Taste Memory

In the end, although Wen Lingyi was extremely reluctant, Su Qing still drove Wen Lingyi back to Lanyue Bay.

She was a little drunker than she had expected, and her steps were a little unsteady when she got out of the car.

After entering the door, she didn't even have the strength to walk back to the master bedroom on the second floor. She pushed open the door of the guest bedroom on the first floor and almost fell into the bed.

The heavy sleepiness brought by alcohol swept over her, and her consciousness quickly sank into a chaotic darkness.

The aftereffects of the wine were relatively mild. When Wen Lingyi woke up, she only felt a dull pain in her temples on both sides, as if something was gently holding them.

When I opened my eyes, the guest bedroom was pitch black. The thick curtains blocked out all the light from the outside, and I couldn't tell whether it was late at night or early in the morning.

After lying quietly for a while, she realized that she hadn't slept in the master bedroom for a long time. It seemed that she had naturally moved to this guest bedroom since Su Zhe returned to Europe.

Compared to the spacious and comfortable bed in the master bedroom, this place can give her a little peace and security.

The big bed in the master bedroom always makes her fall into all kinds of chaotic thoughts.

She would try to recall in vain the different positions Zhou Jianxing had found on that bed: curled up, stretched out? A peaceful sleeping face, or a smiling gaze?

Even between the warp and weft of the bedding, there seemed to be a stubborn, indelible scent lingering, a smell that belonged only to Zhou Jianxing and made her feel upset.

Human memory is sometimes ridiculous. The more desperately one wants to forget something, the clearer and more stubborn the images become, popping up at every opportunity.

Her throat was dry and tight, so she got up from the bed and poured herself a glass of water.

The cold liquid slid down his throat, temporarily relieving the discomfort, but his stomach, washed by alcohol, began to churn uncomfortably, and a strong feeling of nausea surged up without warning.

She quickly put down the cup, rushed into the bathroom, bent down and retched a few times into the toilet.

But the next second, she suddenly remembered that Su Zhe had also lived and used this bathroom, and an inexplicable feeling of disgust arose.

She stood up, staggered back two steps, then rushed to the sink, held onto the cold ceramic basin, and vomited in waves.

The little wine left in the stomach mixed with acid was vomited out, leaving a light red mark in the white washbasin.

She turned on the faucet and the rushing water washed away the filth.

Then, almost paranoidly, he stretched his arms under the cold water and rubbed his wrists and forearms repeatedly, as if there was some invisible dirt on them.

She found that her mysophobia seemed to be worse than before.

Intellectually, she knew it was unnecessary. Su Zhe was even more hygienic and particular about hygiene than many women. But the inexplicable discomfort in her heart lingered.

Or, why not just move to the bedroom on the second floor that was specially designed for Su Qing?

This thought suddenly popped up in her mind. Anyway, Su Qing doesn't often come here to live now.

A while ago, Su Qing was worried that something might go wrong if she stayed alone in an empty villa after a breakup, so she took the initiative to move in and live with her for more than half a month.

In the end, Wen Lingyi found an excuse that she needed someone to calm down and persuaded her to leave.

Whenever she saw Su Qing, she couldn't help but recall those moments of betrayal—in the past it was Zhu Yang, now it was Zhou Jianxing. Su Qing had been directly involved in both of her most failed and unbearable relationships and knew the inside story.

It is said that when two countries are at war, they do not kill envoys. However, when the situation becomes tense and life and death is at stake, the first person to be sacrificed is often the person who delivered the message.

Wen Lingyi didn't want to be so petty and narrow-minded, but she couldn't help it. That kind of resentment, like love, was not something that could be easily controlled by reason.

If Su Qing had not told her those things and shown her those photos, she might have been kept in the dark all along, would not have become suspicious and gone through Zhou Jianxing's things, and would not have discovered so much evidence pointing to the unbearable truth.

So now, can she still maintain her calmness on the surface?

