Chapter 28 "Did you see that?" ...
"Did you see that?"
He pushed the door open a crack, and a sliver of light spilled out. It was different from the bar she had imagined. Stepping inside felt like stumbling into the Peach Blossom Spring described by Tao Yuanming. However, she could still faintly hear the faint singing of mosquitoes. But the environment was extremely important; it had to be quiet, or she might think she was hallucinating.
The walls were covered with all sorts of plant specimens. If you didn't know better, you'd think someone had brought the four seasons here. These plant specimens had probably been specially treated, as they didn't have any unpleasant smells. Just as she was wondering if this was a bar, she saw Xiang Zhinan walk to a corner, and a wall covered with vines appeared before her. Xiang Zhinan reached out and gently pushed it, and this bar, which could be described as fantastical, finally revealed its true form.
Huang Shiyu was immediately captivated by the scenery as soon as he stepped inside. The place felt unreal, with singing and noisy voices mixed together. Various potted plants were placed around, as if the greenery outside the bar had followed him all the way here from the door.
Outside, the colors are monotonous and lifeless; inside, it's a vibrant, layered green paradise.
It serves as both a control group and a decoration that appeals to both refined and popular tastes, but it is precisely this unusual style that is most captivating.
"Business is actually pretty good today." From the moment Xiang Zhinan walked in, he looked left and right, his head clearly busier than his mouth.
"There are quite a lot of people," Huang Shiyu chimed in from behind.
Huang Shiyu knew that Xiang Zhinan probably hadn't heard her question, because when she asked it, there were many people squatting around smoking or whispering, and her question was clearly drowned out by the noise.
"Look at these green potted plants, they were all moved from Xingzhou's house."
Huang Shiyu looked in the direction Xiang Zhinan pointed. Dim light flowed quietly over the glass display case, which contained some budding flowers. The pink petals were edged with a faint white light, like they were holding a pearl, which was very beautiful.
"No smoking here?" Huang Shiyu had wanted to ask since she came in, because she didn't smell any smoke, not even a trace, and considering that the group of people sitting on the ground outside the bar all had cigarettes in their mouths.
Xiang Zhinan wasn't surprised at all that she would ask this question. "Yes, you can't smoke indoors, but no one will care if you smoke outdoors."
"I don't know what he was thinking. Who runs a bar and doesn't allow people to smoke? That's why I said that opening this place is basically a money-losing business. It's just that at the beginning, people come here for the novelty, to take some photos. How can someone who drinks be without a cigarette?"
Huang Shiyu only likes to smoke a little and doesn't like to drink at all, but alcohol is the best way to relieve sorrow, and she occasionally needs it as medicine, so she didn't refute Xiang Zhinan's point, after all, there really isn't a bar that doesn't allow people to smoke.
At this moment, Huang Shiyu felt that what Li Xingzhou opened was not a bar, nor did it seem like a quiet bar; calling it a discipline center would be more appropriate.
As she walked, she soon learned the specific reason why smoking was not allowed. In the distance, she saw several cats frolicking and jumping under the flowerpots. She meowed at Xiang Zhinan a few times, and soon, seven or eight cats stopped in front of him, wagging their tails.
Xiang Zhinan squatted down and kept teasing the cat. While Li Xingzhou wasn't there, she quietly criticized Huang Shiyu: "I don't know what he was thinking. Who would put a stray cat they picked up in a bar? It doesn't look like a stray cat shelter, and it's a stretch to call it a bar. What bar doesn't allow people to smoke? Don't you think so?"
She was also puzzled as to why Li Xingzhou would put the stray cat he had picked up in the bar. The flowers and plants could be used for decoration and to brighten up the bar, but she had never seen a stray cat put in a bar before.
That's quite unbelievable.
"Same as before today, let's bring up a few more bottles of Jägermeister and Want Want milk."
"Add some sparkling water as well."
"Take two more bottles, otherwise we won't have enough to drink later."
"I'm telling you, are you guys going to empty out the entire bar of drinks?" Xiang Zhinan joked as he pulled out a chair for Huang Shiyu to sit down.
"Get lost." The blonde girl glanced at Huang Shiyu, who had sat down, then looked at Xiang Zhinan and asked, "Hey, where did you bring this little sister from?"
"Don't talk nonsense." Xiang Zhinan quickly glanced at Huang Shiyu and, seeing her calm expression, continued to explain, "This is Xingzhou's partner, who also works in smart healthcare."
Another girl at the table laughed and said, "I knew it! No wonder it looked familiar at first glance. I felt like I'd seen it in some news report before. Now that Brother Nan has mentioned it, the mystery is solved."
Because of what the other person said, Huang Shiyu glanced at the girl who had just spoken. She had her hair in a bun and was grinning at her. She looked very pretty and harmless, but what she said made Huang Shiyu, the person involved, feel terrified.
