Chapter 7
The high temperatures and heat waves of midsummer come alternately.
It was noon, the sun was shining brightly, and the azure sky was clear without any trace of clouds.
It was hard to see pedestrians on the newly paved asphalt road at this time. The scorching summer air rose from the road surface, carrying with it a pungent smell like heated gasoline.
Two local dogs were lying in the shade of the tree at the corner, enjoying the cool air. They stretched out their bodies, lying motionless on the ground, with their tongues hanging out, their mouths breathing heavily, and their round eyes looking at the stranger who had just passed by.
The weather was hot and humid, and the local dog was listless and didn't want to get up, let alone have the energy to yell at him.
Zhou Yi was sweating profusely as he rode the little red bike he had borrowed from a roadside public bike station.
Seeing that there was no way forward, he parked the car sideways in the middle of the road, grabbed his collar, and wiped the sweat that was about to flow into his eyes. He found a half-empty bottle of mineral water from his backpack. It was so hot that even the water in the bag was warm. He drank the water while opening his phone, checking the navigation, and then looking forward.
He was nearby, only about ten meters away from the finish line, but no matter how he looked at it, it didn't look like there would be an office building here.
Before him lay a cluster of old buildings. Between the two houses near the intersection stood a narrow path, barely wide enough for two people to walk on. The half-broken wall on the side was covered in weeds, and a gaping hole in the courtyard was faintly visible. The surrounding houses weren't much better off, completely covered in weeds, some even reaching above his knees.
Zhou Yiheng was panting and standing in front of an old wall with an edge that looked relatively intact, avoiding the sun.
He swiped the screen of his phone and switched to the green app where he submitted his resume last night.
The company photos included in the app looked high-end, reminiscent of the elite workplaces often seen in Hong Kong TV dramas and movies. He could almost imagine a sleek office building on the busiest commercial street in the city center, employees in fitted shirts and crisp trousers sitting in a conference room discussing upcoming plans and strategies. The adjacent tea room offered a variety of coffees and snacks. Zhou Yiheng couldn't resist submitting his resume just by looking at the photos, so much so that he didn't even bother to check the position he was applying for.
But now, when he put away his phone, what caught his eyes was a desolate expanse of green. Not to mention the office building, it was so remote that there wasn't even a good tree nearby that could block the sun.
Zhou Yiheng tried to comfort himself, thinking that he had entered the wrong interview address. He deleted the information on the navigation page and re-entered it word for word. He checked it several times, but the result that popped up was still the same.
With the mentality of giving it a try, he clicked on the contact number above.
The phone rang for a while.
"Who is this?" The person on the other end picked up the phone. His voice was a little hoarse and confused, as if he had just woken up from a nap.
Zhou Yiheng cleared his throat and said, "Hello, I'm here for an interview. Is this address correct?"
"The address is correct." The man moved the chair, making a squeaking sound.
Zhou Yiheng asked again: "Is it near the residential buildings?"
"Yes, you are here, just come in."
Zhou Yiheng's eye twitched, and he asked again, "Is it near the residential building?"
"Yes, you are here, just come in."
"I should be around here." He looked at the old house in front of him and swallowed.
"I'll wait for you at the door," she said and hung up the phone in a hurry.
The temperature outside was nearly 40 degrees Celsius, and there was nothing to cover his head with. Just as he was standing in the sun and making a phone call, a lot of sweat was pouring down his face.
The sun was so strong that he could hardly open his eyes.
Pushing the little red car that was hot from the sun, Zhou Yiheng looked at the narrow road in front of him. He gripped the handle tightly, wanting to go in but not daring to.
A reminder popped up on the phone screen, "There are still fifteen minutes until the scheduled interview time. Please turn on your phone to ensure you arrive on time."
In order not to leave any breach of contract record on the app, he took a deep breath, plucked up his courage, pushed his bicycle and slowly walked inside.
At the entrance to the alley, a chilly air washed over him, as if even the temperature inside was lower than outside. Deep cracks were visible on either side of the walls, and moss and mold were creeping in the corners. The glass on the back door window of the old house had shattered, with only a few stubborn fragments still stuck in the frame. Rough weeds grew against the stone. Zhou Yiheng was anxious to get out, wearing a pair of light gray gym shorts that barely reached his knees. The lush grass scratched his exposed calves and a bit of his knees, causing them to itch.
"There is so much grass, why doesn't anyone come to clean it up?" he complained while pushing the cart.
"The destination is on your right. This navigation is over." The AI's mechanical synthesized voice suddenly sounded in his pocket, which really scared him.
The scorching heat flowed in through the alley, brushing against his arm. Zhou Yiheng shivered violently, his hair standing on end. He shook himself and looked around carefully. He was, after all, a true socialist young man, so how could he be frightened by such a desolate place?
