Chapter 8. When we were both nineteen…
Xu Yuewei glanced at Zhou Xu with some gratitude.
Even if she was selfish, after seeing Meng Jiao's billboard, she had the energy to fight this tug-of-war that had been dormant for years.
Naïve, doesn't want to lose.
Zhou Xu touched his nose: "Sorry for bumping into you earlier. I saw someone selling flowers at the entrance and wanted to apologize."
Xu Yuewei gave Zhou Xu a slightly stiff smile, brushing a strand of hair that had fallen across her forehead as she walked behind the counter, asking casually, "Have you finished handing out all the flyers?"
Zhou Xu laughed heartily: "Yes, there are only a few left, they'll all be sent out in a bit."
He then walked to the counter, and with his other hand behind his back, he magically produced two more flowers and handed them to Xiao Han: "I bought three, I'll give one to each of you."
Xiao Han exclaimed in surprise, "Wow, I have one too? Thank you!"
Zhou Xu leaned on the counter, sticking out his tongue like a large dog: "I should thank my sisters for taking care of me, haha."
Xu Yuewei quietly moved behind the counter.
...It turns out she wasn't the only one with it.
She wasn't disappointed by it; her negative emotions were entirely due to embarrassment. She didn't dare look in the direction of table number 9, afraid of seeing his mocking smile that suggested she was deluding herself.
Zhou Xu bought three kinds of roses: white, red, and pink. He gave the pink ones to her, the white ones to Xiao Han, and the red ones to Song Jinshu, whose whereabouts were unknown.
Xiao Han exclaimed, "Ah... I don't like white."
"Then I'll switch with you." Xu Yuewei glanced at Zhou Xu. "No objections, right?"
Zhou Xu generously said it didn't matter, he could put all three flowers in a vase and put them in the shop.
As he was about to walk towards the kitchen, Xu Yuewei grabbed his clothes and pulled him back, saying, "We have a big order, come and help."
The customers at table number 9 ordered two of each of the desserts on the menu.
There were more than a dozen desserts to choose from, and it was quite a hassle to select and adjust the quantity one by one. It's amazing he had the patience.
"There's only one sea salt dessert left. Go ask the customer if they need a different one," Xu Yuewei instructed Zhou Xu as she served desserts onto the tray.
Zhou Xu pointed to himself: "Me?"
Xu Yuewei nodded: "Go quickly."
Soon, Zhou Xu returned, his eyes wide open and his expression strange.
Xu Yuewei just thought she should ask him to ask if he needed any takeout, but just then, a new order came in, this time for a bunch of coffee.
Xiao Han's mouth formed an "O" shape: "Are you here to cause trouble? Quickly call Boss Song back!"
Xu Yuewei turned to Zhou Xu and asked, "What did he say?"
“He said,” Zhou Xu squeezed out the words, his index finger pointing sharply at her, “to get something you like to eat…”
Xiao Han covered her mouth and burst out laughing. She leaned close to Xu Yuewei's ear and whispered, "What a lame tactic. This adds another piece of evidence that men are uniformly controlled by the Y chromosome."
Xu Yuewei's tense nerves relaxed for a moment, and she smiled: "Which one was the most expensive again?"
Zhou Xu's eyes widened to their maximum: "So that's how it is...!"
Xiao Han gave an exaggerated thumbs-up: "Great! I like bad women."
The three of them whispered among themselves like three mice.
Zhou Xu was helping Xiao Han make coffee, while the work of packing desserts fell entirely on Xu Yuewei's shoulders. She was working at a leisurely pace when suddenly a man's voice rang out from ahead:
Do you need help?
Xu Yuewei was carefully dragging the triangular cake into the plastic box when her hand trembled, almost scraping off the cream.
“No need,” she said.
Jiang Shiyan glanced at her: "You're too slow, I'm in a hurry."
He walked along the glass counter to a spot next to her, picked up a piece of unshaped plastic she had stacked beside her, and rubbed it between his fingers until it became three-dimensional.
Some people just stand there, without making any big movements, yet they exude a strong sense of presence.
Xu Yuewei slowed down her packing movements slightly. The half of her body closest to him seemed rusty, and each breath she took was accompanied by a controlled rise and fall of her chest.
