Chapter 357 Single
Li Xiaoxuan, afraid that Nan Zhiyi would feel slighted, quickly tried to smooth things over, glaring at Zhou Xingzhi: "Xingzhi, if you keep being so sarcastic, what good girl would dare to talk to you? You can kill a perfectly good conversation with you, you deserve to be single forever."
Zhou Xingzhi seemed not to hear the ridicule, slowly played a "seven of bamboo" card without even raising his eyelids, and said, "Oh."
His stubbornness made Li Xiaoxuan laugh in exasperation. She simply ignored him and turned to Nan Zhiyi and Zhang Yueran, saying:
"Zhiyi, Yueran, don't be polite with him. He's not good at cards, so let's just focus on him winning today. When Sister Sun comes later, I'll kick him out and tell him to go somewhere cool!"
Nan Zhiyi smiled and teased her, "Well, Xiaoxuan has learned to kick away the ladder after crossing the river. I've learned another trick from you today."
Li Xiaoxuan proudly raised her chin, but when she turned her gaze to Zhang Yueran, she found that the girl was staring at the cards in front of her, her eyes fixed on them, and she didn't move for a long time, her cheeks flushed.
Zhang Yueran's mind raced... He was single...
Li Xiaoxuan assumed she was nervous as a beginner and softened her voice: "Yueran, are you unsure which card to choose? Let your sister help you take a look."
She reassured her, "It's okay, we're just playing around. Winning or losing doesn't matter. Don't be nervous..."
"No, don't be nervous! I know which one it will be!"
Zhang Yueran was startled. After regaining her senses, she stammered a denial.
She quickly glanced at the cards, drew one, but dared not throw it on the table like the others, for fear of accidentally hitting Zhou Xingzhi across from her.
You can only carefully push the cards to the center of the table, the movement so light it's almost silent.
Zhou Xingzhi raised his eyes and glanced at Zhang Yueran very quickly.
That gaze was indifferent and cold, devoid of any emotion; it was just a brief glance, or perhaps even an unconscious sweep.
But Zhang Yueran felt that the look in her eyes carried a tangible warmth, making her fingertips feel a dense, burning sensation.
She lowered her eyes, trying her best to control herself and focus all her attention on the cards in front of her.
She felt her cheeks were still burning, and could only secretly cool them with the back of her hand by gathering her hair.
She dared not look up, especially not in the opposite direction, for fear that her gaze might drift uncontrollably over there and be caught by him, which would be truly humiliating.
Nan Zhiyi glanced at her younger sister a few times and saw that her face was only slightly red and she was pursing her lips, looking like she was seriously studying the game. She thought to herself that this girl was still as competitive as ever, so engrossed in playing a small game of mahjong. She felt relieved and continued chatting with Li Xiaoxuan.
Zhou Xingzhi maintained his nonchalant and casual demeanor throughout, leaning slightly against the back of his chair as he drew, examined, and played cards with unhurried movements.
He would occasionally nod slightly at Li Xiaoxuan or Nan Zhiyi's words, but most of the time he just listened quietly.
At the entire card table, it seemed that only Zhang Yueran was suffering from a restless and agonizing state of mind.
Her brain seemed to be split in two, one half mechanically identifying card patterns and calculating the probability of winning;
The other half, uncontrollably, captured every subtle movement of Zhou Xingzhi: how his slender fingers lightly tapped the cards, the occasional low murmur of him announcing the cards, and even his extremely faint breathing.
Every time he made the slightest move, her heartstrings tightened, filled with both longing and fear.
During a break from shuffling the deck, Li Xiaoxuan talked about her family: "...My mother-in-law complained about the noise at home recently, so she moved to a cadre sanatorium in Xishan. It's quiet there, and she has a few old friends to keep her company. Since she went there, she's actually been in much better spirits than when she was at home."
