Chapter 73 73. All Powers All Powers

After recognizing who the other person was, Xie Kang immediately smiled politely and said, "Good morning, Auntie. What a coincidence."

"Thank you, teacher. Hello, hello."

Xie Kang looked towards the barber shop next to him and asked, "Auntie lives here now?"

Ah Ying shook her head and denied: "No, no, I came here to look for Doudou."

Xie Kang frowned: "Zhuang Yongyuan returned to Shanghai yesterday. Didn't he tell you?"

Ah Ying walked over, weighed the lock on the barber shop door, and said, "She did say she was leaving earlier. I thought it was just a tirade."

Xie Kang heard her accent and asked without thinking, "Auntie, do you speak Minnan dialect?"

Ah Ying nodded: "Yes, my hometown is in the neighboring county."

Xie Kang smiled and said, "Zhuang Yongyuan can't even speak Minnan dialect."

Ah Ying looked around uncomfortably and said, "Doudou's father and I haven't been together for a long time. His father is from Hunan and can't speak Minnan dialect."

Xie Kang nodded thoughtfully and said, "Then I'll go first. Goodbye, Auntie."

"Wait, Mr. Xie, don't leave yet."

"What's wrong?"

"Um...are you still in touch with Doudou?"

Xie Kang's chest tightened, and he hesitated for a moment before answering, "He was quite busy in Shanghai, and we haven't been in touch since he returned."

"Oh, Doudou, why is he so rude? He doesn't even take the initiative to contact his old classmates. I've met his friends in Shanghai, they're not good people, they're like monsters. I told Doudou last time that if he wants to make friends, he should make friends like Teacher Xie."

"So what did he say?"

"Him? He just turns a deaf ear to what I say and won't listen."

"By the way, Teacher Xie, could you help me call Doudou? There's something wrong with his phone, and I can't get through to this number."

Before Xie Kang could ask anything, Ah Ying patted the rusty iron door of the barber shop and said, "A lawyer called me last night and said that Doudou had entrusted him to transfer the ownership of this house to me."

"He won't be back often anymore, and you originally had a share of the house."

"Oh, Teacher Xie, you don't understand. Doudou is just annoying me. He wants to give me the house and completely end our relationship as mother and son! I only have this one son, and if he doesn't want me anymore, no one will care if I die on the side of the road!"

Xie Kang was amused by her exaggerated tone and said, "It's not that serious, right?"

"What do you think? Doudou has always had a worse temper than other children since he was young. If he sees me hugging a relative's child, he'll get angry for a long time. That's why his father always beat him, saying that if he can't change this bad habit, he'll be useless."

Xie Kang asked absentmindedly, "Did he change... did he change later?"

"What happened later? When Doudou grew up, he stopped talking. I didn't know what he was thinking. It's the same now. He has a lot of things on his mind but won't say them out loud."

As if to comfort Zhuang Fu, Ah Ying added: "Men are like this. They are upright outside, but they don't care about children at home."

Xie Kang didn't say anything. There was silence between the two for a while. Ah Ying spoke first: "Then Teacher Xie, your phone..."

Xie Kang interrupted her: "Auntie, I want to see a photo of Zhuang Yongyuan when he was a child."

Ah Ying looked troubled. "The photos of him when he was little were kept with his grandma! I don't know where the album went."

"Lost it?"

"Maybe he's with his uncle. We haven't been in touch for many years..."

As the sky grew brighter, shops on both sides of the street opened one after another, and more passers-by came.

Seeing Xie Kang's gloomy face, Ah Ying awkwardly straightened her hair and said, "Let's not talk about this anymore. It's just trivial. Teacher Xie, please call Doudou for me. I want to ask him something."

Xie Kang slowly took out his phone from his pocket, pressed a few buttons, and said in surprise, "Sorry, Auntie, my phone is out of battery and can't be turned on."

Ah Ying came over and saw that his phone screen was black. There was nothing much to say, so she said awkwardly, "That's perfect. Teacher Xie, when you go back and turn on your phone, please help me persuade Doudou. How can you be so indifferent to my mother?"

