Beishan had pretty relaxed policies when it came to anything tourism-related. Ji Yi took some time to look into the paperwork for the various permits and found none of it was especially difficult, it just meant a trip or two into the city to run around and sort things out.
But before any of that, Ji Yi realized he needed to give the guesthouse a name. He had zero experience in this area and no illusions about being a naming genius. So he did a bit of searching online, only to discover that the well-known guesthouses all had names that were remarkably refined and tasteful. Both the names and the look of those places had nothing whatsoever to do with the rustic country cottage in Ji Yi’s mind.
By the standard of Ji Yi’s own modest goals it would have been fine, but now he stole a slightly guilty sideways glance at the black cat dozing in the sun with its eyes closed. He had no idea whether Lin Zhao, if he ever found out that Ji Yi was really just running this place on a whim, might eat him alive.
Whatever, forget it, Ji Yi thought. Opening a guesthouse was his own plan to try a different kind of life, it had nothing to do with Lin Zhao. Lin Zhao wanting to find someone was Lin Zhao’s business. He had taken it upon himself to use the guesthouse as a way to search for that person, so really Ji Yi was already doing him a favor. If Lin Zhao was going to lose his temper or hurt someone just because Ji Yi didn’t grow the business into something big and impressive, that would be more than a little unreasonable.
Over these past few days together, he had noticed a certain arrogant streak in Lin Zhao’s personality, but he’d also clearly sensed that Lin Zhao wasn’t entirely without reason.
“What are you looking at?” The black cat hadn’t lifted its head, hadn’t even opened its mouth, yet Lin Zhao’s voice sounded right by Ji Yi’s ear.
Ji Yi didn’t expect that even a sidelong glance would get noticed. He was about to answer when someone with green hair came around the corner, carrying a small bucket of eco-friendly wall paint. It was Wei Hu.
Wei Hu’s dark skin was slick with sweat. “Ji-ge, who are you talking to?”
Ji Yi obviously couldn’t say he’d been about to have a conversation with a cat, so he said offhandedly, “Just talking to myself. I was thinking about what to name the guesthouse.”
Seeing someone approach, the black cat stayed silent, but it opened its eyes and lifted its head, keeping watch on the two of them.
Wei Hu often came by to help Ji Yi with odd jobs. He said he had nothing to do at home anyway and treated it as a way to pass the time. Every time Wei Hu came, he’d also help cook once mealtime rolled around. His cooking was nothing special, but compared to Ji Yi, who couldn’t cook at all, he was practically a master chef.
For work like today’s, painting a few spots, Ji Yi always figured out a fair wage for him. If Ji Yi weren’t so not sure whether this guesthouse could even support him, he’d have wanted to hire Wei Hu on as a proper employee.
There was no denying Wei Hu was quick and efficient at his work. Sure, he had a head of green hair and dreamed of becoming an internet star, but he was loyal and kind-hearted. The better Ji Yi got to know him, the more he felt Wei Hu was a friend worth having.
“The guesthouse’s name, huh,” Wei Hu said, setting down what he was carrying to offer his two cents. “I think something down-to-earth would do the trick. What are the guesthouses in our village around here called again?”
Ji Yi pulled out his phone and searched. He found that the other guesthouses were named either “So-and-so Village Guesthouse” or “So-and-so Farmstay” with lodging thrown in, and there were also ones clearly named after the owner’s own name.
Ji Yi and Wei Hu were snickering as they looked, thinking it would be way too easy to come up with a name in this style. Ji Yi said, “Maybe just call it ‘Red Leaf Village Guesthouse,’ or ‘Old Ji’s Guesthouse’, hahaha, that’s great.”
Wei Hu: “Hahaha, now that’s got the flavor. Although ‘Old Ji’ doesn’t quite fit, better go with ‘Little Ji.'”
Ji Yi laughed even louder. “There’s something wrong with you!”
Wei Hu blinked, then burst out laughing. “Hahahaha!”
The black cat stared at them for a good long while, as if watching a pair of idiots.
