao Ming explained. “Plenty of girls have chased me, but their motives weren’t clean, so I didn’t dare get involved. Once you get involved with that kind of girl you can’t shake her off.”
That much Xu Ye did believe.
But he made a joke of it anyway. “Looking at how flashy you’re dressed today, you’re not into men, are you?”
“Mm, that’s right. I’m into you.”
“Christ! Now I feel sick.”
“Hahahaha~”
A burst of laughter came out of the office, and the people passing outside all frowned, thinking: what’s got into young Mr. Zhao today? He’s usually so listless. Why is he this cheerful?
Xu Ye laid each résumé down on the sofa as he finished it, and it was only when he came to the work history of a man named Lü Cheng that he folded it over and tucked it into his pocket.
A big company had no shortage of people like this.
But Xu Ye was very short of them.
Zhao Ming hadn’t noticed what Xu Ye was doing at all, and even if he had he wouldn’t have said anything. As far as he was concerned, every résumé he’d dropped in the wastebasket had already been written off.
“So when was it you were going out with someone?”
“Before I started university.”
Xu Ye said with a quick laugh, “If you want a girlfriend, I could introduce you to a few.”
Zhao Ming shook his head at once. “Forget it. You’re freer on your own. Once you’re dating and married you’re tied down, and I’d rather enjoy myself for a few more years while I still can.”
“That’s a very high level of insight you’ve got there.”
“Naturally.”
The two of them spent the whole morning in the office, and at midday Zhao Ming took Xu Ye to the company canteen for lunch. The food in a big company’s canteen really was excellent — Xu Ye ate two bowls of rice and had a bowl of winter melon and pork rib soup as well.
After they came out of the canteen, Zhao Ming saw Xu Ye down to the foot of the building, and once he’d watched Xu Ye drive away he went back up to the office, still smiling.
…
Back at the dorm.
Xu Ye took the folded résumé out of his pocket.
The young man named Lü Cheng had a remarkably good résumé.
Twenty-nine this year, a graduate of Renmin University, and currently still employed — and the company he was at now was a fairly large investment firm as well.
Everything on it, both his time at university and his career since graduating, was flawless. He was, it had to be said, an extremely rare find.
Xu Ye read the résumé through several times, and once it was past six in the evening — the end of the working day — he called the man himself.
The call was picked up quickly.
“Hello?”
“Hello. Is this Lü Cheng?”
“Speaking. Who’s this?”
“My name’s Xu Ye. You certainly don’t know me, but I’m afraid I have to inform you that Lisheng Capital’s HR department has cut you.”
There was a brief silence at the other end. Then: “Right. Understood. Thank you.”
“Hold on a moment. I’m not with Lisheng Capital. I’m calling because I read your résumé and thought your record was outstanding, and I’m thinking about starting a business right now. I’m calling to ask whether you’d be willing to come in with me on it.”
Hearing nothing at all from the other end for a long moment, Xu Ye quickly added, “Don’t get the wrong idea, I’m not running a scam. If you’ve got time, we could meet.”
Lü Cheng went blank for a second, and then — whether his head had simply gone hot or for some other reason — he actually answered, “All right.”
Xu Ye pressed straight on. “When are you free?”
Lü Cheng stared blankly at the traffic on the road and murmured, “Now.”
Xu Ye raised his hand and checked the time, then got straight to his feet. “I’ll add you on WeChat. Send me the address and I’ll come to you now.”
Lü Cheng: “All right.”
The company Lü Cheng was working for now wasn’t on the scale of Lisheng Capital, but it was substantial enough. The main reason he had been thinking about moving was that his superiors at the company had been deliberately holding him down.
A year earlier, an investment project he had worked on had been an enormous success. As the main person involved in the project he should have been commended by the company, and might even have been promoted on the strength of it. What he hadn’t expected was that his immediate superior would ruthlessly take the credit for the project. He had gone over the man’s head to argue it out with someone more senior, bristling with indignation — only to have strips torn off him.
Once word of it got around the company, his colleagues, far from sympathizing, deliberately kept their distance from him.
His superiors held him down at every turn.
Working in an environment like that was genuine torment.
That was why Lü Cheng had sent his résumé to Lisheng Capital. Hearing just now that he had been cut, he had in fact felt awful, because it seemed to him that he had been rejected all over again.
Fortunately, the things Xu Ye said afterward gave Lü Cheng a small measure of comfort — which was why he had agreed to meet him.
Forty minutes later.
Yangpu District, outside a café near the Yangpu Bridge.
Xu Ye finally met Lü Cheng.
When Lü Cheng saw Xu Ye he was thoroughly taken aback. He hadn’t expected Xu Ye to be this young, and he even slightly regretted having agreed to the meeting.
But what he didn’t know was that his life was going to change that day.
Zhao Ming throwing his résumé into the wastebasket — that was his luck.
And Xu Ye picking his résumé out from among all the others thrown into that wastebasket with it — that was his fate.
First fate, second luck, third feng shui.
Fate and luck. Fate and luck.
Fate always comes before luck. [TL: the Chinese word for destiny, 命运, is written with the character for fate (命) in front of the character for luck (运). 一命二运三风水 — “first fate, second luck, third feng shui” — is a traditional saying ranking what decides a life. The chapter’s last line turns on the order of the characters inside the word itself, and supplies the chapter title.]
(End of Chapter 243)