Chapter 30: Resentful Couple
Hearing the door close, Hang Liumei got up from the bed and asked, "Is he back home?" Hearing the two of them say yes, she felt relieved and slipped back to the sofa to watch TV.
Pu Zhihe walked to the balcony, picked up the cigarette butt Zhu Fu had just thrown from the flowerpot, and threw it away. She then went to the kitchen to get some water. Xiaomai was washing fruit beside her. She put the kettle on the socket, waiting for the water to boil. She tried to chat with him: "Were you guys chatting just now?"
"Well, he asked me if I smoked, if I was in a relationship, and so on."
Pu Zhihe thought Zhu Fu was a gossipy person, so she asked, "Have you answered him yet?"
"I told you I'm not in a relationship. He said it's fine if I don't, no one cares."
"Don't listen to him. Dating is good." Pu Zhihe added, "The most important thing is that people are changeable, but it's difficult for others to change them. Forget it, we're a couple, don't listen to our random advice. These things are learned naturally, and it's pointless to try to follow someone else's advice."
"So what do you like about him?"
"Hmm?" Pu Zhihe didn't understand why he asked this.
"Whether you're teaching, painting, or working with grandma, you're always efficient and clear about what you want. Then, when we met Brother Zhu at the restaurant, you told me he was your boyfriend, which I found very awkward. You're very relaxed about everything else, except this one."
The weather forecast predicted a torrential downpour tonight, and Xiaomai had just opened the kitchen window. Outside, the sky was overcast and windy, and the darkened kitchen was gloomy. A flash of lightning split the sky, and he lowered his head to cut the fruit, his back to the light.
Pu Zhihe couldn't see his expression, but his tone didn't sound like a male college student curious about her love life, but rather like a peer. But Xiaomai still didn't understand her well enough. She came to their house because she didn't know what she wanted.
"People are likely to fall in love with someone who has nothing to do with their initial fantasy image. Zhu Fu was definitely not my ideal type at first. At first, he was delivering love letters for my roommate, but he sent my letter to the wrong person, which led to someone else being together. But then he ended up pursuing me. He was so silly, but I found him very interesting, and then I suddenly decided to give it a try."
"Actually, we were together for a very short time. We've been in a long-distance relationship since I graduated from university and went abroad. I didn't think about him much when I was abroad. I went to class, painted, and traveled every day. When friends asked me if I had a boyfriend, I realized, oh, I have one, and he's still in my hometown. But I've never been two-timing, so I'm not too bad, right?"
"He was a very good playmate when we were in school, but not anymore later on. In the end, the gap between the two of us became bigger and bigger, and it became what you see." After Pu Zhihe finished speaking, she realized that her story with Zhu Fu was so short and simple, and it was indeed useless.
Xiaomai asked, have you thought about the future?
She said, "I also want to end this relationship smoothly. I don't want to hurt anyone, but it seems like now whatever I do will hurt someone else. This person could be Zhu Fu or my parents. You think I'm cool because I'm only concerned with other people's affairs. I didn't expect my own situation to be so difficult."
Xiaomai finished cutting a whole plate of watermelon and began to wash the knife and chopping board: "Grandma said that when working with people, it is taboo to talk too much, but I still want to say that he may want to marry you, but it seems that he does not need you." After saying that, he handed Pu Zhihe a piece of watermelon and walked out of the kitchen.
Today, everyone from Hang Liumei to Xiaomai had been urging her to make a decision soon. Everyone else could see clearly that she was too indecisive. She laughed inwardly at herself, thinking she was just a paper tiger, using her own opinions on small matters while always waiting for fate to help her with the bigger things like marriage. But the bigger the matter, the less help she could rely on, so she had to go ahead with her own instincts. This time, she was really going to leave.
A few days later, Qi Xiuchun called. Pu Zhihe was playing the radio program loudly in the living room, and Hang Liumei was listening with bated breath.
Qi Xiuchun said, "This bracelet can't be made. The painting only shows half of it, but your pattern is not symmetrical. I need the artist to come to me to confirm it."
Pu Zhihe looked at Hang Liumei's expression and said, "Okay, sure. Then when will you come to see me?"
I'll call you in a few days. I'm out of town looking at goods recently. I'll contact you when I get back to Xi'an. Qi Xiuchun's signal was bad on the other end, so he hung up when the deal was almost settled.
"Oh my god, is Sister Xiuchun going to see me?" Hang Liumei stood up from the sofa, rubbing her hands and circling around the coffee table. "Do you think she wants to come back to me to settle old scores or reconcile? She, why doesn't she just say it? We're all so old and she's still beating around the bush!"
Pu Zhihe and Xiaomai both said that she was as embarrassed as you are, so this is perfect, you can use this painting to express yourself, and maybe you can even finish it together.
Hang Liumei grabbed a handful of hair and said, "I don't even dare to think about it." She was at a loss, so she looked up the almanac, first to see if today was auspicious or inauspicious, then to calculate which day would be auspicious in a few days.
