Chapter 26 Even the WeChat step count...
Xu Ji discovered that Tao Siyun was not at home when he couldn't find the WiFi at her home on his phone all night and when he didn't see her in the corridor for two consecutive mornings.
Ever since the last class reunion, Jiang Zhen unilaterally announced that every Saturday would be a "happy day" for them.
In the evening, five people formed a group, and after dinner they found a place to play mahjong.
After several contacts, Li Huan and Ji Yao have become quite familiar with each other and have even become online mahjong partners.
Li Huan moved a stool and sat next to Ji Yao to look at the cards, and the two took turns playing.
"Three!" Jiang Zhen was incredibly lucky today, having won a hand. He proudly displayed his cards on the table, humming a song and shaking his legs as he began to leisurely scroll through his phone. Suddenly, he exclaimed, "Where's Tao Siyun? Where is this location? The view is quite nice."
Li Huan answered without even looking up, "She went to the countryside to sketch. Her school organized a field trip for freshmen in the three provinces south of Huainan, and she's a teaching assistant, so she went along." Li Huan didn't know Xu Ji had moved across the street from Tao Siyun, so she asked curiously, "He's been gone for about ten days now, right? Don't you know? You don't even check your social media?"
Cao Wenzheng was struggling with whether to bet 10,000 or 80,000. He was lost in thought when the mahjong table kept shaking. He scratched his hair in frustration, resigned himself to fate and played a card. Then he kicked Jiang Zhen, "Hey, hey, hey, can you please stop shaking? You're having a seizure!"
"No." Jiang Zhen pulled the corners of his mouth into a smile, winked at the person opposite him, and blew a meaningful whistle.
Xu Ji ignored him.
These days, Tao Siyun is like a travel blogger, taking photos wherever he goes. Every photo he posts is grouped according to color themes, and he changes several of them a day to accurately locate the village.
Every time Li Huan would praise it in various ways, “Beautiful!!” “Love it!!” “Follow me!!”
He is not blind.
I knew it as early as the next day.
He was waiting for the elevator when he saw Tao Siyun's circle of friends and learned her whereabouts from the comments section.
Tao Qian: [Where have you been?]
Tao Siyun: [The school organized us to go sketching in other provinces, which will take about two weeks]
Tao Qian: [Send a route, report daily, pay attention to safety, tell me if you run out of money]
“…”
Generally speaking, in Tao Siyun's opinion, WeChat friends who only like but do not comment are like two people who have not been in contact in real life for a long time and are just doing this out of politeness.
After all, this is now one of the ways for everyone to socialize.
Just a “friend who likes my posts”.
But the other party was Xu Ji.
In Li Huan's words, even after adding him as a friend for many years, don't expect to receive a message from him during holidays, not to mention during normal times, even if it's just a copy-and-paste message like "Happy New Year".
I am too lazy to even be perfunctory and I am always the aloof one in the WeChat list.
So based on this and his understanding of him, Tao Siyun imagined the reaction on his face when he saw his circle of friends flooding with posts.
He might not even bother to click on it to take a look, and would just silently give her a like with an expressionless face, tell her "I've read it", and then swipe away arrogantly.
But if you even like the step count on WeChat for several days in a row...isn't that a bit too polite?
Tao Siyun stared at the hollow icon on the screen that Xu Ji had just liked without blinking. He thought about this and that for a while, and gradually came to his senses amidst Yuan Xiao's complaints. He returned to the WeChat interface and continued to send the photos he had taken today to the classmate who was responsible for writing the content for the official account.
"It's terrible. The bathroom doesn't even have a shower head. It's just a broken plastic pipe. The water is so slow. If you don't know, you would think there's a water shortage here. Can you imagine? Before I could even finish rinsing off the foam on my head, my body was already dry."
Tao Siyun said sympathetically, "Just hold on a little longer, and we'll be in Suiwu tomorrow."
"I'm afraid the more I expect, the greater the disappointment." Yuan Xiao slumped down on the bed, groaning, "I'm so tired, Dad. I think I know why we came here."
"?" Tao Siyun raised his eyes: "What are you doing?"
"Help watch the kids," Yuan Xiao said bitterly, "I have to watch these energetic kids running around everywhere with their sketchpads and paint boxes, disappearing as soon as you're not paying attention."
“…”
"You don't know. When our group was returning this afternoon, we were missing two people during roll call. There was no cell phone signal, and the professor was so anxious that his blood pressure shot up. But the old man, who was already old, was walking briskly, climbing the mountain with us to look for people. His feet were covered in blisters. Is it easy for old people?"
Tao Siyun shook his head and considerately took out a box of throat lozenges and tossed it to her. "Teacher Yuan, it's not easy for you either. Your voice is hoarse from shouting. Have a good rest."
***
Suiwu is the last stop of this trip. It is located at the intersection of three provinces. As the county with the most ancient villages in China, it has beautiful natural scenery.
