Chapter 12

People are always busy before the New Year, and being busy can make them forget about things that are too troublesome to solve. Li Ye believes that this is because they are temporarily isolated from trouble.

The source of Li Ye's troubles was only a few walls away from her. The closer it got to the end of the year, the longer Zhou Yuan practiced the piano every day, and the more easily Li Ye would think of him at home. Often, when she came to her senses, she would find that time had suddenly jumped forward a little.

Fortunately, all the important things have been taken care of, and the family of three has been spending their time at home watching TV, playing on their phones, eating snacks and chatting. They've already entered vacation mode.

On New Year's Eve, Li Ye still felt that many things were different. New Year decorations were officially hung up at home. Ms. Li insisted on delaying it until now, saying that she was pursuing a sense of ritual.

So today we also have tasks. Li Ye needs to put up Spring Festival couplets, Ms. Li is in charge of putting up window decorations, and Teacher Li is busy with the fresh flowers he bought. Everyone is very busy.

Once again, she was doing her job in front of her own house. As the second tallest person in the family, Li Ye, who is 1.69 meters tall, was more than willing to take on the task of putting up the Spring Festival couplets.

First, divide the Spring Festival couplets into upper and lower lines and paste them perfectly on the left and right sides of the door. If you look at them from a distance, the height is basically the same and they are not crooked, which is great. The next step is to take out a hard stool, as the height of the horizontal scroll still needs to be achieved with external support.

Do you need help?

At the same time, Zhou Yuan's voice and the aroma of cake emanating from him, along with the scent of cream and fresh fruit, rushed towards Li Ye from behind. She turned around and saw that Zhou Yuan was barely covering her; they were just a hair's breadth away from colliding.

Li Ye looked to Zhou Yuan's side. He had also been called out to put up Spring Festival couplets, but the person with the height advantage had already finished his work and was very willing to help Li Ye finish the rest.

"Yes, thankfully it's not too much trouble for you. Is the cake ready?"

Realizing he had wandered as far as his neighbor's house, Li Ye naturally wanted to hurry back to his own territory and trusted his volunteer assistant with ease.

"I've already told my family that I'm waiting for your cake tonight, is that alright?"

Zhou Yuan took the horizontal scroll from Li Ye's hand and skillfully gestured its position on the top of the door. He stopped at the exact position according to the woman's instructions to move left or right, and found the fixed point that Li Ye had dug for the horizontal scroll when he was a child.

"You can feel the traces of the paint touch-up."

Li Ye had almost forgotten about this, but of course, he still had to stubbornly retort a few times, "After all, Teacher Li is not a professional in this field, so it is understandable that his skills are not up to par. It's okay if he can't see clearly from below."

"Isn't it true that we have to search for the right spot every time we put up Spring Festival couplets? They are the hardest to find. If there are reference points on both sides, this problem won't occur."

Zhou Yuan added, "He was caught at the very beginning and didn't have time to catch up later."

Li Ye wouldn't be angry about this. They were all funny stories from his childhood. The main characters before he was ten were mostly Zhou Yuan, and the stories up to when he was fourteen were mostly about Li Ye, such as the one just mentioned.

"The cake is ready, looking forward to tonight."

The sound of someone calling Zhou Yuan to go home came from the Zhou family. Before returning home, Zhou Yuan left only this sentence, letting Li Ye stand outside in the cold wind for a few more minutes to dispel the unnatural heat on his face.

"I'm back! Everything's up and done. Do you need any help?"

When Li Ye got home, she thought about finding something to do to distract herself from her excessive anticipation of the early hours of the morning. Fortunately, this year her family's New Year's Eve dinner consisted of several dishes from different people, which were put together on a large table, keeping her busy.

For the sake of the dining experience, the menu was ordered in advance, and Teacher Li paid for the groceries and drinks, and it was also his responsibility to serve the dishes to the table.

Ms. Li was in charge of two main dishes: braised beef ribs and braised pork knuckle, along with a fish, a plate of cured meats, and a refreshing and non-greasy stir-fried leafy greens.

Li Ye was in charge of the remaining five dishes, which only required slicing and plating braised beef, simply deep-fried brown sugar glutinous rice cakes, steamed glutinous rice meatballs, sliced ​​fish cakes scooped from the local specialties, and yam and pork rib soup that could be cooked in a pressure cooker. All of these were simple dishes.

"It's just the three of us, a simple meal is enough. We don't need so many fancy dishes. We can eat out at restaurants whenever we want, so we don't have to make things difficult for our family during the New Year."

Teacher Li, who doesn't cook, makes it sound very nice, but in reality, the amount of preparation work required is quite substantial. This is even with Teacher Li being asked to assist every year, and this year Li Ye also shared some of the workload.

"I'll take care of lunch. What would you like to eat?" Li Ye volunteered to take charge of lunch.

"Just stir-fry two simple dishes, not too much meat, there will be plenty later." Ms. Li was annoyed by the details of preparing the pork knuckle and whole chicken.

Okay.

By noon, the only meat dishes served by Li Ye were stir-fried green peppers and sausages, tofu meatballs and vegetable soup, and steamed and fried lotus root slices and stir-fried garlic sprouts. This perfectly met Ms. Li's requirements, and the family finished all the dishes, leaving no trouble for the New Year's Eve dinner.

In the afternoon, the kitchen preparations entered the next stage, and laughter could be heard from the background of the TV in the living room. Li Ye and Ms. Li, freed from the kitchen, took off their aprons and lay down on the sofa.

Teacher Li moved the electric grill over here, along with the grill rack and tabletop, and the fruits and snacks placed on it.

"This milk candy is delicious. Xiao Ye bought it. I'll buy this kind of candy for my family next time." This is from Ms. Li, who has been too busy lately to try the local specialty candy.