“But seriously,” Wei Hu said, “there’s nothing wrong with picking a name with some local character. The guesthouse’s name is its calling card, after all. When guests book a room, the first thing they’ll see is the name.”
“True,” Ji Yi said, still not done laughing. “Little Ji’s Bar Guesthouse, hahahaha. If I actually named it that, would it storm the trending searches?”
The black cat had been about to lower its head and ignore the two fools, but at that last bit it opened its eyes again, clearly deep in thought. After a moment it rose unhurriedly, padded leisurely over in front of Ji Yi, tilted its head up at the still-laughing man and let out a “meow,” then fixed him with a steady stare.
Ji Yi’s laughter cut off abruptly. He’d completely forgotten Lin Zhao was right there, and now that he thought about it, when he’d made that crude joke just now, Lin Zhao had probably heard it. Whether or not Lin Zhao understood it, Ji Yi felt more than a little embarrassed at having let himself get carried away in front of someone he barely knew.
That meow was clearly Lin Zhao wanting to tell him something. He turned to Wei Hu and said, “My phone’s dead, I’m going in to charge it.”
Wei Hu didn’t suspect a thing and just told him to go.
The moment Ji Yi stepped inside, the black cat followed him in, sure enough. Once he’d confirmed Wei Hu was far enough away outside not to hear them, Ji Yi spoke up: “That’s just how I joke around with my friend. You’re not going to try to control what I say, are you?”
His face was wary.
Lin Zhao spoke in human words, but about something else entirely: “You want to name the inn. I have an idea.”
Ji Yi didn’t expect that, far from finding him vulgar, Lin Zhao seemed to want to help him out. For a moment he felt flattered. “What idea?”
“Call it ‘Dai Shan’, ‘dai’ as in ‘to wait,'” the black cat said.
“Dai Shan?” Ji Yi thought it over. “Isn’t that a bit too artsy? Don’t worry, I’m not actually going to name the place ‘Little Ji’s Bar.’ I’ll probably go with something like Red Leaf Village Guesthouse, plain, easy to understand, down-to-earth, and it fits our surroundings here.”
He thought he was talking it over with Lin Zhao, but Lin Zhao lifted his eyes and looked at him coldly. “Dai Shan.”
From the moment Lin Zhao had heard Ji Yi and Wei Hu say the guesthouse’s name might sway a guest’s choice, might even be the key to drawing guests in, the idea had already taken root in his mind.
Seeing how firm his tone was, Ji Yi said, “It’s not that it won’t work, but who says you get to decide?”
Did you put up any money, that you get to fight over naming rights?
Ji Yi wasn’t the type to back down easily, otherwise he wouldn’t have stood his ground as a kid against people playing ghost, refusing to flinch and even brawling with actual ghosts. Even though he had his reservations about Lin Zhao, he still couldn’t help talking back now and then, unwilling to just knuckle under.
“I think if it’s called ‘Dai Shan,’ it might draw him here,” Lin Zhao said, his gaze distant, his tone flat yet threaded with something complicated.
If Lin Zhao had thrown a few hard words back at Ji Yi, Ji Yi might well have rolled up his sleeves and traded a couple of blows with him. But Ji Yi was the sort who yielded to gentleness and bristled at force. At those words, he suddenly fell quiet.
“I guess it wouldn’t hurt…”
At any rate, “Dai Shan” as a guesthouse name really did have a lot more depth than the few Ji Yi and Wei Hu had come up with earlier. And he could just chalk it up to doing his good deed for the day.
There was still one thing Ji Yi couldn’t help wondering, and he muttered under his breath: “You’re this obsessed with finding this person, you two didn’t used to be a couple or something, did you?”
Was it unrequited love, or a tortured romance, or a broken mirror made whole again [1]an allusion to the Chinese idiom 破镜重圆 (‘a shattered mirror made whole again’), used for a separated couple who reunite jQuery('#footnote_plugin_tooltip_2931965_1_1').tooltip({ tip: '#footnote_plugin_tooltip_text_2931965_1_1', tipClass: 'footnote_tooltip', effect: 'fade', predelay: 0, fadeInSpeed: 200, delay: 400, fadeOutSpeed: 200, position: 'top center', relative: true, offset: [-7, 0], });?