Besides, it’s daytime, in the middle of the day, not the middle of the night. What are you afraid of? What is there to be afraid of?
He mentally encouraged himself, looking at the information on the notes page, counting the order of the several old houses nearby, and finally spotting the name hanging on an inconspicuous wooden door, the same one as on the recruitment page. On a palm-sized piece of wood, the five characters "This Grocery Store" were written in charcoal black ink.
The yellowish-brown wooden door was ajar, and the facade was mottled, looking like it was quite old.
He parked the little red car by the side of the road and went over to knock on the door twice.
He stood at the door and waited for a while, but no one came out. Looking at the half-open door, he pushed it gently.
The old elm doors made a long, creaking sound when they were opened, which made Zhou Yiheng's heart suddenly contract, as he was already in a state of high mental tension. He couldn't help but curse.
The door was half open and he looked in.
The yard was immaculately swept, and everything was neatly arranged. There were no weeds growing like outside, and no damaged, dusty, or cobweb-ridden corners. Compared to the other, uninhabitable old houses, this place didn't seem real.
There was a large floor-to-ceiling glass between the yard and the entrance. The door was locked from the inside. Through the glass, he saw a person sleeping diagonally on the sofa closest to the door. She was covered with a thin blanket, which was pulled up to cover her upper body, leaving only her forehead and hair exposed.
Hearing the sound of glass being knocked, Xiao Xiao came out of the room and asked as he walked, "Who is it?"
"Hello, I'm here for an interview," Zhou Yiheng answered through the glass door.
After opening the door, Xiao Xiao glanced at him and said, "I thought you had gone home. I went out to look for you but couldn't find you."
As she spoke, she walked towards the sofa, nudged the person sleeping on it, sat on the edge of the sofa and whispered to her to wake up.
The man wasn't sleeping particularly peacefully, his body trembling slightly. She suddenly woke up, looking forward in fear, his face panicked, still showing a lingering fear. She shook her head nervously, opened her eyes and saw Xiao Xiao. After realizing that this was someone she knew, she relaxed a little, but she was still panting and patting her chest with her hands.
Xiao Xiao said something to her. She looked over, her eyes, which had not yet calmed down, were filled with surprise again.
She was stunned for a long time, with a strange expression on her face, as if she couldn't believe what she saw. The fearful expectation and the desire in her heart that she couldn't suppress at all, wanting to burst out of her chest, her fingers pinched into her palms unconsciously, and the slight pain seemed to remind her that this was not a so-called hallucination, nor a dream.
An overly complicated and passionate gaze came straight at him from the sofa, and Zhou Yiheng felt a little uncomfortable being stared at by her.
"Who are you?" Her voice was very soft, and if you listened carefully you could hear the trembling in her voice.
"Hello, I'm here for an interview. My name is Zhou Yiheng."
She repeats uncertainly, "Monday horizontal"
"Yes, one horizontal and one vertical."
"Oh," she replied lightly, and her eyes, which had been enthusiastic just now, suddenly became lonely. She said to Xiao Xiao who was sitting next to her, "You go ahead with the interview, I'll go upstairs and lie down for a while."
Yang Ye slowly got up from the sofa, bent down to fold the thin blanket he had just covered himself with when sleeping, picked up the blanket and went upstairs.
Her slender back looks a little hunched, with a vicissitudes of life that does not match her age.
Xiao Xiao was already used to her reaction. When she heard the door close upstairs, she asked Zhou Yi to come over and sit on the sofa.
I went to the kitchen and got him a bottle of mineral water. I also downloaded a registration form from the internet for the interview and handed it to him with a pen and paper from the table. Zhou Yi scanned the form. It was full of common questions, so he filled it out quickly.
After filling out the form, he saw Xiao Xiao sitting behind the computer. He was so bored sitting there alone that he began to observe the house.
The high-ceilinged, two-story house was divided into two sections, with a thick wooden beam as big as a bowl extending from the top. The interior decor had a rather old-fashioned feel. The living room, which led from the entrance, was decorated with a vase nearly a meter tall and several pots of similarly tall evergreens. The uniformly carved, openwork window panes let in scattered sunlight. In front of him, what should have been the office area, was a few steps from the living room. Two desks and two modern laptops sat in the middle, the desks facing each other cluttered with miscellaneous items. Apart from these items, there seemed to be nothing else on this floor. However, the sofa he was currently sitting on was incredibly large, taking up nearly half of the floor.
"Have you filled it out?" Xiao Xiao came to ask him for the registration form after finishing her work and sat on the single sofa next to him.
She roughly skipped over his name, hometown, and age. When she saw the column where he wrote the school, Xiao Xiao's eyes lit up with a bit of surprise. "You graduated from Z University, so did I. Which class were you from?"