Could it be the report she's thinking of? The one Li Xingzhou mentioned at the beginning, where the media likes to put her and Li Xingzhou together and then write about them like they're making a culinary disaster, whatever is most shocking. The media just loves to create sensational headlines to grab attention and generate traffic, and they don't care about whether the people involved live or die.
Financial news is now almost as popular as entertainment news. After all, audiences get tired of watching the same old stories in the entertainment industry, and they get aesthetically fatigued. Occasionally shifting the focus will pique the audience's curiosity, which is exactly what the media wants.
"Hey, the media always likes to stir up this stuff, it's nothing special." She gave a noncommittal answer, quickly changing the subject: "What are you guys playing at?"
"Which report? I'm online all the time, how come I don't know about it? Show it to me." Xiang Zhinan clearly only caught the words "report" and didn't sense at all that Huang Shiyu didn't want to continue the topic.
"Oh dear." The girl with the bun looked down at her phone and replied, "I just stumbled upon this on a random page. Where am I supposed to find it for you?"
Xiang Zhinan's curiosity, which had been piqued, withered instantly before it could even sprout. He scoffed and grabbed the mixed liquor from the table, pouring a glass for himself and Huang Shiyu.
Huang Shiyu hadn't planned to drink, but whether she drank or not was up to her. Since everyone was here to have fun, she didn't want to spoil their enjoyment, so she took the wine from Xiang Zhinan and put it aside.
Accepting a drink is one thing, drinking it is another. Accepting a drink doesn't mean you have to drink it. Besides, the bar lights are dim, and you can't even see people's faces clearly. You can only vaguely make out the general outline of their faces. To be honest, this kind of atmosphere is the best place to escape drinking.
"Brother Nan, let me ask you something, why did President Li open this bar?" the blonde girl asked.
Everyone at the table turned their gaze to Xiang Zhinan's face, staring at him even though they couldn't see his expression, as if it were an instinct.
"Why? What could he be doing this for? He's got too much money to burn, that's all," Xiang Zhinan said, taking a sip of his drink.
Everyone at the table laughed at his words, and the laughter was quite continuous. Even Huang Shiyu slightly twitched the corners of his mouth.
“But I have a feeling he has a crush on someone. It’s not like we art students are more sensitive,” the blonde girl said, looking at Xiang Zhinan, who was handing fruit to Huang Shiyu across from her.
Huang Shiyu held the fruit Xiang Zhinan handed him, staring intently at the blonde girl opposite him, clearly wanting to know what she was going to say next.
"Look at the bar's exterior, it's completely black, just like him, giving people a mysterious and aloof feeling. However, compared to the bar's exterior structure, the two characters 'Du Yi' above the bar are straightforward and exposed, as if giving people an illusion, as if they want to completely split open this surface to reveal the beautiful spring scenery inside, but they are too cautious, using an unconventional method to frame this unrequited love in the dark, letting it grow wildly, but not daring to let it overflow."
The blonde girl's analysis was very logical and insightful.
The girl with the bun next to her chimed in, "What you said makes a lot of sense. It explains the name of the bar all of a sudden."
Xiang Zhinan ignored what she said and spoke again in a slightly joking manner: "If you put this kind of effort into studying, you wouldn't be unable to write a piece of music, would you?"
But to be honest, he thought these musicians were quite romantic, and what they said made a lot of sense.
He didn't know if Li Xingzhou's feelings could be considered unrequited love. No, what kind of unrequited love was it? Li Xingzhou had already said last time that he didn't intend to forgive Huang Shiyu, so there was no such thing.
Moreover, in his own view of love, even the deepest love cannot withstand the passage of time and will gradually dry up. He has seen people who were once deeply in love also evaporate like tears that have been stored up and exposed to the sun. In the end, only the tear stains remain to prove that they were once loved, nothing more.
The blonde girl was clearly displeased. "Speak freely, but don't make personal attacks."
"Weren't we talking about the news report? How did we get onto the topic of bar renovations?" Xiang Zhinan used a toothpick to stick a piece of fruit into his mouth.
Is that what she thinks? Is that what she means? To save herself, to open a bar to save herself? It seems absurd.
Huang Shiyu shook her head, as if laughing at herself for overthinking. Her head movement was small and went unnoticed. Then she picked up the soda water on the table, took a sip, and put the cup down, her gaze falling on the stage.
At this moment, the singer on stage is singing:
We almost became a couple.
Pretending to be friends takes less talent
"Not everyone can be frank."
She doesn't listen to many songs, but this line is so classic that her rusty brain immediately connects to the melody. The singer's unique, gentle voice, as slow and flowing as water, is like telling a short story, making many scenes from the song's music video flash through her mind at this moment.
"I found that photo."
Everyone at the table was drawn to this nonsensical remark, including Huang Shiyu, who had been listless and preoccupied with his own thoughts.
