The weather in Jincheng has always been as capricious as it pleases. At six in the morning, when Zhong Yu woke up, a hazy layer of thick fog had condensed on the windowpane, and the rain was pouring down like a waterfall.
She dragged her exhausted body up from the small cot, deftly folded the quilt, put on her work uniform, and rushed frantically into the bathroom to brush her teeth and wash her face.
The mirror reflected a pale, petite face, with large, round, clearly defined black-and-white eyes, and dark, panda-like bruises underneath them. She looked every bit like an unlucky soul who had been squeezed dry and impoverished by life.
The Zhong Yu who had cried inside a BMW five years ago could never have imagined that there would come a day like this, where she would be crammed into a rundown rental apartment, counting on her fingers to figure out whether the money left in her bank account was still enough to pay for her medical and social insurance, and how much living expense was left for the next month.
The trivialities of daily subsistence had long left her with no time to dream. Life was so dramatic; the obstacles that failed to knock her down kept right on beating her, and they never stopped.
Zhong Yu gave a self-deprecating chuckle and twisted her sore neck. She boiled a pot of water, poured in oil and salt, and then dropped in a pack of corn dumplings, rewarding herself for yesterday’s hard work.
Sigh, what kind of instant convenience meal am I going to have to eat for lunch today?
Biting into a piping-hot dumpling, Zhong Yu ate her fill and barely managed to recover her energy. She picked up her backpack and walked through the battered hallway. In front of the hallway was yet another gloomy alley, its flagstone pavement reflecting a wet sheen, piled chaotically with cardboard boxes and various kinds of discarded waste.
Zhong Yu nimbly avoided the obstacles. Reciting poems about rainy alleys in her head, she crossed the mouth of the alley. Just as she stepped onto the main road, she almost took a fall. A massive gale almost flipped her umbrella completely inside out. Shivering in the wind and rain, she gripped the umbrella handle tightly, feeling like a mushroom in a hot pot, spinning round and round in the stirring broth.
The sky was gloomy and dark, severe weather caused traffic jams on the roads, and even the bus was delayed for a long time. By the time Zhong Yu finally made it to the convenience store, she was already late.
The boss sitting at the front desk glanced at her, spat a sunflower seed shell onto the damp floor with a pachak sound, and spoke at a leisurely pace: “Late by three minutes, deduct half a day’s pay.”
Zhong Yu didn’t say a word. Yesterday afternoon, because of Ning Youxia, her pay had already been docked, the excuse being that she had harmed a customer’s interests. Today she was having it docked again, which added up to an entire day of working for free.
She kept quiet, letting a naive, stubborn streak well up from her eyes, dissipating into the sultry, muggy rain mist.
The boss’s expression darkened as she slapped the desktop: “Are you refusing to accept this?”
“No,” Zhong Yu answered in a ringing, resolute voice, her neck held stiffly upright. The atmosphere remained at a standstill.
They stared at each other in silence. Seeing the boss’s expression grow worse and worse, to the point where she stopped chewing her sunflower seeds, as if dark clouds had drifted from outside the window straight onto her face, Zhong Yu took a deep breath. Forget it, she tried to persuade herself, don’t get angry; it’s not worth it.
Jobs were hard to come by nowadays, let alone for someone like her with a dark history. It was already good enough to have any job at all; why bother caring about so much?
Zhong Yu’s straight-as-a-board spine curved downward, and she slowly lowered her head, opening her mouth as if the words she wanted to say were blocked and unable to be forced out.
At that moment, the sound of an engine approached from afar.
“Everyone here?” a man’s voice came from the entrance, sounding indistinct. “The shipment has arrived, Boss.”
The boss’s expression cleared up slightly, and her voice squeezed out thin and sweet: “Oh, you’re here.”
She glared at Zhong Yu again, spitting a sunflower seed shell right beside Zhong Yu’s sneakers: “What are you standing around in a daze for? Go help Brother He get the things.”
Zhong Yu felt a baffling sense of relief. Obediently lowering her head, she walked out the store door. Rainwater dripped down the eaves into a curtain, splashing onto the shipment boxes’ filthy rain cape. The man was smoking a cigarette while standing next to the vehicle, hauling the items down box by box.