Zhou Yiheng of the “16th Class” rubbed his palms back and forth, feeling a little nervous.
"You're two years younger than me. Are you studying education?"
"Yes," Zhou Yiheng replied. Then, suddenly thinking of something, he asked, "Does this place also need a professional counterpart?"
Nowadays, nearly all respectable companies are looking for graduates with relevant majors. Earlier in June, he and a few roommates went to a job fair near campus. They carefully selected a few candidates to submit their resumes to, but after just two sentences, they were rejected, claiming his major wasn't suitable, without even a chance to speak again. Zhou Yiheng complained to his roommate when he left on Monday, but she didn't think twice: if it was so easy to find a job in her field, why would she apply for a sales position at her company?
"Not that much. I studied fine arts before, and I'm still working as an assistant now," Xiao Xiao said readily. "Let me ask you a few more questions. Do you have a driver's license?"
"have"
"When did you pass the test? Can you drive now?"
"I took the exam in my junior year, so I should know a little bit."
“Have you ever driven on the road before?”
Zhou Yi shook his head and said, "No"
"Are you brave enough?"
He was surprised. "Is this also related to work?"
"I'm thinking of finding someone with a driver's license who's a bit brave, so they can help drive when we go out. But don't worry, even if you don't have one, the boss will pay for you to register for the test after you officially join the company. You only have one chance to pass it," Xiao Xiao explained jokingly. "One last question, can you cook?"
Having never heard such interview questions before, he was stunned. After a while, he nodded blankly.
"That's about it," Xiao Xiao said. Seeing the awkward and unnatural expression on Zhou Yiheng's face, she suddenly understood. "By the way, do you have any questions?"
Zhou Yi shifted his body sideways and sat on the edge of the sofa. "What exactly should I do?"
"Boss's assistant, help with cooking every day, organize these materials, take some on-site notes when you're on a business trip, and clean the room when you're at home. Don't worry, the job is very simple and not troublesome at all." Xiao Xiao introduced him enthusiastically, for fear that he would suddenly run away. After searching for so long and finally waiting for this person to come, she naturally had to find a way to get him to stay.
There was no movement upstairs, so Xiao Xiao leaned in and whispered to him, "Actually, there's not much to do every day. When the boss isn't out at home, you basically have nothing to do. You can play games at work, watch TV shows, or even sleep. She won't bother you."
Zhou Yiheng asked again: "Will this also be your future workplace?"
"yes"
Thinking of the desolate and dilapidated scene he saw when he came in just now, Zhou Yiheng was a little shaken. Although he really needed a job to save his life, working in such a place for a long time would inevitably make him feel a little uneasy.
"Are you worried that there's too much work to do?" Xiao Xiao saw his hesitation. "Don't worry, the boss is easy to get along with, and there are only a few of us, so you don't have to worry about workplace conflicts. You don't need to punch in or out, and there are no restrictions on working hours. Accommodation is provided, and the workplace is just a few steps away from where you live. If you played games or watched TV the night before and stayed up late, it's okay to come to work in the afternoon, and the boss won't deduct your salary."
Xiao Xiao tried hard to introduce the good side of this job to him, using all her skills and all the temptations she could think of, "The internship salary is 5,000, which will be doubled after becoming a regular employee, and there are five insurances and one fund."
Indeed, the moment he heard the salary, Zhou Yiheng was moved.
He asked, "Where do you live?"
"Then," Xiao Xiao pointed to the bedroom next to the kitchen, "there are two vacant guest rooms on the first floor. You can pick the one you like. When can you come to work?"
"I can do anything"
"Okay, you sit and wait for me first, I'll go call the boss down." She ran up to the second floor with a smile, stood at the stairs and shouted at the closed door, "Boss, it's your turn for the interview."
Not long after she sat down, Xiao Xiao called her again. Yang Ye came out of the house yawning, wearing a pair of woolen slippers on her feet.
Leaning against the wooden railing on the second floor, she looked down at Xiao Xiao and asked, "What's wrong?"
That was the first time Zhou Yiheng looked at Yang Ye so seriously, on that midsummer afternoon.
Yang Ye bent over, her head slightly lowered. She wore a pure white silk blouse and dark gray house pants, a seemingly mismatched outfit, but on her, it was remarkably harmonious. Her hair was disheveled, a little clinging to her face. She suddenly glanced toward Zhou Yiheng, who saw her face.
The moment their eyes met, he didn't know where to look. His face suddenly became hot, his head buzzed, and there was nothing in his eyes except Yang Ye.
She is exquisite and beautiful, but not the bland kind. Her beauty has a strong visual impact and shock, which can catch your eye the moment you see it, break through your psychological defenses, and finally live directly in your heart.
Thinking about it later, maybe I had already fallen in love at that time.
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