The rain kept beating against Mu Wen’s window, drumming against her new home.
She suddenly sat upright in bed.
“Mu Wen?”
Xie Chong called her again from the other end of the phone.
The rain made a soft, rustling sound, and his voice sounded soft and husky as well.
Mu Wen finally reacted.
“Who are you?”
“Xie Chong.”
“Who is Xie Chong? I don’t know him!”
Mu Wen believed in getting revenge immediately.
Without even hesitating for a second, she hung up.
Then she rolled around on her bed, laughing.
That felt so good!
So this was how satisfying it was to act cool.
Xie Chong called again.
Mu Wen answered.
This time, she stopped teasing him and happily called out,
“Mr. Xie! I knew you still remembered me!”
Xie Chong was standing by the roadside.
His large umbrella covered him like a canopy, making the sound of the rain especially clear.
The rain had soaked his trouser legs and shoes. He felt completely damp, almost as if he had suddenly been transported to London.
Mu Wen’s happiness after her little prank flowed straight into his ears, and even his bad mood from the rain improved.
“Why were you laughing like such a big idiot just now?” he asked.
Before Mu Wen could argue back, he asked,
“When did you come back?”
“I came back today!”
“Today?”
Xie Chong was a little surprised.
On the very first day she had returned, they had actually met again as if fate had arranged it.
Xie Chong remembered their last meeting.
He had also been drinking that night. They had eaten a plate of fried rice at a roadside stall on a winter night.
It had been such an ordinary moment, yet he suddenly remembered it on this rainy night.
“Yes, today,” Mu Wen said happily. “I thought the person under the umbrella looked like you, so I deliberately came over to say hello. Unfortunately, you didn’t recognize me and someone even pulled you away.”
“I’m not suffering from dementia. How could I not recognize you?”
“You’re not?”
“?”
Xie Chong wanted to make a few sarcastic remarks, but the people he had been dining with were getting into their cars and leaving one after another.
The rain was heavy. They quickly said goodbye to Xie Chong, so he had to stop talking and exchange a few polite words with them.
Mu Wen quietly waited.
Xie Chong’s hoarse voice was soaked in the heavy rain, as if it had been left to ferment and had gained a little strength.
She listened to him talking to the others, trying to tell whether he spoke differently to them than he did to her.
He did.
Xie Chong was so polite.
He kept saying things like,
“Tonight was wonderful. Let’s meet again next time.”
“I’ll visit you another day.”
“Let’s keep in touch.”
…
This was another side of him.
In places she couldn’t see, he lived with a completely different face.
His life had so many sides.
Mu Wen felt that this kind of socializing was taking too long, so she hung up.
Xie Chong finally saw everyone off.
He let out a long breath, then looked at his phone and saw that Mu Wen had already ended the call.
He called her again.
“Does that little alley where you used to live still have fried rice when it rains?”
“Of course. Working people don’t stop because of rain or wind,” Mu Wen said.
“Do you want to go eat some?” Xie Chong asked. “Do you still live there?”
“I moved across the street,” Mu Wen said. “Across the overpass, in the residential community beside the supermarket.”
“Want to go?”
Xie Chong had only suggested it on a whim and wasn’t expecting anything.
But Mu Wen immediately answered,
“Let’s go!”
Mu Wen desperately wanted to catch up with him.
She knew that she had thought about him countless times over the past few months.
Originally, she had planned to slowly forget him.
Beijing had so many people. She would eventually have her first real client, her second, her hundredth. She would meet more and more people.
All of that would gradually fade her memories of Xie Chong until she finally forgot him.
But she had met him again.
On her very first day back in Beijing, she had seen him standing in the rain.
His umbrella had covered his face, but she had recognized him at a glance.
Mu Wen couldn’t refuse him.
She had already jumped out of bed, her hair still dripping with water.
“Let’s go. I’m getting ready to leave right now!”
This shocked Xie Chong.
He had very few friends.
The only person who would happily agree to meet him without hesitation after he made a suggestion was probably Qian Song.
But Mu Wen had agreed without even pausing.
She even sounded excited.
“It’s raining…” Xie Chong reminded her.
“Stop talking so much!” Mu Wen said. “Hurry up! I’ll see you under the overpass!”
She hung up.
Using her old, worn-out hair dryer, she dried her hair, then changed into a white T-shirt and knee-length shorts she usually wore for casual walks.
She grabbed her umbrella and went out.
The rain was still falling.
She ran along, stepping into little puddles.
Everywhere she passed, little “flowers” of water bloomed beneath her feet.
She ran onto the overpass.
The headlights of cars on the road flickered through the heavy rain, making everything look blurry and hazy, like a nearsighted person taking off their glasses.
But on the road across the overpass, Xie Chong stood out clearly from everything around him.