As she spoke, she began to complain about Qin Fen, "Since my mother-in-law left, Qin Fen has become even more unruly. Yesterday, after get off work, he invited a bunch of people over, and they made a ruckus until midnight. This morning, look, he called over these same people again. Even Xingzhi, who usually seems to live among those old wooden shacks and is practically unknown, was dragged here by him..."
As she said this, her eyes swept over Zhou Xingzhi, who had no expression on his face.
Zhou Xingzhi's eyebrows twitched. "Mrs. Li is mistaken. Qin Fen invited me three or four times this time, so I guess I came on my own initiative to join in his antics."
Li Xiaoxuan was surprised and pressed, "Oh? Has the sun risen in the west? Tell me quickly, why did you volunteer to join in this fun? What kind of magic does Qin Fen have?"
Zhou Xingzhi slowly raised his eyes: "He asked me to demonstrate the optimal solution for the friction of the chessboard track and the cueing angle, saying that the loser would have to supply the Xishan Farm with strawberries for the next six months. I gave him a rough estimate, considering the elastic deformation of the cue stick and the uneven wear of the velvet table surface, that the 'sure-win' angle he mentioned wasn't much more likely to win than a Thirteen Orphans game. He found me boring, so he let me go."
Li Xiaoxuan only half understood what she heard, and when she heard "Thirteen Orphans", she pouted and said, "That's right, Mahjong is a national treasure, much more interesting than those foreign things!"
Nan Zhiyi did take a special look at Zhou Xingzhi, as he knew physics.
Zhang Yueran, who had been on edge the whole time, understood the dry humor hidden in Zhou Xingzhi's words.
She never expected that Zhou Xingzhi, who seemed as pure and serene as a snow-capped mountain and the bright moon, would make such a sly and mischievous joke, speaking in such a serious tone while saying such playful things.
She wanted to laugh, but she pursed her lips to suppress the smile, afraid of offending him.
Zhou Xingzhi noticed that his gaze had finally fallen formally into her eyes.
His gaze was clear and bright, as if it could see through all pretense.
Zhang Yueran's heart stopped beating suddenly.
She instinctively wanted to look away, but forced herself to pretend to look away naturally, though the fingertips holding the cards trembled slightly uncontrollably.
Just then, a few hearty laughs came from outside the side hall, accompanied by approaching footsteps.
Li Xiaoxuan called out, "Oh, Sister Sun is finally here! Come on, Zhiyi, Yueran, let's finish this round quickly so we can put Xingzhi back."
Sister Sun led a young woman in. The woman was about twenty-six or twenty-seven years old, and her eyes and brows exuded a pampered arrogance.
Seeing that the people at the card table were about to get up, Sister Sun quickly waved her hand and said, "Don't be shy, don't be shy, let's finish this round first."
The girl next to her greeted her with a smile, "Xiaoxuan, long time no see!"
Li Xiaoxuan smiled faintly and responded, then introduced the two: "Vera, this is Comrade Nan Zhiyi, my good friend. That is her sister, Comrade Zhang Yueran. Both sisters are top students from Peking University."
She then turned to Nan Zhiyi, "Zhiyi, Yueran, this is Lin Weila, a sister from a family that has been friends for generations. Her father works in the Ministry of Light Industry, and Weila works at the Cultural Exchange Center under the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Her husband is also in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs."
Upon hearing this, Nan Zhiyi and Zhang Yueran both greeted them politely.
"Hello, Comrade Lin."
Lin Weila smiled brightly, her gaze sweeping across the card table before landing on Zhou Xingzhi, who had been sitting quietly. "Xiaoxuan, why don't you introduce this gentleman?"
"This is Qin Fen's friend, surnamed Zhou."
As she spoke, she haphazardly pushed the cards aside. "Alright, alright, I win! Mr. Zhou, thank you for coming all this way. Why don't you go play with Qin Fen and the others? We need to find someone else to play with."
Zhou Xingzhi nodded slightly and got up from his seat.
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