Her house was an old timber-framed structure with rammed earth walls. Three main rooms faced south, with a side room to the west and a kitchen to the south.
To the east stretched a large open area, where she had built pigsties, a cattle pen, and chicken coops, and fenced off a vegetable garden. The remaining space was used for tethering the cattle to sun themselves and for the chickens, ducks, and geese to wander about.
Although the house was made of rammed earth, she had renovated it just last year—the walls were freshly whitewashed, and the old worn tiles had been replaced with glazed ones.
Add to that her love of cleanliness and her diligence, and the place was kept spotless. It might not compare to someone’s Western-style villa, but when it came to hygiene, there was no fault to be found.
By the time she finished cleaning out the pigsties and cattle pen, most of the afternoon had passed. The repair mechanic arrived, and after inspecting the vehicle, said the brake pads were too worn down and the brakes had seized up—they needed to be replaced. Li Suian winced at the cost but forked over one hundred fifty yuan for a new set of brake pads.
By the time she saw the mechanic off, it was already four in the afternoon. Li Suian went to the vegetable garden and picked some produce—garlic sprouts, cilantro, greens, green peas, and so on—a little of each. She planned to bring them to her neighbor as thanks for helping tow her car earlier that day.
Feeling that a few vegetables weren’t quite enough to offer, she also grabbed a bag of her vacuum-sealed cured meat and ten eggs she had saved up.
When she arrived at Wen Qi’s place, Li Suian found her ethereal, immortal-looking neighbor sleeping in the yard again. He was lying on a lounge chair, covered with a thin blanket from head to toe.
To put it bluntly, what came to mind was a corpse in a morgue.
She called out to him twice, but there was no movement. Her heart skipped a beat. Recalling how sickly he looked, a terrible thought crossed her mind—could he have kicked the bucket?
With that thought, she anxiously patted his shoulder.
Wen Qi’s consciousness was hazy at that moment, his mind replaying his past like a lantern show. His youthful vigor and high spirits, the gradual decline after falling ill, the flattery and praise he once received, the sarcasm and ridicule now, the tear-streaked faces of his parents and loved ones—all of it pressed down on him, suffocating.
Let him just die like this, he thought. Die silently in a strange place, with no one to grieve for him, no one to remember that someone like him had ever existed here.
Just as his consciousness was about to sink into darkness, two crisp calls shattered the silence in his mind.
“Wen Qi! Wen Qi!”
The voice reached his ears like a beam of light, bringing a glimmer of brightness back into his dark world.
So—someone in this unfamiliar place did remember him, didn’t they?
Then his shoulder was gently patted, jolting his hazy consciousness fully awake, pulling him back to reality and making him aware of what he was doing.
He threw off the thin blanket covering his face and opened his eyes. The somewhat harsh sunlight made it hard to see at first; he could only make out a figure before him.
As his eyes gradually adjusted to the brightness, the figure came into focus—a radiant, beautiful young woman.
A porcelain-white face, arched willow-leaf brows, large round almond eyes with a sparkling gaze, a small straight nose, and lips naturally rosy, full and delicately shaped.
He recognized her—his neighbor. At this moment, she was crouching in front of him, her face etched with concern, delicate brows furrowed slightly. Her jet-black hair was tied into a ponytail, falling to one side of her shoulder as she leaned over, and he could catch the scent of her hair—rose-scented.
She was beautiful, with fair, rosy cheeks and an aura of vibrant health, so different from the villagers here whose skin was dark and sun-baked from years of ultraviolet exposure.
Seeing that he had finally woken up, Li Suian felt a measure of relief. Her naturally talkative nature got the better of her, and she began to ramble on.
“Don’t cover your face when you sleep under the blazing sun—what if something happens from the heat? Next time, set a few alarms to wake yourself up regularly. Being drowsy and listless all day isn’t good for you…”
Though she was just a young woman of twenty, she sounded like a nagging old mother hen. Wen Qi thought he would feel annoyed, but he didn’t. His heart was strangely calm, with a faint warmth spreading through his chest like a gentle current.
Yet despite how he felt inside, his face betrayed nothing—still as silent as water, cold as frost.
He sat up straight, the thin blanket sliding down to his lap. He was wearing a thick, fleece-lined black thermal top that clung slightly to his frame, making his thin, frail build all the more apparent.
Li Suian clicked her tongue inwardly. What a pity—this neighbor of hers, who looked like a celestial being, was so skinny he was practically skin and bones. What a shame, what a shame!
She held out the things she was carrying, her voice crisp and pleasant, like pearls falling onto a jade plate: “I asked you to stay for breakfast this morning, but you didn’t. These are vegetables I grew myself. I didn’t know what you liked, so I grabbed a bit of everything for you.”
She spoke quickly, set the things down, and darted off like a nimble rabbit, as if anticipating his refusal.
“No need, thank you.”
Just as Li Suian had expected, the moment she turned to run, the man’s cold, aloof voice of refusal came from behind her.
She looked back over her shoulder without slowing her steps, smiling brightly: “This is to thank you for helping me this morning. Take it! If you run out of vegetables, come pick some from my place!”
The young woman moved like a startled hare and vanished from sight in no time, leaving Wen Qi sitting there, staring blankly at the large bag of vegetables.
The vegetables were fresh, a vibrant green, plump and hearty—clearly the work of someone who knew how to garden.
The sun gradually slanted westward, and the aroma of cooking from the neighbor’s house drifted into the courtyard once again. Wen Qi rose lazily, feeling a rare impulse to cook for himself.
The courtyard he had rented had only one old kitchen, with a traditional earthen stove. The walls had turned black from years of smoke.
He didn’t know how to use the earthen stove, so he had bought an induction cooker and some pots and pans. In the past month, he’d only used them to boil instant noodles; otherwise, they’d barely been touched.
He didn’t know how to cook either. Back home, servants had attended to him, so he’d never had to worry about such mundane matters.
But he understood the basic principle of stir-frying—roughly, you put oil and vegetables into a pan and cook them through.
The eggs Li Suian had given him were plump and round. He took two, cracked them into a bowl, and stirred. But the eggshells didn’t seem to cooperate—a gentle tap against the edge of the table left them intact. When he applied a bit more force, the egg liquid spilled all over his hand.
The sticky texture made him frown involuntarily. When he poured the egg mixture into the bowl, a few pieces of eggshell fell in along with it. Wen Qi patiently picked out the bits of shell one by one.
He moved slowly, washing a head of Shanghai bok choy and preparing to stir-fry it with the eggs. He had never eaten this dish before, only figuring that stir-frying the two ingredients together probably wouldn’t kill anyone.
He poured oil into the wok and switched on the induction cooker. Not knowing when the oil would be hot enough to add the vegetables, he simply stared at the wok until the oil inside began to smoke.