Chapter 10
Lin Qi took off her headphones, and the lonely, vast soundscape faded instantly. The lazy jazz music from the record store and the faint sound of traffic outside the window returned to her world.
She seemed to have just woken up from a big dream and was still a little dazed.
She looked at Chen Yan's calm eyes that were filled with exploration and waiting, smiled, and expressed her feelings very frankly.
"It breaks my stereotype of rock music," she said. "This song gives me a blues folk feeling."
This is her rational analysis based on music knowledge.
Then, a cunning light flashed in her eyes, and she threw out her most real and imaginative feelings.
"Besides," she said with a smile, a hint of pride in her tone, "I feel like I'm walking on the streets of old Beijing in the 1980s, waiting for an old man playing the erhu to tell me a story."
The moment she finished speaking, Chen Yan listened quietly, his eyebrows raised in surprise. Then, without warning, a very genuine, even brilliant, smile bloomed clearly on his face.
This smile diluted all his innate alienation and calmness, making him look particularly lively and bright.
"Blues folk songs...you're right." He first acknowledged her professional analysis.
Then, as if savoring it, he repeated the second half of her description in a low voice: "Old Beijing in the 1980s, the uncle playing the erhu..."
He shook his head, his eyes almost overflowing with smile and admiration.
"I've heard it for so many years," he said, looking at her in a very sincere tone, "and I've never thought of this picture."
"Your association," he offered the highest praise, "is much more interesting than the album cover itself."
He carefully removed the vinyl record from the audio player, wiped it clean with a velvet cloth, and carefully placed it back into its sleeve. This action was filled with the reverence one would have for a treasure.
He held the Pink Floyd and looked at the book and the Bach record in her arms.
"Alright," he said, as if giving a final verdict on today's "exam." "Second guess, you're right."
He paused and put the record back to its original place.
"As for the third one..." He turned his head and looked at her, naturally leaving a suspense for the future.
"Shall we find another opportunity to verify it next time?"
He said this lightly, but it was like a stone with a hook thrown into the center of a lake.
This is not a question.
This is an appointment with complete certainty about "next time".
Lin Qi was stunned at first, then he burst out laughing, his eyebrows curved like a crescent moon.
"Why," she pretended to sigh, but her tone was full of laughter, "you want to keep it a suspense?"
"Okay." She cooperated very well, took up his suspense, and also drew inferences from his experience and threw back one of her own.
"Next time, I'll explain to you why I chose these three books."
Hearing her words, Chen Yan was stunned for a moment, then burst out laughing. It was a low, chest-deep laugh filled with pure joy.
He looked at her pretending to sigh and shook his head, unable to hide the smile in his eyes.
"We have to leave a reason to look forward to our next meeting," he said slowly, with a hint of tenderness in his tone that he himself hadn't noticed.
He took her "complaint" and turned it into something close to a confession.
Then, he looked at the book in her arms and nodded cooperatively: "Okay. I'll remember this agreement."
He glanced at the books in her arms and his own empty hands, and frankly admitted, "To be honest, my curiosity about your three books now exceeds the remaining 20%."
"Let's go," he gestured towards the cashier nearby, "go check out. Otherwise, the suspense we're in will affect the owner of this store as well."
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