He stood there waiting for her with an umbrella.
Mu Wen felt as though it had been a very long time since she had last seen him.
Back then, she had not yet graduated.
He had still been her client.
She jogged toward him and reached her hand under his umbrella.
“Hi!”
Xie Chong extended his hand from beneath the umbrella and copied her.
“Hi.”
Then he raised his umbrella and, just as expected, saw Mu Wen’s smiling face.
“Let’s go.”
That was all he said before turning around and walking away.
They each held an umbrella as they walked toward the back alley.
Large umbrellas were lined up one after another.
Many people stood beneath them, some hiding from the rain, some chatting, and others eating.
The spicy skewers were still there.
The grilled lamb skewers were still there.
The savory pancakes were still there.
And the fried rice was still there.
They each held a plate of fried rice and sat on little stools to eat.
Xie Chong’s legs took up Mu Wen’s space.
She kicked him away.
Xie Chong suddenly asked,
“Does your hometown not have cell towers?”
“What do you mean?”
Mu Wen didn’t understand.
She immediately argued,
“Do you know mobile towers can even be found in remote areas? How could my hometown not have one? Are you looking down on me?”
“Yes.”
Xie Chong thought:
You have cell towers, yet you still shout into the phone like that.
“Then where exactly is your hometown in Inner Mongolia? Inner Mongolia is huge.”
“Yakeshi.”
“What?”
Xie Chong didn’t hear clearly.
“Where?”
“Does your brain not have a cell tower either…?”
Mu Wen finally got her revenge for her hometown.
She raised her voice.
“Ya! Ke! Shi!”
Yes.
That was exactly how she had shouted before.
Xie Chong wondered whether Mu Wen turned into a primitive person the moment she left Beijing.
Maybe after taking off civilized city clothes, she would pick up some tools and start rubbing sticks together to make fire.
It had to be like that.
He became so absorbed in his imagination that he couldn’t stop himself from laughing.
He raised his head from his plate of fried rice and saw Mu Wen staring at him as though he were a strange creature.
So he shrugged.
“I’ve been drinking. Don’t mind me.”
Mu Wen copied his shrug.
She asked whether he had already moved into Wanliu and whether he was satisfied with the place.
Xie Chong said,
“I’ve been there a few times, but I haven’t moved in yet.”
“Why?”
Mu Wen was surprised.
“How can you resist? Whenever I buy new clothes, I can’t wait to wear them. It’s a brand-new house! How can you resist?”
Xie Chong looked at her seriously.
“If you bought new clothes every day, would you still be that happy?”
Mu Wen was speechless.
Because she rarely bought clothes.
She wore her clothes for years and was always reluctant to throw them away.
That was why she was so happy every time she bought something new.
Then she understood what Xie Chong meant.
President Xie was saying that he had so many houses that he wasn’t particularly excited about moving into a new one!
How annoying.
Mu Wen thought:
Whenever I think of him, how do I manage to forget that he’s such an irritating perfectionist?
“Do you want to see it?” Xie Chong suddenly asked.
“See what?”
“Your work.”
“Now?”
“Is there a problem?”
Mu Wen didn’t answer.
He was a single man.
She was a single woman.
Going to his home on a rainy night was undeniably an intimate situation.
She didn’t know what was going through Xie Chong’s mind when he invited her.
But he looked so straightforward and calm, as if all her worries were unnecessary.
Xie Chong drank his water while watching Mu Wen, waiting for her answer.
“Let’s go,” Mu Wen said. “Let’s take a look.”
It was the first renovation project she had ever designed.
She didn’t know what Xie Chong had eventually turned it into.
Now she had a chance to revisit the place.
She couldn’t refuse.
Xie Chong stopped drinking.
He hadn’t expected Mu Wen to trust him so completely, without any defenses.
She didn’t even seem worried that he might take her into a private space and hurt or humiliate her.
“Let’s go.”
He stood up and walked back into the rain.
Mu Wen wasn’t afraid that Xie Chong was a bad person.
She knew he wasn’t.
But she had started to fear something else.
The uncertainty that had always existed inside her suddenly became clear.
She realized that the reason she had thought about him again and again for so long was because she liked him.
They walked all the way to the overpass.
Mu Wen saw Xie Chong’s car slowly coming along the roadside.
She said, “Goodbye,” then immediately ran up the stairs of the overpass.
Xie Chong followed her.
He even ran past her.
Their umbrellas were dripping rain as though they were desperately racing to express their own emotions.
In the middle of the overpass, Xie Chong blocked Mu Wen’s way.
She almost ran straight into his arms.
Their umbrellas collided and were pushed out of shape.
“Are you planning to run all the way to my house?” Xie Chong deliberately teased her.
“Are people from Yakeshi all this energetic?”