"They come directly from the grasslands, and they're quite expensive, one yuan each. You can eat ten or twenty in half an hour, and they're not greasy at all." - Li Ye, who was selecting and paying for the food.

"Buy it if you like it." This comes from Teacher Li, whom I also quite like.

Everyone suddenly became interested and started taking stock of the local specialties and snacks that Li Ye had bought. Teacher Li took a few of each item and put them in a box. Li Ye checked the shopping list on his phone one by one, while Ms. Li looked around the table.

"Old Li, is there any food you haven't brought over yet?"

Upon hearing this, Li Ye also began to look for any omissions. He checked the shopping list and found no errors, so he offered a reminder.

"You haven't brought out the real substance yet, have you?"

Looking at the snacks on the table and coffee table, it's true, I didn't see any loose New Year's goods bought offline. The sunflower seeds I'm opening now are all whole bags bought online by Liye.

“The items were placed on the outside. Ono bought too many, and they were all piled up together. If I moved them to a different spot, they would all be blocked. If I didn’t see them, I would forget about them.”

Teacher Li returned to the living room with a box of dried nuts and took responsibility for the mistake, but she also let Li Ye down a bit.

Li Ye quickly changed the subject: "Speaking of which, the cake should be delivered by now."

"Yuanyuan, did the other side really agree to do this?" Ms. Li still didn't quite believe it.

"I could smell the cake this morning, so it must have been made. Zhou Yuan said he would deliver the cake in the afternoon, and then it would be the same as before."

Li Ye felt that apart from Zhou Yuan making the cake, everything else was going in the same direction as in previous years. He thought so and said, "It's just friends celebrating a birthday and giving each other a cake. It shouldn't require parental consent, right?"

Ms. Li suddenly fell silent. Li Ye looked away from her phone. It was Teacher Li feeding someone candy. She was afraid that pink bubbles would be forming in the air soon. She waved her phone to indicate this.

"Zhou Yuan asked me to pick up the cake."

As the door opened, Zhou Yuan stood there holding a packaged cake box. Li Ye took the gift, which was tied with a bow. Through the plastic film, it was clear that inside was a perfectly normal cream and fruit cake.

"Thanks, what time will you come over tonight?"

"At 11 o'clock, this time it's 'The Butterfly Lovers'."

Zhou Yuan didn't think there was anything wrong with it. He remembered that he knew Li Ye's birthday was on the day of the Spring Festival, and he would come here every year during the Spring Festival.

Around 10 or 11 p.m. on New Year's Eve, Zhou Yuan, along with his parents, went to Li Ye's house to perform the violin and brought some birthday gifts for Li Ye. Only then did they return to the Zhou family next door to spend a complete New Year's Eve.

Ignoring the fact that both sets of parents have tried their best to keep smiling every time they see this scene over the decades, praising the child and giving the child birthday wishes is fine, but being the first to send or receive New Year's greetings is absolutely not allowed.

Every time the countdown begins at midnight, both families still close their doors and spend the New Year alone.

The kitchen was crammed full of food preparation, but the refrigerator had space for a cake. Li Ye glanced at her phone. She hadn't had much rest, and now she had to start working in the kitchen again. Her family's New Year's Eve dinner was at 6 p.m., and the kitchen would be cleaned up by the time she watched the Spring Festival Gala at 8 p.m.

At 5:55, the New Year's Eve dinner, symbolizing perfection, was laid out on the table. Teacher Li also set out the bowls and chopsticks. No one drank alcohol, but two shallow glasses were still poured to honor the ancestors, and the family members' three glasses were filled with grape juice.

At six o'clock, Li Ye played an audio recording of firecrackers, which was considered as a way of celebrating the firecrackers. The family didn't say anything formal and started setting off firecrackers right away.

After systematically finishing off the braised pork knuckle, the meal was almost over. Teacher Li was left to clean up the table, while Li Ye went to the empty pressure cooker to stew chicken soup.

Afterwards, I scrolled through my phone and watched TV, occasionally hearing piano music drifting over from next door. It was eleven o'clock, as agreed.

Zhou Yuan was the first to knock on the door. He was carrying a violin and a heavy box on his back, followed by his parents, who were dressed casually.

"Here you go, it's an early birthday present. You can open it in a bit."

After entering the neighbor's house, adults faced adults, and children faced children. The large box that Zhou Yuan had given them was placed in the dining room with a light touch. It couldn't be anything valuable, could it?

Before Li Ye could think any further, the four adults had already arranged their seats and were ready to enjoy the musical performance. Even Zhou Yuan was standing in the living room with his violin, ready to start at any moment. All that was missing was the protagonist, Li Ye, taking his seat.

The most important thing about performances during the Chinese New Year is that the audience knows something about the show. For example, "The Butterfly Lovers" is a famous piece that is widely used in China, so there are bound to be places where people have heard it before.

Watching Zhou Yuan intently strumming the strings, Li Ye seemed to hear for the first time the emotions in his music that matched the melody: the lightheartedness during his studies, the reluctance during parting, the oppression during his struggle against his family, and finally, the plea when he transformed into a butterfly—a plea for freedom and love.

Unconsciously, Li Ye closed his eyes to feel the music. When he opened his eyes again, the transformation into butterflies had ended, and the love story of Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai had also come to an end.

But Zhou Yuan's gaze was fixed on her, on her face, on her lips. He hoped that those lips would speak now and give him the answer he wanted; he was sure she would understand.

"This time it combines skill and emotion, and it's better than ever before."

Li Ye still avoided answering, but Zhou Yuan was not discouraged. He put away the zither, led people to the restaurant, and pointed to the large box he had brought.

Aren't you curious about the gift?