In fact, she knew in her heart that it was just an ostrich mentality, just like an ostrich burying its head in the sand before a sandstorm, pretending to be ignorant.

If you can't see it, the crisis doesn't exist.

However, she couldn't figure out how Zhou Jianxing did it.

How could he keep saying that he loved her, wear that special ring on her finger with great care, and act as if he couldn't live without her, while secretly planning a wedding with another man?

Is it because he thinks that Wen Lingyi is a married woman, so she doesn't care about this kind of relationship at all, or even takes it for granted?

The identity issue that had troubled Zhou Jianxing the most in the past has now become the source of Wen Lingyi's uneasiness and inability to let go.

It was not until this moment that she truly understood the pain that Zhou Jianxing might have felt—if that pain really existed.

·

Walking into the kitchen, everything inside returned to the way it was before Zhou Jianxing had been there. It was tidy and cold, like a developer's meticulously decorated model apartment—gorgeous but devoid of any sense of life.

All the odds and ends that Zhou Jianxing bought were packed up and thrown away by Wen Lingyi.

She didn't want anything to remind her of her foolish past.

Sitting alone at the dining table, in front of me was a cup of warm water that was still steaming.

Wen Lingyi lowered her eyes, staring at the layer of fine white mist condensed on the inner wall of the glass under the light, in a daze.

Once, she thought that after breaking up with Zhou Jianxing, with his stubborn and somewhat reckless nature, he would inevitably pester her and keep pestering her.

But the reality is not so.

Only once, about two weeks after they broke up, late at night, did the surveillance camera at the door capture a familiar figure.

Zhou Jianxing appeared in the screen staggeringly, his walking posture was very unstable, one step deep and one step shallow, like a roadblock zombie in PVP, clumsily bypassing the bushes in the garden, and finally stopped at the steps in front of the door.

She just stood there, looking up at the door for a long time.

In the end, he did not force his way in, did not ring the doorbell, and did not try to contact her in any way. He just seemed to have been drained of all his strength, and slowly and ungracefully curled up on the cold stone steps and fell asleep.

Until the early morning of the next day, when it was still dark, she left quietly and silently.

Wen Lingyi later watched the surveillance video over and over again.

When Zhou Jianxing came, she didn't seem to have anything suspicious on her, and it didn't look like she came prepared with any intention of doing anything bad to her.

The way she stumbled seemed more like she was drunk, relying on her remaining instinct to get here.

So, why on earth would Zhou Jianxing come to her door, drunk and alone, in the middle of the night? What was she trying to do? What was she trying to say?

Why did he end up doing nothing, as if he was afraid of being discovered, and sneaked away before dawn?

There are no answers to these questions.

Wen Lingyi simply and quickly contacted a lock replacement company, replaced the smart door lock on the front door, and installed several more covert surveillance cameras and burglar alarms without hesitation.

·

The contents of his stomach had already been emptied, and now he felt a distinct sense of hunger.

Wen Lingyi thought back to the month after Zhou Jianxing left. Did she eat well? The answer seemed to be yes. She still ate on time and even deliberately maintained a regular three meals a day.

However, I often eat half of it and then spit out the other half for various reasons.

After stripping away the halo that Wen Lingyi attached to Zhou Jianxing, the food Zhou Jianxing cooked actually tasted just so-so, ordinary, nothing special.

As she thought about it, Wen Lingyi's eyelids trembled. She watched the white mist on the inner wall of the glass turn into water droplets, like falling tears, crying for her.

She picked up her phone, opened the food delivery app, and swiped aimlessly for a long time.

Only a few fast food chains were still open late at night. The menus were filled with heated pre-prepared dishes. She looked at the pictures, and the appetite that had just risen in her stomach quickly subsided.

Or maybe I should just not eat it? She thought. Eating late-night snacks is not good for maintaining a good figure.

As soon as this thought flashed through my mind, I felt a familiar, dull pain in my stomach again, and even a little cold sweat seeped out of my forehead.

