Chapter 148: Tao is ruthless. What is destined to happen will happen eventually. What is not destined to happen will never happen...
"He's willing to pay attention to people when he wants to, and ignore them when he doesn't. When he's in a good mood, he can do whatever he wants, but when he's in a bad mood, he has to coax him and go along with him. He's very clingy, and he gets separation anxiety when we're apart for even a moment. But he also doesn't like people to see his vulnerability and sensitivity, so he's willing to sacrifice face for his own good."
Zhu Yingning enumerated Xu Sirui's crimes one by one. "When he gets a minor injury, he likes to make a big deal out of it, portraying himself as extremely miserable, inviting others to indulge and pity him. But when he's truly heartbroken, he says nothing, and even questions are impossible to answer."
The saleswoman's lips twitched at this, unsure of the customer's feelings. But with sales pressure on her, she had to speak up. "From your description, it sounds like he has a very volatile personality. We have a perfume created by a niche perfumer that fits your description perfectly."
She pulled a bottle of perfume from the shelf and introduced it, "This perfume is called 'Sunny and Rainy,' named after Liu Yuxi's 'Bamboo Branch Poems'—'The sun rises in the east, the rain falls in the west; it's said there's no sunshine, but there is.' The top notes are a mixture of earthy aromas and woody notes, refreshing and soothing, like the dark, heavy air before a rainstorm. The middle woody notes gradually fade, revealing the scents of willows and rain. The addition of citrus balances the dampness of these two notes, making it a very refreshing scent, perfect for spring and summer. The base notes are very gentle, simulating the scent of a quilt exposed to the sun, and a hint of sweetness can be found if you smell it carefully."
"We only have this one bottle left in our store. You won't find it in other stores in the mall. It's a one-of-a-kind item."
Before Zhu Yingning could express her opinion, the salesperson asked her with a smile if she wanted to try a sample.
"I……"
"I imagine the man you describe must be quite a character, and this unique perfume would be a perfect match for him."
The Xu Sirui-esque idiom "unique" successfully touched Zhu Yingning. In the end, she was defeated by the salesperson's eloquence and compromised, "Okay, then please let me try the perfume."
The salesperson excitedly found an unopened scented sheet from the cabinet, carefully tore open the package with her long fingernails, and wiped Zhu Yingning's wrist with the side of the scented sheet that had been sprayed with perfume. She said that body temperature can promote the evaporation of fragrance, and that perfume smells different at different times, which is the so-called front, middle and back notes.
While they were trying out fragrances, Zhu Zhiwei had already picked out the right concealer. Curious, she came over and rested her chin on Zhu Yingning's shoulder, asking knowingly, "Oh my, my, this is terrible! Who are you buying this for?"
She couldn't stand the teasing, her ears turned red, and she stammered and said too honestly that she wanted to buy it as a gift for Xu Sirui.
"Pamper him so much, be careful he might fly off into the sky."
She thought of Xu Sirui's depressed look these past few days and sighed imperceptibly, "If only it could be like that."
**
When paying, although Zhu Yingning was mentally prepared, she still felt very painful, so painful that she was in a daze when she walked out of the mall.
"Why does a few hundred milliliters of perfume cost seven or eight hundred yuan?" She was in tears.
"You can't think like that." After all, having lived in Beijing for several years and running an affordable luxury brand, Zhu Zhiwei was more adept at this than she was. He put his arm around her shoulders and comforted her, "What you're buying isn't the perfume, it's the design, the thought, the brand effect, the uniqueness. The gift you give him doesn't reflect the value of the gift itself, but the value he holds in your heart."
She exclaimed, "Sister Weiwei, you and that salesperson are both really good at talking. If I had more coins in my pocket, maybe you could have tricked me into buying a house."
Zhu Zhiwei laughed heartily and pinched her face. "I think you've become a bad person! What do you mean by 'hustling'? You're actually scolding me in such a roundabout way."
**
Zhu Yingning returned home with the perfume that was said to reflect his value in her heart. She felt inexplicably uneasy. She didn't even ring the doorbell. She secretly opened the door with her key and sneaked into the house.
It was past eight o'clock in the evening. Xu Sirui hadn't turned on the lights. The house was so dark that she couldn't even tell whether he was at home or not.
She was about to go to his bedroom after putting on her slippers when someone turned on the living room light. The light instantly filled the living room, blinding her and causing her to close her eyes unconsciously. After more than ten seconds, she finally opened her eyes a little and saw Xu Sirui standing in the corridor leading out of the bedroom, still wearing the thin blanket on his shoulders. He pursed his lips, frowned slightly, and looked at her expressionlessly. He asked, "Why are you sneaking around like that?"
She scratched her head and moved in front of him with her hands behind her back.
Xu Sirui became increasingly suspicious, as her movements made it seem as if she had a bomb hidden behind her back. Just as he was about to ask her what was wrong, she reached out, pulled his hand out from under the blanket with her left hand, and placed a rectangular box in his palm with her right hand.
He lowered his head and read the introduction on the box.
It's a perfume that looks expensive.
Men's perfume.
It couldn't possibly be that she bought it for herself. He immediately understood, but his expression became even more dull. After a long pause, he spoke slowly and with difficulty, "Today doesn't seem to be a holiday."
"Hmm." She hummed in agreement.
"It's not my birthday either."
"Um."
"Then why are you giving me this?"
"I don't know." She shook her head, still with her hands behind her back, lowering her eyes to look at the unopened bottle of perfume, and muttered softly, "I just suddenly wanted to buy something for you, so I bought it."
