It was not until the day of the winter holiday that Fu Sili left the Imperial Academy early in the morning, carrying his bundle.
Fu Jing went out for a trip. When he returned, he saw the wooden door of the west side room left slightly ajar. He reached out to touch it, and the door creaked open, revealing a gap.
The bed was neatly made, and there were a few less books on the table; the room was empty and hollow.
“Mingzhang!”
Fu Jing gently closed the door and turned back. A tall and thin young man walked over from outside. With thin lips, long and narrow eyes, and sharp features, he looked like someone not to be trifled with at first glance.
Xu Jianshan strode over and placed a stack of books on the table. “I have brought the things you wanted.”
“Thank you for your hard work. Have you finished dealing with your father’s affairs?”
Xu Jianshan replied with a grin, “I am still busy with it these days. I have just selected the timber for the construction of the palace, and I will begin overseeing the project after the New Year. My father even sent a letter today, saying that the Imperial Academy is having a winter break and asking me to invite you to sit at our home. I told him you are a busy person and might not come, so I had someone send some things to your place. You should receive them after you return today.”
Fu Jing raised his eyes slightly.
Xu Jianshan added, “It is just some local specialties as New Year’s goods. It is the thought that counts; they are not anything too valuable.”
Xu Jianshan had met Fu Jing back in Nanjing. His father, Xu Ming, had been transferred from Nanjing to Shengjing in the past two years, so the whole family moved to Shengjing.
“Hey? What happened to your wrist?”
Seeing the gauze exposed on Fu Jing’s wrist when his wide sleeves slid down while pouring tea, Xu Jianshan said in surprise, “Did an assassin break into the Imperial Academy? What kind of expert could actually pull that off?”
Fu Jing lowered his eyes, pushed the tea over, and smiled. “Drink your tea. In the future, remember to knock before you come into my courtyard.”
Xu Jianshan replied, “Is there treasure hidden in your courtyard?”
He even had to knock. Everyone lived in the same shabby courtyards; what was there to be so precious about?
Xu Jianshan sipped his tea, swallowed his grumbling, and tilted his head as he remembered something. “Oh, I remember now.”
“Some time ago, I heard people say that someone had entered your courtyard, and you were the one who took the initiative to tell the director.” Xu Jianshan stroked his chin. “Is that the person you were looking for a few months ago? Your relationship is so good now that you have even brought the person by your side?”
Xu Jianshan loved to chat about these things, but Fu Jing had never liked talking about his own affairs. Xu Jianshan did not expect a reply and just rambled on about the gossip he had heard recently.
“I heard that the child has some trouble keeping up with the lessons and has often been kept back by the teaching assistant. He gets scolded along with the one from the Du family. Did you not offer any guidance?”
“Are your relationships not good?” Xu Jianshan shook his head. “Impossible. If your relationship was not good, he should be living in the outer ear-room now.”
Fu Jing tapped the table to interrupt him. “How do you know he is not living in the outer ear-room?”
Xu Jianshan smiled like an old fox. “When I came in, I saw you standing in front of the door of the west room for a while. I thought you were looking for the person inside, but since there is no movement now, it must mean that this person has already left.”
Fu Jing was silent for a moment and then smiled. “Remember to knock next time you come here.”
“Are you two angry at each other?” Xu Jianshan, seeing that the relationship was deadlocked, guessed boldly. Inspecting the slightly serious expression on Fu Jing’s face, he was shocked. “You can actually get angry at a child?”
Fu Jing was silent.
Xu Jianshan suppressed his laughter and feigned seriousness. “Children are all like this. I have a cousin who is the same, doing things on a whim. It is better to just go along with them.”
Fu Jing signaled for him to leave. “I do not coddle children. Go after you finish your tea. Look at the sky; it is going to snow.”
Fu Sili had just run out of the Imperial Academy when he was caught by Gao Yi, who had been waiting for a long time.
Upon meeting, the two rubbed their hands together and went off to drink and find a restaurant to reminisce.
Fu Sili originally thought there was nothing to talk about, but Gao Yi insisted that he had been waiting in front of the door since before dawn. Remembering that he had been disciplined for so long at the Imperial Academy, he followed him to relax.
They went to a small restaurant by the roadside. After a few cups of warm wine, Fu Sili’s body warmed up, and he watched the people coming and going outside with a flushed face.
“Is that person looking for you?”
Fu Sili saw a person standing by a pillar under the eaves, glancing toward their table from time to time.
Gao Yi glanced over and gave an impatient click of his tongue. “My father sent someone to watch me. Now I have to have someone following me whenever I go out.”
Fu Sili did not ask more. “Oh, since your father’s people are watching, do not drink so much.”
Gao Yi drank several cups in a row and sneered. “I will drink. I will drink. Why are you bossing me around? Look at how thin you are. Do you not eat at the Imperial Academy?”
“You are sick.”
Fu Sili calmly picked up food with his chopsticks, already accustomed to his occasional outbursts.
“Why are you not talking?” Gao Yi complained dissatisfyingly. “Have you stayed at the Imperial Academy for a few days and become as dull as that bunch of scholars?”
Gao Yi looked disgusted. “Get away from me. The smell of the sour Confucian is choking me.”
Fu Sili put down his wine glass. “Your grandfather, are you sick? You are the one who should get lost!”
Gao Yi smiled, picked up the wine glass he had put down, and handed it over. “That is more like it. Come, let us drink.”
Fu Sili remained silent.
Gao Yi said nonchalantly, “I saw that you were still restrained after coming out of the Imperial Academy, so I wanted to help you collect your thoughts. My father also sent me to that place; it is simply not a place for humans to stay.”