The feeling in your stomach and your emotions always amplify and entangle each other. When you are sad, your stomach will feel uncomfortable; and when you are hungry, you will seem to become even more depressed.

Most eating disorders, tracing back to their roots, may be emotional problems.

She finally got up and went to the refrigerator.

She remembered that there seemed to be some chocolate in the freezer that had been put there before.

She opened the drawer of the freezer, but there was no chocolate inside. Instead, what caught her eye were the dumplings that had not been finished. They were round and plump, and because of her movements, they collided with each other, making a rustling sound, and some of them rolled to the edge of the drawer.

Her eyes froze. How could she not remember these dumplings? She and Zhou Jianxing had spent almost the entire day making them.

It's not like she didn't remember how to deal with the dumplings.

She was just avoiding it, and was unwilling to face the fact that they still existed, and unwilling to face the good things that Zhou Jianxing had done that really existed and that he had actually given.

She was afraid that the little bit of remaining good would dilute the pain in her heart and make her forget how to continue to resent Zhou Jianxing.

The cold air blew in from the open freezer. She had a weak constitution and couldn't help shivering. The discomfort in her stomach seemed to worsen.

She looked at the bag of dumplings, and a voice in her heart said: They should all be thrown away and cleaned up thoroughly.

He reached out for the bag of dumplings, and just as his fingertips were about to touch the cold plastic bag, he paused.

Suddenly, I remembered that every time Zhou Jianxing saw her washing dishes with the faucet turned on as high as possible, letting the water flow, he would frown slightly, squeeze his round eyes together, and mutter in a tone that was both distressed and a little complaining: "What a waste of water."

Yeah, what a waste.

Because people want to eat meat, animals are kept in captivity, bred regularly, and even castrated, just to satisfy human appetites.

After the plants are planted, they rely on the hard work and sweat of farmers to water them, and they also have to pray for good weather and not let all their hard work be wasted in the face of disasters.

There's nothing wrong with the food itself. Dumplings are just dumplings.

The dumplings Zhou Jianxing makes by hand are no different from the frozen dumplings sold in supermarket freezers in terms of function and use. The ultimate goal is just to fill the stomach.

She closed the freezer door and turned to boil a pot of water.

At the same time, I picked up my phone and, somewhat unfamiliarly, typed into the search engine: How many minutes do I need to boil homemade dumplings? Frozen.

Her shadow standing alone in front of the stove was vaguely reflected on the smooth glass window of the kitchen, looking lonely and cold.

The water quickly boiled and the white dumplings were pushed into the boiling hot water.

After a while, the steaming dumplings were scooped out and placed on a white porcelain plate.

It turns out that even without Zhou Jianxing's guidance, she can cook a pot of dumplings by herself, without breaking the skin and revealing the filling, and with the dumplings cooked to the right degree.

She picked one up, blew on it carefully, and then bit into it.

The warm juice with a rich aroma instantly overflowed in the mouth, flowed down the esophagus into the stomach, and quickly soothed all the uneasiness and pain there.

It is filled with pork and corn, tastes sweet, and is pinched into a cute ingot shape.

Taste is a peculiar memory storage device that can always accurately preserve details and feelings that are difficult to describe in words.

Just like when people grow up, they always inexplicably miss a certain taste they ate when they were young, as if as long as they taste that familiar taste again on their tongue, they can instantly travel back to those carefree old times.

She chewed slowly and suddenly felt a little regretful.

When Zhou Jianxing was mixing the filling that day, she should have leaned over to take a closer look. What seasonings were added? What were the proportions? It turned out that Zhou Jianxing always liked to nag her about the cooking steps, but she never really listened.

Maybe... she could also try to learn and replicate it herself.

People's names need to be deliberately forgotten and desensitized, but smells don't.

It is there, objective, neutral, and silently carries everything.

What is scary is not betrayal, but the fact that betrayal is real and love is real too.