Chapter 29
Lin Qi picked up the teacup and imitated the way those tea drinkers did. He first looked at the tender green tea leaves unfolding in the cup, then moved closer to the rim of the cup, gently smelled the elegant bean fragrance, and finally took a small sip.
"Is it the Mingqian special grade?" She raised her eyes, looked at Chen Yan, and gave her own judgment, "Light. It's okay."
Chen Yan was already finding it quite amusing to watch her professionally perform the movements of smelling, observing, and tasting the tea. When he heard her accurately pronounce the tea "Mingqian Special Grade" and give it a very restrained "OK" rating, he was taken aback at first, then couldn't help but chuckle.
He thought she was so cute like this.
He shook his head, with complete and undisguised admiration and smile on his face.
"You can even taste this?" He exclaimed in sincere admiration. "If my father knew that you had revealed the secret of his treasure in one gulp, he would probably immediately make you his close friend."
With a joke, he gently connected her and his father, two very important people in his life.
He looked at her, and with a tone that was a bit helpless and indulgent, he continued, "In the end, after all this work, Teacher Lin only gave me an 'okay' evaluation."
He poured himself a glass and took a sip, imitating her.
"It seems," he put down his teacup, looked at her, and said very seriously, "I'm really looking forward to the Lushan Cloud Mist you bring me next time. Let me learn what 'delicious' means."
Lin Qi chuckled, "Then I'm afraid your father will kick you out for casually evaluating his collection as just okay. Actually, I don't really like weak teas. Longjing is usually very weak, so no matter what grade, it's the same to me."
After hearing her subsequent explanation, Chen Yan suddenly understood and nodded.
"I see." He looked at her, a hint of apology in his tone. "It was my negligence. I only wanted to give you what I thought was good, and forgot to ask your preference first."
He said seriously, as if he was saving an important document in his memory, "I've noted it. You like tea with a stronger flavor."
After saying that, Chen Yan glanced towards the kitchen. The aroma of the pot of braised beef in soy sauce had already begun to waft out.
He stood up and walked to the record player.
"We still have about an hour until our 'graduation project' is ready." He turned around and looked at Lin Qi, extending a new invitation, "Would you like to listen to some music first?"
He raised his chin towards the record rack, with a hint of anticipation and a smile in his eyes:
"It's just right. I'll let you check my homework too - see if there are any songs that Teacher Lin likes in the remaining 20%."
"Great!" Lin Qi walked over with great interest. "Whose songs are they?"
Her enthusiastic look made him feel that the old records in his collection seemed to have regained their brilliance today.
Chen Yan smiled and waved at her, asking her to come to him.
He did not directly answer her "Who are they?", but like a tour guide, he took her to the small shelf where Cantonese records were stored.
"Not many," he said modestly at first. "They are all old things I bought one by one in the second-hand market in Shenzhen when I first started working."
His fingers slid across the rows of slightly worn record covers, then he pulled out one and handed it to her.
On the cover, there is a man with picturesque eyebrows and a melancholy temperament.
"For example, this one," he whispered, "Leslie Cheung's 'Summer Romance'."
He looked at her with a hint of smile in his eyes: "This one is considered an entry."
He pointed to the other records on the shelf: "Next to them are some Danny Chan, Anita Mui, and Beyond... They are all tears of that era."
He paused, then added with some regret, "Unfortunately, I still haven't been able to find any good vinyl records of Faye Wong and Priscilla Chan, the ones you said you liked last time."
He still remembered. He remembered the hobbies she mentioned casually, clearly, to this day.
He looked at her, made a "please" gesture, and gave her the choice completely:
"Okay, Teacher Lin. Now, please start your 'review'. Which one would you like to listen to first?"
"Okay, then let's listen to Leslie Cheung's album." Lin Qi made the choice without hesitation.
Chen Yan nodded and took the vinyl record from her hand very carefully.
"Good choice," he said.
He walked over to the record player and, with a touch of ritual and practiced technique, gently wiped the dust off the record with a special velvet cloth. Then, he placed the vinyl record firmly on the turntable and started the machine.
He didn't put down the needle immediately, but turned around to look at Lin Qi and motioned her to sit in the best position on the sofa for listening to music.
After she sat down, he leaned over and placed the needle steadily on the first track of the record.
After a very subtle "crackling" sound with a sense of age, a rhythmic, passionate and slightly unruly prelude instantly filled the entire living room.
It is Leslie Cheung’s classic song “Refuse to Play Again”.
The rhythm of this song and his calm temperament form a very wonderful and harmonious contrast.
Chen Yan didn't say anything, but walked to the single sofa next to her and sat down, leaning back very relaxedly, closing his eyes, as if completely immersed in music and memories.
In the kitchen, the aroma of the pot of braised beef, mixed with the pop music of Hong Kong in the 1980s, fermented a very warm and wonderful homely smell in the whole room.
When the song ended, the needle rose automatically and silence returned to the room.
Chen Yan opened his eyes and looked at Lin Qi. His eyes were filled with a soft nostalgia, stripped of all calmness and restraint.
"When I first came to Shenzhen for an internship, I hadn't graduated yet and my Cantonese was halting," he said softly, as if he was telling a story from long ago.
"At that time, every hair salon and convenience store downstairs in the urban village where I lived played this song."
Lin Qi also looked at him softly, "Sometimes it's like this, the tune of a song, the taste of a song, can be more memorable than the person himself."
Hearing her words, the nostalgic look on Chen Yan's face slowly turned into a very deep and very quiet gaze.
He looked at her as if he was meeting her for the first time.
He had thought that sharing this dusty, somewhat silly past would make him seem a little out of place, but he didn't expect that not only did she not find it childish, but instead, she caught all his emotions with a sentence full of empathy and wisdom.
He leaned back on the sofa and relaxed completely.
"Yes." He agreed with her point very softly but very firmly.
“Because taste and melody are the most honest. They will always stay at that point in time, they won’t lie, and they won’t change.”
He looked at her with an unprecedented gentleness and sincerity in his eyes.
"Until one day," he said in a low voice, as if telling a secret, "the right person dug it out again and gave it new meaning."
He smiled slightly and gave the final answer.
"For example, today."
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