Hearing footsteps, he turned his head for a look and smiled: “Zhong Yu, come over here quickly.”
Zhong Yu walked over holding her umbrella and skillfully took the cargo from his hands. Bending over, she stacked the cardboard boxes up without a sound. The man’s gaze unblushingly roamed over her slender spine and waistline, as if her forbearance were an unspoken, tacit consent.
In a blind spot where he couldn’t see, Zhong Yu rolled her eyes and said coldly, “Would you mind not smoking?”
“Fine, whatever you say goes.” Brother He chuckled softly and pinched out the cigarette. The cigarette butt was casually discarded onto the road surface, sharing the exact same fate as the sunflower seed shells from the boss’s mouth.
Without a word, Zhong Yu briskly picked up the cargo and walked toward the store. Brother He followed right behind her carrying cardboard boxes, the two of them walking into the store one after the other.
The boss, Yang Xiumei, hurried over, her face wreathed in smiles: “Oh, Brother He arrived early today.”
“It’s raining today, so there aren’t many chores to do.” Brother He put down the cardboard boxes, grabbed a handful of sunflower seeds from the front desk, and tossed them into his mouth with his wet fingers. Then, pulling them back out, he wiped them across the yellowish wall. “Where’s your daughter? Did she go to school?”
Yang Xiumei stood next to him acting demure, smiling from ear to ear: “Yeah, Xiaolu even said yesterday that she hasn’t seen you in a long time and missed you.”
The two of them chatted about domestic trivia back and forth, occasionally glancing absentmindedly at Zhong Yu.
Squatting nearby, Zhong Yu took inventory of the cargo, categorizing the daily necessities and snacks from the boxes before placing them one by one onto the shelves. She listened to their chatter with half an ear, but her pace never slowed down a bit.
“When I was driving over just now, I saw a crazy expensive car parked across the street,” Brother He said with absolute certainty and high spirits, as if he were the one driving that luxury vehicle. “It must be some rich boss who came here to talk business.”
Yang Xiumei’s eyes widened, and she chimed in very supportively: “Oh, coming to talk business in this kind of weather?”
“More than that.” Brother He shook his head with a grin and answered, “A young woman in a wheelchair even got out of that car.”
Yang Xiumei: “Ah? Oh dear, these big bosses don’t have it easy either, being so young and turning out like that.”
Brother He sneered: “That’s why I’m saying, these rich people aren’t necessarily happy either. Can money buy happiness? They probably don’t even have it as good as us.”
Yang Xiumei cracked open sunflower seeds with a crunching sound: “Exactly. Nowadays, rich people get mentally depressed over every little thing; they really have too much time on their hands and nothing to do.”
Zhong Yu straightened up, using the back of her hand to wipe the sweat from her cheeks. Letting out a long breath, she thought secretly: Having too much time on your hands is still happier than where I am now, not knowing where my next meal is coming from. Having money could solve most of the problems she was facing.
Suddenly, the wind chimes tied to the store door rang out tling-tling-clang, and a damp wind mixed with rainwater blew toward her.
Someone had entered the store.
Zhong Yu heard the rattling sound of wheelchair wheels quietly gliding across the damp, rough tile surface, making a firecracker-like crack-pop sound as they rolled over the sunflower seed shells.
Yang Xiumei and Brother He abruptly fell silent, everything turning quiet in an instant as if the pause button had been pressed.
A clear, icy female voice sounded from behind her: “Where are the tissues?”
Zhong Yu froze in place instantly.
She felt a sense of disbelief, as if the midnight bell of twelve o’clock had rung, ending an illusion. The moment she opened her eyes, she was back in the rental apartment, in the crowded school dormitories, in the empty classroom.
The treasure she cherished most had been left behind on the staircase of memories, yet she had never looked back.
She didn’t dare look back.
“Right here,” Yang Xiumei stammered. “This, this Boss, I’ll get them for you.”
After a few seconds of silence, the sound of the wheelchair moved away from behind her. Zhong Yu’s breathing was awakened along with it; her complexion was ashen as she steadied herself against the shelf with a wretched look, her body trembling slightly.