"Being nice to you doesn't need a reason," she said, the last half of the sentence unspoken. She felt it was a bit ambiguous, so she stopped talking in time. She then waited quietly, waiting for him to react to her gift. Any reaction would be fine—happy, surprised, or perhaps disgusted that the perfume she chose didn't suit his taste, and then he would hold the perfume tightly in disgust.
But she waited for a long time, and there was no movement above her head. When she looked up, she saw his eyes like mountains, rivers and lakes, and rivers made of tears winding among the mountains of eyelashes.
He cried quietly, a crystal teardrop gathered on his chin, a round teardrop, full as a pearl.
She was stunned for a moment and asked, "Why are you crying?"
Xu Sirui burst into laughter and said, "I'm so moved that I can't cry."
"No," she denied, "I gave you this gift to make you smile."
After hearing this, he couldn't stop crying. He sighed and covered his eyes with a blanket.
From Zhu Yingning's perspective, he looked like an aloe vera.
The thin blanket wrapped around her like a shell, with invisible hard thorns around it, but she knew that if she cut open the shell, the aloe vera inside would be soft and cool to the touch.
She took a step forward, hugged him tightly through the blanket, and then walked past him to her room.
**
Halfway through the semester, Zhou Tianqing found two jade Buddha statues from somewhere and said she would take them to a temple to have them consecrated and give them to them to bless them with academic success. It happened to be a weekend, so she drove over to pick them up, saying it would be a good idea to burn incense and pray for them as well.
"Tanzhe Temple?"
"Yes, the Tanzhe Temple that says 'First there was Tanzhe Temple, then there was Beijing.'" Zhou Tianqing explained to Zhu Yingning in the back seat while driving. "Tanzhe Temple is for seeking career and academic success. Different temples in Beijing have their own specialties. There's also an old saying, 'Men go to Yonghe Temple, women go to Hongluo Temple.' It means that men are most likely to receive blessings at Yonghe Temple, while women are most likely to go to Hongluo Temple."
She listened with great interest. Zhou Tianqing asked her, "Do you worship this in your hometown?"
"We usually only worship the God of Land, our ancestors, and the God of Wealth," she thought. "We also worship the Moon Goddess during the Mid-Autumn Festival."
"Very pragmatic." Zhou Tianqing commented with a smile.
Arriving at Tanzhe Temple, Zhou Tianqing parked the car and led them through the mountain gate straight to the Heavenly King Hall.
On weekends, many people come to the temple to burn incense and pray, so many that even people have to queue up to get and buy incense. Zhou Tianqing said that since it's a rare trip here, she must burn the best incense, so she bought high-quality incense for herself and Xu Sirui.
Xu Sirui reminded her to hold the incense in her left hand when lighting it, as the right hand was responsible for killing, making the left hand more pure. Zhu Yingning imitated his movements, lighting the incense, kneeling on the mat, holding the incense above her head, and bowing three times towards the main hall, silently making a wish as she did so. Then, she bowed clockwise to the Four Heavenly Kings on either side, and finally inserted the incense into the incense burner.
The wish she made was very simple. She thought that since Tanzhe Temple was a temple for studying and career, and everyone had their own specialties, she would just focus on her studies. She hoped that she and the people she cared about could achieve academic success. She put other wishes aside for the time being, lest the gods and Buddhas think she was greedy and refuse to fulfill her wishes.
She firmly believed that if she spoke her wish out loud, it would not come true, so she did not ask Xu Sirui what he had asked for. When she wrote the red ribbon, she kept her wish secret—even though there was nothing shameful about it.
After visiting the Heavenly King Hall, we went to the Main Hall and repeated the same process in the Heavenly King Hall.
When we got here, Zhou Tianqing said she was going to go find the monk she had arranged to consecrate the temple. The ritual was quite long and might require a long wait. "You and Ruirui don't have to accompany me. Just wander around the temple."
After she said this, she left, leaving Zhu Yingning and Xu Sirui looking at each other in bewilderment.
"Let's keep going forward." He led the way deeper.
Tanzhe Temple is nestled in the mountains, surrounded by verdant hills. Along the way, cultural and creative shops and cafes sprouted like weeds along the roadside, and the constant flow of people added a bustling atmosphere to the quiet temple.
Although there were many people coming and going around, Zhu Yingning felt calm and even felt like asking Xu Sirui jokingly, "Did you wear the perfume I gave you?"
Xu Sirui had been walking lazily, his eyes narrowed slightly by the smoke from the incense, and he looked incredibly sleepy. But her question lifted his sleepiness, and he nearly fell flat on his face. He stumbled a bit before catching himself and continued walking forward, not even looking at her, mumbling an inarticulate "hmm."
She smiled faintly beside him.
"What are you laughing at?" He suddenly turned around.
"No." Zhu Yingning closed his silly grinning mouth.
Near the mountain gate, Xu Sirui could still explain to her in a serious manner what this temple was and what that tree was, and took her around the Emperor Tree three times to pray for blessings. Later, as they went deeper inside, he said that he didn't come here often.
"Then just walk around and take a look."
As soon as she finished speaking, she saw someone nearby shaking lots. She thought it was interesting, so she watched for a while.
"Do you want to draw lots?" Xu Sirui also stood up.
She shook her head: "Just looking at it, not smoking."
"Two dollars for one fortune, pretty cheap."
"It's not about the money." She saw the mother who had gotten the best fortune excitedly hugging her daughter, smiled, and said, "I just think it's unnecessary. If I draw a good fortune, I'll get carried away, which will only make things worse. If I draw a bad fortune, I'll be depressed, feeling that my efforts are doomed to failure, and thus lose motivation. Whether the result is good or bad, it will affect my mentality. Since I can't control my joy or sorrow, I won't draw. I'll just imagine the outcome of everything as good and work towards it."
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