The homestay is located in Wuwu Village, which is known as the "most beautiful ancient village". The village is built on the mountain and the houses are built in a staggered manner. When you open the window and stand on the roof, you can take in the entire Wuwu scenery.
Especially when the sun is about to set, the afterglow, wrapped in the curling smoke rising in the distance, slowly brings the world's fireworks into an effect of unity of light and scenery, which has the flavor of an old movie.
Tao Siyun was not an art student, so he didn't know there was such a place in Nanze.
It is the sketching season now, and there are not many tourists. Several nearby B&Bs are all occupied by students. In addition to them, there are studio teachers who bring college entrance examination candidates who are participating in training and college students from other art academies.
The owner of the B&B is surnamed Liang. He is quite young, but the way he dresses doesn’t look like a boss. Instead, he looks like a decadent hipster.
All the people who came this time were young people, and it happened to be the village's annual traditional festival. After discussing with several other B&B owners, he planned to organize a barbecue party together in two days.
In the evening, Yuan Xiao visited Tao Siyun's room and held her hand excitedly for a long time——
"Boss Liang and I are actually university classmates! Incredible, right? I've seen his name before in a work I did while I was still in school, and I was wondering why it looked so familiar. Turns out he's a fellow student I've admired for so long!"
"I have always liked his style of painting, but he graduated just when I entered university, and my teacher couldn't contact him. I didn't expect that this time... he actually..." Yuan Xiao covered his face, he was so excited that he couldn't speak.
Seeing her expression, Tao Siyun immediately understood. "It's quite a coincidence. There must be a destiny..." She kindly reminded, "So, do you want to let me go first, then go downstairs and add me on WeChat or something?"
Yuan Xiao nodded, then shook his head. It was obvious that he was struggling. Finally, he said hesitantly, "But I feel embarrassed to be alone. It would be great if someone could accompany me..." After that, he looked at her expectantly.
“…”
Tao Siyun calmly pried her hand away and said with a troubled look on his face, "So, are you planning on letting me go with you?"
"Yeah, yeah." Yuan Xiao nodded frantically like a chicken pecking at rice.
"Then let's make a deal first. I'll just accompany you downstairs. As for the rest, you can handle it yourself."
***
The homestay they stayed in was a three-story courtyard with a large area. There were more than a dozen rooms upstairs and downstairs. There were also a few tabby cats in the yard. People could pet them at will, but they didn't like to talk to people and looked very aloof.
The first floor is a public activity area similar to a living room, with a large rectangular solid wood table in the middle.
When Tao Siyun and Yuan Xiao went downstairs, they happened to see Boss Liang standing next to a fair-skinned girl and talking to her.
Seeing this, Yuan Xiao froze on the stairs, turned around and looked at Tao Siyun with a heartbroken face, unable to move his legs anymore.
Just then, the phone on the table rang, interrupting the conversation between the two people downstairs.
Liang Jin picked up the phone and said "Hello" impatiently.
"How many times a day do you have to check on her? It's endless, isn't it? Your daughter is very well behaved. I watch over her every day. Don't worry, I won't let anyone else between 50 and 15 years old, including my two neutered male cats, stay with her for more than two minutes, except me, okay?"
“…”
The two looked at each other and breathed a sigh of relief almost at the same time. Yuan Xiao silently mouthed to Tao Siyun: I'm scared to death.
Liang Jin rubbed the girl's short hair and hung up the phone without hesitation.
"What did you do to him, girl? Why does he feel so insecure? He calls me every day to check on you." Liang Jin said, "Wait until you reach the legal age and get married quickly. This way, some old man won't be so worried and suspicious all the time..."
The girl's voice was very soft as she retorted: "Who's old? You're old. You two are obviously the same age."
"You're so protective!" Liang Jin covered his heart with one hand and said bitterly, "Manman, Manman, you're making me so sad."
The girl said seriously, "Don't call me that again. Teacher Pei will be angry if he hears it."
Liang Jin: "Are you deliberately showing off your affection in front of me?"
"That's not what I meant. Well, I'll go out to digest my food first. Thank you for the midnight snack. Good night." The girl smiled cunningly and slipped away.
“…”
Only after the girl left the courtyard gate did Yuan Xiao pretend to be calm and go downstairs.
"Boss Liang, what time does the barbecue start? We have students sketching during the day, so we need to let everyone know in advance so they can try to schedule their return time."
Liang Jin was clearing the dishes when he heard the voice and turned around. "Ah, it's around seven or eight o'clock. We can still make it. But you have to come back two hours early to work together. Otherwise, if there aren't enough people and you don't have time to eat, don't blame me!"
"Oh, no problem. Let's add each other on WeChat so we can keep in touch anytime?"
"Okay," Liang Jin picked up the phone on the table and clicked on the WeChat QR code in front of her, "Scan it."
With a "beep" sound, the two successfully added each other as friends.
The whole process was so smooth and natural that Tao Siyun, who was standing by, was full of admiration.
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