Xie Kang agreed generously and said, "Auntie, I'll go home and charge my phone first."

"Go quickly, go quickly! Otherwise things will be delayed!" Aying waved her hand and said to him.

Xie Kang nodded and walked a few steps away. He heard Ah Ying mutter behind him, "Bad boy, we agreed to celebrate the New Year together this year."

After saying that, she went to knock on the door of the grocery store across the street. Bang, bang, bang, it sounded very loud in the quiet morning.

Xie Kang had been exposed to the cold wind all morning and was walking near Zhuang Yongyuan's house. He originally wanted to find a place to have breakfast, but he had no appetite and returned to the hotel hungry.

Apart from the hotel, he had nowhere else to go. His parents had found out about his resignation two weeks ago. Xie Tao told him to get out of the house, so he really did, taking a few clothes and a computer and leaving, and staying in a hotel.

At first, the school had not yet closed for the holidays, and Xie Kang could still go to class to pass the time. But the winter vacation started the day before yesterday, and he had nothing to do. He was drowsy during the day and couldn't sleep at night. He wandered around Pingnan like a ghost at midnight.

Xie Kang had walked through Pingnan at midnight countless times, a place he knew better than during the day. At first, there were four of them, then two, and eventually, he was alone. The streets used to be quiet, with only a few drunks at most, but now, there were delivery trucks whizzing by.

After returning to the hotel, Xie Kang hurriedly took off his coat, threw it on the sofa next to him, and fell straight onto the bed.

Smelling the hotel sheets, Xie Kang thought about the smell he would smell when lying on Zhuang Yongyuan's bed. Suddenly, he realized that the laundry detergent Zhuang Yongyuan used was the same one they often bought in college, and it smelled the same.

He fell into a deep sleep and had a lot of dreams. He thought he had slept for most of the day, but when he woke up, he found that not much time had passed and it was still daylight outside the window.

While taking a shower, Xie Kang turned on the TV. The noon news was playing on TV.

The weather was nice today and the sun was warm on his body. Xie Kang went out and bought a hamburger, then sat by the river, enjoying his lunch while basking in the sun.

The river surface was sparkling, as delicate and beautiful as any other day, but the sea in Pingnan was very rough. Every time he went there, the waves rolled violently, as if one day they would rush into the urban area of ​​Pingnan and flood this place, his home, school, Zhenbao Barber Shop, Haiyuan Hotel, and the villa area where his aunt lived.

Xie Kang left his car at home and rode his motorcycle. He rode across the bridge, intending to walk around the area where Zhuang Yongyuan lived as a child. Just after crossing the bridge, he suddenly remembered that he had promised Shen Xifu that he would teach her to play guitar in the afternoon. He quickly turned around and found a music store on a commercial street behind Xinding Plaza.

When paying, Xie Kang had to turn on his cell phone. After a while, countless messages and missed calls came in all at once.

Who do you think you are? Without us, you would be begging for food!

Dad was just saying that out of anger. You should come back and admit your mistake to him, and we can discuss the work matters as a family.

If your mother hadn't spoiled you, how could you be such an ungrateful person now?

Don't air your dirty laundry in public. If there's anything we can talk about behind closed doors, let's do it as a family. Your uncle will be returning next week and the whole family will celebrate the New Year together. You must come, otherwise I won't know what to say when people ask you where you've been.

It was all news like this, and colleagues came to ask him how he resigned. As for Zhuang Yongyuan, he never contacted me after he returned to Shanghai.

Xie Kang frowned. He paid the bill and was about to turn off his phone when another message came in: "You didn't even come home for the New Year. Are you trying to disappoint your grandfather? You've pissed him off to death! How could our Xie family have such an unfaithful and unfilial descendant like you?"

Xie Kang stood leaning against his motorcycle, his new zither on his back. He wanted to turn off his phone, but couldn't help but stare at the word "Grandpa" on the text message again and again, so he finally replied.

“Where are we going to eat during the New Year?”

Just as the message was sent, a phone call came in. He hung up, and his mother called again, and he hung up again. This happened many times before his mother reluctantly sent him the room number of the Haiyuan Hotel and reminded him that his relatives didn't know about his resignation yet, so he shouldn't let anyone know.