In the evening, Zhu Fu contacted Pu Zhihe again and asked if she wanted the diamond ring from the proposal day. If she didn't like it, she could return it. She didn't want to waste such a valuable item. The two met at a restaurant.
"You're not satisfied with that proposal, right? When I was preparing, I hesitated whether I should have fewer people come. When I saw your expression that day, I knew I was wrong. Is there anything else you don't like besides this?" Zhu Fu crossed his fingers and leaned his arms on the table, his words sounding sincere.
"If I really wanted to get married, I could propose to you, or I could just go to the Civil Affairs Bureau and get the marriage certificate someday on a whim. But," Pu Zhihe leaned back in her chair with her arms folded, "I told you to wait until Teacher Hang and I were done with the exhibition. Why can't you do that? Why can't you ever understand me? Or do you just not care about my decision?"
Zhu Fu turned his head away speechlessly, exhaled deeply, and tapped the table with his index finger. "What's the difference between doing these things now and doing them later? Why can't we work and live at the same time? Or will you be busy with other things after the exhibition is over? Does that mean you don't want to marry me at all?"
"I thought about getting married before, but that was because I was naive back then and thought marriage was something that should happen naturally when you reach a certain age. But I don't think so now. Zhu Fu, you and I are no longer suitable for marriage."
"Why? Pu Zhihe, I really don't understand you. Because you've met this senior you admire and are closer to your dream, you feel like you can live a life of seclusion? I've always been very supportive of you. You're such a talented person, but you didn't continue working and instead went into creative art. Now you're almost thirty and haven't become a great painter. It's time to be realistic. It's just that your family has been too permissive and you're too bookish. Alas, you're from a merchant family, so you don't have a long-term vision."
"Who are you talking about, you who's giving orders? Why should I do something just because I'm thirty? You're almost thirty, and I haven't commented on you even though you're in your current state. What gives you the right to keep asking me for things?" Pu Zhihe spoke harshly, and Zhu Fu's arrogance retreated.
The waiter came with the food and both of them fell silent for a moment.
After the outsiders left, she said self-deprecatingly: "The opportunity to be with Teacher Hang is so important to me, but you only care about me having enough food, clothes, and a husband to marry, and you don't bother to think about anything else."
Zhu Fu leaned back in his chair, rubbed his face, and ran his fingers through his hair. "Because I really don't know what you're thinking. I don't even know what you mean by that."
"Zhu Fu, you are just mechanically following the steps of a relationship and not treating me as a special person. In other words, you like me very much, but you don't understand me and don't want to understand me. There is no point in the two of us wasting time." Pu Zhihe has calmed down.
"Now you're accusing me, right? The problem you're talking about is simply because we didn't spend enough time together. Feelings tend to become dull, and all love turns into family affection. It's impossible for us, in our thirties and forties, to still be the same as we were in college. People like that are sick, you know."
Zhu Fu stuffed a large piece of meat into his mouth and started chewing. Then he suddenly took out a ring, opened it, and placed it on the table. "Take another look at this. If you're sure you don't want it, I'll return it. If not, I can still change the size and style."
Pu Zhihe said without even looking at the ring: "Return it."
"What about the three golds? You're not even looking at the three golds anymore?" Zhu Fu asked. He suddenly thought of something. "You're not really interested in that ancient gold at the wedding expo, are you?"
She was discussing something seriously with him, but he didn't listen to a word she said. Instead, he was concerned about a bracelet. Seeing his ridiculous anxious look, Pu Zhihe admitted without hesitation: "Yes, I want to buy that, and I have already placed an order with the owner of that store."
Zhu Fu immediately became anxious: "Already decided? Why didn't you discuss it with me? Which one did you decide on, the 20,000 or the 30,000? Or was it the 40,000?"
"I don't know the final price yet. I ordered it specially, so I won't know until it's finished."
"Ah?" Zhu Fu's voice suddenly rose. He stared at her for a few seconds before finally making up his mind to ask, "You're in such a hurry to buy this for yourself, don't you think what we've prepared for you is too little?"
Pu Zhihe was amused by him. "Oh my god, Zhu Fu, your reasoning is that I'm using a bracelet to force you to raise the price, right? Your brain can only accept such a reason, right?"
"Isn't that the situation now? You don't like wearing those things, so why did you order such an expensive luxury item? You buy this, and then I take out my own things. If outsiders see it, won't they say that the things our family prepared for the wedding are not as good as what you bought casually? It would be so embarrassing for me if word got out."
Zhu Fu finished speaking in one breath, then took a sip of tea to calm his anger. "You and I are ordinary people, so let's just live our lives normally. I think it's you—you should just stop reading those opposing views online. They're just talking and then eating and drinking, disrupting our lives to the point where we can't even live."
Pu Zhihe pulled out her phone to scan the QR code to pay, then stood up, pulled out a napkin to wipe her mouth, crumpled it up, and tossed it onto Zhu Fu's plate. She said condescendingly, "Then we'll call it quits, Zhu Fu. The world out there is too dangerous these days. You must be wary of bad guys like us. Don't let me take the lives of the old Zhu family."
After saying that, she left the restaurant without looking back.
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