Yang Sisi's tendency to mask her pessimism with laughter made me feel sorry for her, but I couldn't bring myself to say anything to flatter or comfort her. So I changed the subject, looking at her motorcycle and saying, "This motorcycle looks pretty cool. When did you buy it?"
"I picked it up secondhand from a friend." After a slight pause, she added, "I'm someone who's about to leave Dali, so I'm not going to waste money on a new one."
"It's good, it's good... secondhand is good too!"
Yang Sisi was getting a little annoyed, and then complained to me, "Can you stop making small talk? I hate it when you talk like this!"
"Who's just giving you the runaround?... I'm genuinely interested in this motorcycle. I was the one riding it the whole time, and it's in really good condition."
"Then I'll sell it to you."
"How much?"
"Twelve thousand, no bargaining."
“You can’t charge an exorbitant price just because I’m interested… At this price, I can buy a new car at any dealership in the city.”
Yang Sisi looked at me with disdain and replied, "You bumpkin, do you even know what kind of car this is? I'll give you 12,000 yuan right now, and you still can't buy a used one."
"I really don't know. Can you broaden my horizons?"
“Look closely… This is Kawasaki Ninja. In the entire Dali, there are no more than five women who can handle her, and I am one of them.”
I looked at Yang Sisi, then at the motorcycle known as the Kawasaki Ninja. It was true that without very long legs, one couldn't handle it. But I didn't praise her for that. I just nodded to show that I believed her, and then intermittently fell into silence.
Yang Sisi was silent for a moment, then seemed to remember something and asked me, "You just told Cao Xiaobei that you had your eye on a batch of shops in Jiulongju. What did you mean by that?"
"The inn is about to be demolished, so I'm looking for something else to do."
"You're really unlucky... of all the shops you could have chosen, you had to go for that old bastard Cao Jinbo's!"
“His family is very wealthy. They not only own houses in Jiulongju, but also more than a dozen shops on the bar street. If you want to do business well in Dali, you will have to deal with him sooner or later. So I don’t think I’m that unlucky… Besides, have you ever seen a business that goes smoothly?”
"Just try to comfort yourself."
I smiled, but a trace of melancholy lingered in my heart. A money-making opportunity seemed to have been driven into a dead end by this dramatic turn of events, and now the only hope was to wait for Cao Jinbo to return so I could talk to him in person…
In my daze, Yang Sisi tentatively said to me, "How about I go and talk to Cao Xiaobei?"
"Come on... You just portrayed yourself as his mortal enemy in front of him... and now you're going back to beg him? Are you really not going to care about saving face?"
Yang Sisi ignored him and came up with a twisted argument: "I was blinded by hatred just now. Now that I think about it, if I can use the resources of my enemy to make some money for myself, it would be a small revenge."
"Why do you always think about problems in such a bizarre way... If I could think like you, I wouldn't have been struggling with this before!"
So you agree to me doing this?
“I didn’t agree… and you’re not allowed to get involved in this.”
Are you afraid I can't handle Cao Xiaobei?
"I'm afraid Cao Xiaobei won't be able to handle you... and you'll end up with a mountain of debt..."
"If I repay you with my body, can I ever repay you?"
After Yang Sisi finished speaking, she looked at me with an all-knowing gaze. Of course, I knew what she meant by saying that. She was just joking and being stubborn with me. I knew her too well. She would never actually repay someone with her body because she owed them something. Xiao Bao was the best example... She herself said that Xiao Bao was probably the best man in the world to her, but she was only touched and never thought about becoming Xiao Bao's woman.
With that in mind, I said to her, "Stop joking. I'll handle this myself... If it really doesn't work out, I can choose not to do this business, rather than getting you involved and complicating something that was originally simple."
Unexpectedly, Yang Sisi had already stopped dwelling on the matter before me and instead asked, "What kind of person do you think Cao Xiaobei is?"
"Are you referring to simply good people or bad people?"
"Um?"
I pulled out a cigarette, lit it, took a deep drag, and then replied, "If he's a bad person, he's only bad on the surface, unlike his father who's evil to the core and so cunning... If he's a good person, I haven't had much contact with him, so I haven't seen his good side yet... Actually, you should know him better than I do."
“He’s a man who’s both good and bad…so I’ve never really hated him…” After a short pause, Yang Sisi said in a low voice, “Because I’ve seen his good side…I can’t believe he’s Cao Jinbo’s son. He’s actually more innocent than most people. He says what he thinks and never hides anything.”
I laughed and said, "Isn't that just like you... You always try to make yourself look obviously bad, but deep down you're a simple person."
"No, I'm not simple, not simple at all... Sometimes I think more than you seemingly complicated people."
"Maybe..."
...
In reality, Yang Sisi and I didn't have much substantive communication, but after leaving her, my mood inexplicably fell into a complex vortex. I always felt that those people in this world who seem stereotypical are far more sorrowful than we perceive. Like Yang Sisi, perhaps in the quiet of the night, she also feels helpless when thinking about her life. She is not as carefree as she seems; deep down, she may have a stronger "will to survive" than I do now. This will to survive arises in the process of pursuing change. Although it is not as unbearable, it is still painful enough!
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