They couldn't help but wonder why he ordered so much food, especially so many desserts, but they didn't dare to ask, even if they just casually asked.
Xu Yuewei secretly glanced at him out of the corner of her eye, trying to find some clues on her own, such as the doting smile that unconsciously appeared when buying desserts for her lover.
But no, he remained expressionless, radiating a natural dislike for these sweets.
The three roses, which were originally placed on her left, are now sandwiched between them, getting in the way.
Xu Yuewei planned to finish wrapping the one she was working on and then move the rest aside. But just then, she saw Jiang Shiyan take out another piece of compressed packaging. The sharp edge of the plastic sheet accidentally hit the base of the pink rose, and the rose slid a lot to the edge, with the flower head facing outwards, about to fall off.
"Why!"
She managed to free one hand to block the man who was attacking her, but it was too late.
The rhythm card struck precisely the second. As the rose fell to the ground, Jiang Shiyan swayed very naturally, as if he had just adjusted his posture because he was tired of standing. However, the tip of his shoe stepped right on the flower.
Jiang Shiyan's gaze lingered on the hand that was supporting his arm for a moment before he slowly moved his foot away. On the floor lay a pink rose, looking disheveled.
If you ignore the shattered ice-like wrinkles on the plastic packaging and the flat, specimen-like flowers, you can pick them up and pretend nothing happened.
The culprit, holding the flower stem, let a few petals fall: "Sorry, I didn't see them."
Xiao Han and Zhou Xu also turned to look, but dared not speak out in anger.
Xu Yuecang snatched the flower from his hand, threw it into the trash can, and said to Xiao Han, "I accidentally knocked it over. I'll buy you another one later."
Xiao Han said no need, but Jiang Shiyan propped up his eyelids and looked at the two red and white roses on the table.
A slender hand pushed them inwards, then simply picked them up and placed them upright in the gap between the freezer and the cash register.
He looked away, only to see the back of her head flash past his eyes.
Xu Yuewei went to the kitchen to get an ice pack, and when she came back, the man was gone.
Where are the others?
"They just went out." Xiao Han frowned. "Who were they?"
Jiang Shiyan returned quickly, carrying a bunch of flowers in his arms.
They were all dumbfounded, staring blankly as he approached.
Xiao Han: "Sir, what's wrong with you...?"
Jiang Shiyan picked out an identical pink rose and handed it to her: "This is to make it up to you."
It was placed on the table directly in front of her.
Then, carrying a large bouquet of flowers, he walked towards Xu Yuewei. The guests at that table who were watching the commotion became even more excited and all turned their heads in his direction.
"How about a tenfold compensation for any damage?"
He bought many roses of different colors, as well as daisies and bellflowers, but they all blurred into a blur in her eyes.
Only a few sunflowers in the middle, with their fiery petals, bloomed as the most dazzling presence.
For a period of time, Xu Yuewei enjoyed painting, and the flower she painted most often was the sunflower.
Because it's simple and easy to draw.
However, when Jiang Shiyan mistakenly thought it was her "favorite" flower, she did not explain.
She doesn't have her favorite flower, her favorite dish, her favorite type of music, her favorite season, or any of those things.
Once something becomes your "favorite," the moment that thing changes or you lose it will be especially painful.
Call her a worrier or a pragmatist, that's just how she is.
Xu Yuewei shifted her gaze away from that bright yellow, and now her vision was filled with black again—the color of his overcoat and trousers, the color of his entire being.
In my memory, he wasn't someone who liked wearing dark clothes, but both times he wore black and gray.
She heard her own voice was cold, which actually matched the color scheme quite well.
"No need. As you can see, our shop doesn't have the conditions to grow flowers."
Jiang Shiyan didn't care: "Then just throw it away."
Xiao Han and Zhou Xu were practically dumbfounded.
With a cold expression, Xu Yuewei accepted the bouquet and walked towards the onlookers: "Hello, would you like some flowers?"
She gave away all the sunflowers.
*
The drinks were finally ready, but Jiang Shiyan took the desserts to the car first.
When he returned, Xu Yuewei had already put on her coat, carrying five drink takeout bags in each hand, and said indifferently, "I'll take you."
Jiang Shiyan stared at her for two seconds before slowly turning around.