Xie Kang turned off his phone and, carrying his newly bought zither, knocked on the door of Shen Xifu's house for a long time before Shen Xifu cautiously opened it. The smell of incense was strong inside, and Shen was performing a divination ritual for someone.

Shen Xifu took Xie Kang and quietly passed by Grandma Shen and her customers. After closing the door of the room, Shen Xifu dared to speak.

She had noticed the brand new guitar bag Xie Kang was carrying and asked, "Teacher Xie, did you buy a new guitar?"

“I told you not to call me Teacher Xie.” Xie Kang took off his violin bag, held the strap and handed the violin to Shen Xifu: “This is for you.”

"Thank you, Mr.... Thank you, thank you. If you don't let me call you teacher, what should I call you?"

"Then don't shout."

Shen Xifu curled her lips: “Why did you give me a new piano again?”

“In order to get you to return the old guitar to me.” Xie Kang quickly looked around her bedroom, found the old acoustic guitar she had placed on the bedside, and took it into his own hands. He held the guitar neck tightly, as if he was afraid that Shen Xifu would snatch his guitar away.

Before Shen Xifu asked him, Xie Kang said first: “I regret it. This piano is a birthday gift from Zhuang Yongyuan to me. I don’t want to give it to you.”

Shen Xifu muttered, “I can buy a piano myself, but you gave it to me for no reason, and now you’re talking as if I want to monopolize it.”

After the New Year's Eve party, Xie Kang sent her home and forced the guitar from the trunk into her hands, forcing her to accept it. Every time she saw the "Z to X" mark on the guitar neck, she felt uneasy, as if she had stolen something from someone else. Now that Xie Kang asked for it back, she felt relieved.

Xie Kang didn't say anything more to her about the guitar, and urged her to pick up her guitar and start practicing.

Shen Xifu stole the limelight when she performed with Lily Heart on New Year's Day. She completely loved the feeling of performing on the stage, so she came to Xie Kang and wanted him to teach her how to play the guitar.

After Xie Kang resigned, he had too much time on his hands and agreed to the offer right away.

After practicing for more than an hour, Shen Xifu took the initiative to stop. Xie Kang frowned and said that he still had time and could practice for a while longer.

Shen Xifu hesitated for a long time before admitting that she had an appointment with someone and could not practice.

Seeing her beaming with joy, Xie Kang asked, "Where are you going to play?"

"Let's go to Xinding Plaza to watch a movie."

Shen Xifu had already stood in front of the clothes rack, thinking hard about what to wear next. Xie Kang looked at her, feeling sour. He himself had such a time. When Zhuang Yongyuan said that the newly bought T-shirt was not good-looking, he would never wear it again.

After a while, he felt that he was too bored and was jealous of a high school student here, so he picked up the piano and was about to leave, and then reminded Shen Xifu: “I can’t teach you for a long time. If you want to learn, it’s better to find a teacher to guide you. Once you get the hang of it, you can learn it by yourself.”

Shen Xifu looked back at him with a look of surprise: “Where are you going?”

This question stumped Xie Kang. He had some savings, and with a map, he could visit any of those unfamiliar provinces and even countries. All he had to do was buy a ticket and, at most, get a visa.

But the more this happened, the harder it became for him to go anywhere.

Xie Kang hastily threw down a sentence without thinking, and fled with his zither on his back. When he reached the door, he met Grandma Shen who was seeing off a guest. Grandma Shen warmly called him over and wanted to make him some tea. After Xie Kang declined, he suddenly asked her, "Grandma, when I'm observing the dead, I keep seeing the appearance of others who have passed away. What does it mean?"

"Do they all hate me and are angry with me?"

Grandma Shen shook her head: “I don’t know either, I just showed you around, I can’t really explain what the things you saw meant.”

Seeing Xie Kang's terrified face, she added, "Teacher Xie, don't overthink it. So many people die every day. How many of them die willingly? We who are still alive just need to live our own lives well."

Xie Kang nodded, went downstairs and walked into the evening light.