Then he added,
“We can’t go today. I didn’t bring my keys.”
“Oh.”
“That’s too bad.”
Mu Wen secretly breathed a sigh of relief.
Xie Chong also let out a quiet breath.
His eyes turned toward the road below the overpass.
A long line of winding cars stretched all the way into the rainy night.
Beijing at night in the rain was beautiful, like an oil painting.
If only rainy days didn’t come with wind.
Suddenly, a wild gust of wind blew up and nearly tore their umbrellas away.
The two of them desperately held on.
Mu Wen’s thin umbrella was flipped inside out, its ribs twisted into strange shapes.
The wind almost knocked her off her feet.
“Damn!”
Xie Chong grabbed her arm and pulled her beneath his umbrella.
With a delighted laugh, he said,
“You’re about to fly away!”
He took her broken umbrella and handed her his own.
Mu Wen didn’t refuse his kindness.
She felt that Xie Chong’s brain must have been soaked by the rain.
A little more rain probably wouldn’t make any difference.
What normal person would say, “You’re about to fly away!” at a moment like this?
“How’s the new apartment?” Xie Chong asked.
“It’s great. I really like it.”
Mu Wen began telling Xie Chong about her new home.
The little flowers on the windowsill.
The private kitchen.
Her clean single bed.
Her bed was right in front of the window, so she could see the sky while lying in bed.
“It’s raining today, but even the rainy sky is beautiful.”
Xie Chong walked quietly beside her and listened.
Sometimes he slightly turned his head to look at her.
Her face was full of life as she described the things she loved.
At one point, she happened to look at him too.
Her eyes were filled with hope for her brand-new life.
Yes.
In Mu Wen’s heart, coming back to Beijing meant beginning a completely new life.
The rain was heavy, but they walked very slowly.
Mu Wen was eager to pour out everything that had happened to her over the past few months, like spilling a bag of beans all at once.
Xie Chong simply listened.
Even after they had reached the building where Mu Wen lived, she showed no intention of stopping.
And he showed no intention of leaving.
Fortunately, the whole world was filled with the sound of rain, so their conversation would not disturb anyone sleeping.
Xie Chong’s phone rang.
The driver said the car had been parked by the roadside for too long and he needed to make a turn and come back.
Only then did Mu Wen realize how much she had been talking.
She felt a little embarrassed.
“Ah… I sound like a machine gun.”
Xie Chong said,
“Even machine guns eventually run out of bullets.”
He was only joking.
He didn’t think there was anything wrong with Mu Wen talking so much.
In fact, he liked listening to her.
They were no longer simply a client and a designer.
Their conversation had moved beyond the house and into ordinary everyday matters.
Strangely, the transition had happened so naturally that it didn’t require any deliberate effort.
Xie Chong felt that Mu Wen gave him the feeling of having a friend.
He really had too few friends.
The driver returned, and Xie Chong had to leave.
Mu Wen offered to walk him to the entrance of the residential community.
Xie Chong refused.
“If you walk me to the entrance, then I’ll walk you back. Then you’ll walk me back again, and I’ll walk you back again. We’ll keep doing that until morning.”
Mu Wen giggled.
She switched umbrellas with him, then turned around and went home.
She lived on the first floor.
After entering, she turned on the lights and ran to the window.
She pressed her face against the glass to see whether Xie Chong had left.
Xie Chong suddenly saw a face pressed against the window.
He was so startled that he jumped backward.
Mu Wen opened the window just a crack.
Putting on a ghostly voice, she slowly said,
“Good—bye—”
Xie Chong’s scalp tingled.
He turned and hurried away.
Soon, he disappeared into the dark rainy night.
The driver asked where he wanted to go.
“Wanliu,” he replied.
He had brought his keys.
But the moment Mu Wen said she wanted to come over, something inside him had resisted.
Wanliu had a special meaning for him.
It had always been empty, waiting for its true owner to move in.
After returning from England, he had only been there once.
He had gone there to deliver some kitchenware and bedding.
But he had simply left everything in the living room without even unpacking it.
“Wanliu?” The driver sounded surprised. “You rarely go there. You said you didn’t like that place.”
“It’s too late today. I don’t want to bother going anywhere else.”
He tidied up the place a little and, for the first time, slept in his new home.
Strangely enough, he slept very well.
He felt as if something new was rushing into his body, one thing after another, trying to change him.
His phone lit up.
There was a text message.
He opened it.
It was from Mu Wen.
“I’m so happy that we happened to run into each other today! Looking forward to seeing you again!”
Mu Wen had tried to imitate the polite way Xie Chong spoke when entertaining people.
She had spent a long time editing the message because every possible tone seemed to carry some hint of intimacy.
Only Xie Chong’s own way of speaking felt just right.
That polite, distant tone.
It was truly just right.
Them