The leather shoes made a distinctive sound on the softly lit tiles, the rhythm like a person's steady heartbeat.
He went out first, holding the door open until she came out too.
The glass door closed, the soothing music stopped abruptly, and was replaced by the sounds of tires screeching against the ground, motorcycle horns, and pedestrians talking on their phones as they walked—the so-called urban noise.
My mood became inexplicably irritable.
Jiang Shiyan hadn't taken more than a few steps when he suddenly turned around and stopped.
"I remember you said you have a younger brother." He glanced at Zhou Xu through the semi-transparent glass. "Is it him?"
"...Why do you ask that?"
“You seem to be accommodating to him,” he said in a calm, even voice. “It’s a healthy sibling relationship.”
"You guessed wrong, it's not."
She noticed that the shape of his lower eyelids had deepened, as if he were smiling, but there was no real smile in his eyes.
Xu Yuewei frowned slightly, unable to guess what he meant.
Was it because Zhou Xu offended him when he asked about the second cup being half price?
As the assistant owner of Mist Café, Xu Yuewei defended Zhou Xu without thinking: "He's only nineteen years old, don't take it personally with a child."
To everyone's surprise, Jiang Shiyan chuckled, "Kid? When you and I were nineteen..."
They slept together.
He paused at the crucial moment, his gaze passing over her head and shooting toward the uninvited guest a few steps behind.
Zhou Xu froze, his upper body leaning out and bracing against the shop door, while his lower body was stuck inside.
"I……"
He stiffly raised his hand, the white roses shimmering in the sunlight, the plastic packaging crumpled into shards like crushed ice from his grip.
"I see you've taken off your apron, are you about to leave work?"
Xu Yuewei nodded, reassuring him: "I remember tonight is your welcome party, I will go."
"Not this one." Zhou Xu walked towards her, holding the flower. "The flower will wilt overnight. Aren't you taking it with you?"
He rarely uses rhetorical questions to make requests, and he is unusually indirect.
Xu Yuewei had no third hand to take the flowers. As she hesitated, Zhou Xu stepped forward and put the flowers into the pocket of her coat.
"I won't help you carry it over." Zhou Xu nodded, seemingly agreeing with something.
"Okay, see you tomorrow."
Why didn't you help her carry it over?
Jiang Shiyan suddenly spoke, his question sounding like a command. Zhou Xu met his indifferent peach blossom eyes when he wasn't smiling, and for some reason, his body obeyed first.
"Then... sister, I'll carry half for you."
The three of them turned the corner, and Jiang Shiyan's car was parked on the side of the road. The scratches on the front of the car had disappeared.
In the end, she paid for the car repairs herself and didn't call the police, as she has always disliked trouble and entanglement.
But right now, the biggest problem is right next to her.
Jiang Shiyan had already unlocked the car door. Zhou Xu walked quickly ahead of them, while Xu Yuewei deliberately slowed down and lowered her voice, saying, "Why did you say those kinds of things?"
"Which sentence?" The man glanced at her. "You don't want him to come over?"
"The sentence before that."
What did I say?
Xu Yuewei couldn't repeat herself, but if you insist on nitpicking every word, then he really didn't say anything.
It was just that I emphasized "you and me" in front of someone I had no connection with.
She stopped speaking, and in the silence, she felt someone touch her fingers and flinched.
Jiang Shiran reached for the coffee hanging on her left hand; the three insulated bags were hanging on her three fingers, and she touched them one by one.
Index finger, middle finger, and ring finger.
The bag wobbled, but luckily the drinks were all in cup holders and didn't spill.
The man's fingertips brushed across her palm, and her slightly cold hand suddenly warmed up quickly. When the weight was removed, she felt her hand was both hot and numb.
It turns out that the temperature rise was caused by blood returning to the body.
She made a few gentle stretching and bending motions with her fingers, then transferred one of the two bags she was carrying in her right hand to her left.
He opened his mouth, but couldn't utter the words "Please have some self-respect".
After all, he didn't do anything.
I was just being kind by sharing another half of her weight.
In the end, Xu Yuewei simply lowered her head, quickened her pace, and silently distanced herself from him.
A note from the author:
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Pull~ Pull~ Pull~ Pull~
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