Yang Xiumei grabbed a few packs of tissues, sneaking covert measures of the curly-haired woman in front of her while checking out.
The woman sat in a wheelchair, her appearance graceful and poised, her expression solitary and cold. The fluorescent light outlined the upward slant of the corners of her eyes. Clearly having already reached the front desk, she tilted her head slightly, gazing at the shelf not far away.
Brother He stared open-mouthed, speaking in soft, gentle tones: “What else do you need?”
The woman didn’t speak, her gaze as chilling as a pale, morbid Roman sculpture.
The figure behind the shelf moved clumsily, walking out with a stiff, same-side stride. When she turned around, she accidentally brushed against a stack of fruits, and the golden-yellow lemons instantly tumbled to the floor with a thump-thump sound.
Yang Xiumei clicked her tongue: “Zhong Yu, you good-for-nothing hex! You really are clumsy-fingered.”
Zhong Yu silently cursed her bad luck. Pulling her neck in like a quail, she squatted down to pick up the scattered fruit, wiping them clean one by one.
She numbly repeated this mechanical action until a porcelain-white hand picked up a lemon and handed it right before her eyes. Those fingers were slender and strong, the fingertips rounded and neat, and at the base of her fingers remained a scar that she used to be familiar with.
She held her breath, feeling grateful that she was currently wearing a mask so her expression couldn’t be seen. Muffling her voice in thanks, she took the fruit, her clenched fingers trembling involuntarily.
The blame and sarcasm she faced when looking for a job, the loss of dignity when borrowing money everywhere, and all the embarrassing situations she had experienced were nowhere near as humiliating as this very moment.
“Zhong Yu,” Song You finally spoke. “Look up.”
Zhong Yu raised her head, trembling with fear like branches swaying in the rain. Her mind went completely blank, and she could only squeeze out a smile she thought looked calm.
Long time no see, Song You.
Song You lowered her gaze, looking down from above, her dark-ink eyes carrying an undeniable scrutiny as they swept meticulously over every inch of Zhong Yu, from head to toe, from her reddened eye rims to her slender ankles.
She looked down at her with a blank expression; compared to Zhong Yu’s flustered gaze, she appeared overly cold and merciless.
Like a startled deer, Zhong Yu looked ready to flee at the slightest sign of trouble. She asked in a muffled voice: “You, what do you want, I’ll get it for you…”
“No need,” Song You interrupted indifferently. “You work here?”
Not knowing what to say, Zhong Yu could only nod in a muffled manner.
Song You said nothing more, pushing her wheelchair straight toward the exit.
Zhong Yu’s gaze flowed along with her to her slender calves, seeing that a plaster cast was unnaturally bound there. Her heart instantly tightened, and she instinctively chased after her: “Your, your foot, what happened to it?”
Song You stopped, tilting her head to gaze at her: “Are you concerned about me?”
Zhong Yu fell silent again, opening her eyes wide with eager anticipation. Her eye color was light and translucent, the lights sinking into it as the silvery halos melted into a pool of water.
Song You was silent for a moment, the corners of her mouth carrying a bit of a mocking smile as she said in a low voice: “It’s none of your business.”
Zhong Yu paused. Her usual sharp tongue was entirely gone as she sniffled somewhat clumsily: “Sorry, I, I shouldn’t have asked…”
Song You pushed her wheelchair out of the store door, and Zhong Yu followed behind her like a sleepwalker. A blast of damp wind blew straight into her face, causing her to suddenly shiver all over and finally regain a shred of sobriety.
The relationship between them was already a thing of the past. Yesterday’s events were too painful to look back on, so what kind of identity should she use to pry into her ex-girlfriend’s affairs?
She truly didn’t have that qualification, nor should she wish for too much. Song You was so outstanding now, standing worlds apart from her.
Zhong Yu’s straight spine bent down bit by bit, as if something was pressing down on her throat, making it hard for her to breathe. She stood rooted to the spot, her expression dim, like Cinderella stripped of her fine clothes and pumpkin carriage, the old dream was finally time to wake up.
At that moment, Song You spoke: “Push me to the car.”