This time Lin Zhao didn’t scold him. Even crouched on the ground, at a clear height disadvantage, he still managed to look down his nose at Ji Yi with an upturned gaze. “The relationships between all things in this world are not confined to that one vulgar kind, romance.”
So he really did find him vulgar after all. Ji Yi shot back spitefully: “Vulgar? I wish you a lifetime of refinement.”
Lin Zhao gave him a sidelong glance and didn’t deign to bother with him.
With the guesthouse’s name settled, Ji Yi spent the next few days running around town and got all the necessary permits taken care of.
Late June was almost here, and summer vacation came right along with it, one of the several peak travel seasons each year, and Ji Yi didn’t want to miss it.
A couple of days earlier, Jian Yi had shown him the designs he’d worked up. Ji Yi was a layman with simple tastes, the way he saw it, as long as the old house kept its original style with just a few tweaks and touches to make the whole thing more harmonious, that was enough.
It was absolutely not just because he wanted to save money!
Jian Yi understood what Ji Yi needed and steered his designs in that direction. Ji Yi was very pleased with them and heaped praise on Jian Yi. He’d actually wondered whether he should pay Jian Yi some kind of fee, but then he thought about Jian Yi’s income, whatever monetary reward he could offer probably wouldn’t even register for the guy. So he didn’t bring it up specifically. He just told Jian Yi that if he ever got bullied on that ghost film set, he could tell him and he’d go smooth things over.
Lately, though, Jian Yi seemed to have had some kind of realization and complained less about the ghost crew. On top of that, Jian Yi had put Ji Yi in touch with several of his old classmates. Some of them worked in the field, so they knew all about the murky waters of renovation, how buying materials as an insider versus an outsider were two completely different things.
This saved Ji Yi a great deal of trouble sorting through and selecting materials. A few courier runs later, the goods were hauled back and piled up in the yard. When Chen Weiguo showed up right on schedule that night to work on the renovation, he took one look and praised it as the work of a real insider, every yuan spent right where it counted.
Old Man Li and the other old ghosts stood by lending Chen Weiguo a hand. They worked a little slowly, but after all these days they’d shed their initial clumsiness. In between tasks, Old Man Li would even do odd jobs for Ji Yi like boiling water and chopping firewood.
Old Man Li even bragged to Ji Yi: “My old lady died early back in the day, so I did all these things on my own. It was just me, an old man, but everyone for miles around knew I was clean and hardworking. Our house barely had a speck of dust, people would come over and say there was nowhere to even set foot.”
In short, the old ghosts threw themselves into the work and got along nicely with Ji Yi.
That morning Ji Yi got a call from a courier telling him a package had been left for him at the parcel pickup point in town.
Ji Yi figured it was the guesthouse signboard he’d ordered custom-made online, so he rode his bike into town to pick it up.
It was almost mealtime, but because the noon sun was glaring, there weren’t many people on the street. Ji Yi found a spot to park his bike and went straight to the pickup point to collect his package. On the way, as he passed the little eatery he’d eaten at once before, he heard what sounded like quite a commotion inside.
He glanced over casually without thinking much of it. It was only after he’d retrieved his package that Ji Yi noticed the eatery wasn’t lively because it was full of customers, it was the liveliness of a quarrel.
By now the restaurant door had been flung open from the inside. The owner, his face full of anger and impatience, was shoving two young people who were obviously tourists out the door. “If you’re not eating, then get lost. Are you deliberately here to stir up trouble and bring me bad luck?”
The two young people flushed red, but they still shot back: “Who’s bringing you bad luck? This is just not the same as the late-night snack we ate yesterday.”
The restaurant owner planted his hands on his hips and cursed: “Are you out of your minds? I close up shop here at eight, how could you have eaten a late-night snack here?”
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