It was rare for Fu Sili to agree with him, but he snorted, “Get away from me. I will not drink the wine you handed me; I cannot afford it.”
He raised his chin slightly, dodged the wine glass Gao Yi handed over, and picked up his chopsticks to eat the peanuts on the plate. He picked up two at a time, making a crunching sound in his mouth.
Gao Yi watched him for a while, confirming that Fu Sili would not take the glass, and muttered, “Then if you do not drink it, I will.”
With that, he finished the wine in his hand in one gulp.
“Hey? That is my wine glass!” Fu Sili looked over from the corner of his eye, his eyes slightly widened.
“Is it?” Gao Yi looked at it. “So what?”
Fu Sili was silent for a moment and continued to eat peanuts. “How can you use someone else’s things? Do not do this next time.”
Powerful families all had a strong sense of boundaries, and people at Gao Yi’s level were even more so. This kind of lack of avoidance was something Fu Jing had only seen in his previous living environment.
He was not avoiding it, but in the environment of Shengjing, he certainly had to follow their rules.
Fu Sili kindly advised, “You should not use things other people have used casually. People will laugh at you.”
Gao Yi did not know his thoughts, but was puzzled. “Why? Are you going to laugh at me?”
“Second Young Master.” A voice suddenly interrupted from the side. The two looked in the direction of the sound. It was the person standing under the eaves who had already walked in. Without looking sideways, he saluted Gao Yi: “The time has come. It is time to go back.”
Gao Yi grabbed his head irritably. “Why are you rushing me? Did I let you speak?”
Fu Sili ate peanuts silently. Seeing Gao Yi squirming on the chair like he was sitting on pins and needles for a while, he finally got up.
“It is New Year’s Eve today, and my father is urging me hard. I will come to find you tomorrow night.” Gao Yi called the waiter over and ordered several more dishes, muttering, “Eat slowly. Put the bill on my account.”
Fu Sili was stunned, remembering that today was New Year’s Eve.
How did he spend last year’s New Year’s Eve?
The waiter happily served the dishes. Fu Sili looked at the food on the table that had not been touched much, and then several more plates were set down. He sat alone at the table, took a clean wine glass, filled it, lifted it slightly toward the empty seat in front of him, smiled, and drank it in one gulp.
Until the afternoon, the sky darkened suddenly. Fu Sili was woken up from the table by the waiter. He raised his head blankly and stood up with a yawn.
“Customer, it looks like it is going to snow. You should go back early. Should I have someone pack up these dishes on the table for you?”
Fu Sili waved his hand, rubbed his eyes, and walked out slowly.
But it was unlucky. No sooner had he said it was going to snow than it actually did.
Fu Sili walked for a while. Seeing that it was snowing, he stood under the eaves for a while, looking up at the snowflakes falling one after another.
“Running around again! Is your skin itching or what!” A woman pulled back a child who was about to run off and gave the child’s butt a slap.
The child jumped and was still restless. “Mom! It is snowing! Let us go play in the snow!”
“Play what play, you will get sick if your clothes get wet. Stand still!”
The woman wrapped the child tightly, held the child in her arms with one hand, and held an umbrella in the other. The two hurried past Fu Sili, kicking up snowflakes that fluttered and fell on Fu Sili’s shoulders.
The child was lying on his mother’s shoulder with only his eyes exposed. Fu Sili hung his face and made a face at the child with his hands hooked under his lower eyelids.
The child stared wide-eyed and jumped like a fish, only to be pressed back by his mother’s hand the next moment.
Fu Sili watched the two walk away. He looked up at the sky, looked at the snow, tucked his hands into his sleeves, and walked into the Fu family house with his head buried.
This was the third snow since he arrived in Shengjing. It was bigger than the first two and colder. Large flakes of snow fell from the sky, white and somewhat dazzling.
The snow crunched under his feet. Fu Sili pulled the bundle that was sliding off his back. He could not recognize which road he should take. He looked left and right, and inadvertently turned his head back, seeing a familiar figure in the center of the long street.
The man was tall and slender. The jade-colored academic robe of the Imperial Academy looked like it was tailored specifically for him. He held a sky-blue oil-paper umbrella and walked slowly toward him.
“What a coincidence.”
Fu Sili’s heart jumped. He looked around and crouched into the wonton shop next door, put the bundle on his shoulder on the table, and brushed off the snow on his body.
“Customer, would you like a bowl of wontons?”
“No, no.”
Fu Sili waved his hand gently, whispered, and stared at Fu Jing walking step by step to the position where he had just stood, and then stopped.
So which road should he take?
Fu Sili frowned. He did not know why he stopped walking. Then he saw Fu Jing reaching out to stop someone, and a carriage stopped beside him.
Fu Jing seemed to have chatted with the carriage driver for a few words. Fu Sili could not hear a sound, and the person was still standing with his back to him. Fu Sili could only see Fu Jing make a move to give something.
The driver smiled. Suddenly, the two turned their heads together and met Fu Sili’s gaze.
Fu Sili remained silent.
Fu Sili turned his head and waved frantically at the waiter, wanting to speak but not daring to speak loudly: “Bring a bowl of wontons! Wontons!”
The waiter stared blankly at Fu Sili, who was waving his hands vigorously and saying something. Behind him, a tall man with a refined temperament shook off the accumulated snow on the surface of the umbrella on the steps and walked slowly to the side of the teenager.
The two stood and sat. The elder one took the bundle on the table away. The teenager was stunned for a few seconds, then followed quickly.