The girl with the bun hairstyle scrolled through her phone for a long time before finally finding this photo. Even in the dim lighting of the bar, you could see the excitement on her face. Like a traveler who had found a treasure, she couldn't wait to hold up the photo on her phone in front of everyone.
I even shook my phone a few times. I don't know if it was because my adrenaline surged with excitement that I couldn't control the shaking.
Huang Shiyu glanced at it once and then lowered his gaze.
Huang Shiyu recognized the photo. Even though the bar lights were now shrouded in fog, she recognized the people in the photo as herself and Li Xingzhou at a glance, though it was from their student days.
The reason I could recognize her immediately was mainly because the media used this photo back then. I don't know where it was dug up from, but since she only showed her eyes in the photo, I didn't pay attention to it.
The light seemed to be glued onto the photo, making it very blurry. In the photo, Li Xingzhou's face was illuminated by flickering light, and his face was turned to the side. A thin arm was wrapped around the boy's neck. The girl's face was not visible; she was wearing a mask and her eyes were curved as she looked at Li Xingzhou. An uninformed person would easily mistake the two for a couple.
But she knew it wasn't.
The phone screen, though small, contained the memories of their youth, or rather, it captured a fragment of the most tranquil and beautiful time that belonged only to her and Li Xingzhou, a rare and precious memory.
After parking the car, Li Xingzhou walked towards the bar, pushed open the door, and his gaze swept across the bustling crowd. Soon, he saw Huang Shiyu sitting next to Xiang Zhinan. From his perspective, he could see her upright posture, which stood out among the various languid sitting postures in the room. She seemed like a frozen frame in a movie, quietly staying in her own world no matter how noisy the surroundings were.
Before Li Xingzhou even got close, he heard the girl with the bun say, "Why do I feel like this girl's eyebrows and eyes look so much like Helen's? What do you guys think?"
Xiang Zhinan touched his chin and looked at Huang Shiyu, who was looking down, his gaze filled with undisguised scrutiny. "It seems a bit like that. No wonder Xingzhou thought you looked familiar when we were moving our luggage. You really do look like me."
"Helen, which high school did you go to?" Xiang Zhinan asked, seemingly out of sheer curiosity.
As soon as he spoke, all three pairs of eyes on the table turned to look at her, and Huang Shiyu rarely felt so uncomfortable.
She wasn't good at lying to begin with, nor did she intend to lie. Besides, she and Li Xingzhou weren't like the people in the reports. She honestly said, "Yucheng."
"Huh? You also went to high school in Yucheng? Was it No. 2 High School?" Xiang Zhinan's eyes were filled with barely suppressed surprise, and an unbelievable thought was growing in his mind.
"Um."
"What a coincidence, you must have seen a sailing boat before, right?" he asked tentatively.
They had not only met, but were also classmates and had stayed up the latest nights together, seeing different sides of each other.
"Never seen you before, Xiang Zhinan, when did you become so gossipy about my affairs?" Li Xingzhou answered for her, thus defusing the situation.
"Who cares about your petty affairs? What don't I know?" Seeing Li Xingzhou come over, Xiang Zhinan took the girl with the bun hairstyle's phone, stretched out her hand to show him, and said, "Wow, this sounds so convincing, I'm going to believe it."
Huang Shiyu tactically picked up the soda water she had just drunk, sipped it slowly, and observed Li Xingzhou. She was mainly afraid of this man's unpredictable behavior. Although he had denied it before, she was afraid that he would suddenly do something crazy again.
Li Xingzhou looked at Huang Shiyu without any attempt to hide his gaze.
Huang Shiyu naturally noticed Li Xingzhou's gaze, but she could only pretend to be nonchalant.
"You believe that? It's nothing but media speculation." After saying that, Li Xingzhou withdrew his gaze and sat down next to Xiang Zhinan.
The song on stage is still being sung:
"After several rotations, it becomes us"
Deep fingerprints
Stay with everyone you've loved
Warming the atrium
I've loved and hated many times.
The more careful you are, the more it hurts.
After swallowing the soda water, Huang Shiyu slowly placed the cup in his hand on the table, but his hand did not move away. Although his eyes were fixed on the cup in his hand, his peripheral vision had already crossed Xiang Zhinan and moved to Li Xingzhou.
Separated by a window to the south, and with the light too dim, one could only vaguely see Li Xingzhou tapping rhythmically on the table with a few knuckles bent on one hand, but it must have been very light, as there was no extraneous sound. His other hand lay horizontally on the table, unmoved.
Huang Shiyu's eyes started to sting from watching. It was quite a feat for her, given that she already had astigmatism, to be able to see this much.
“Helen just asked us what we were playing, and Mr. Li is here too, so let’s join in.” Seeing that the atmosphere was getting a bit dull, the blonde girl took the initiative to warm things up. “But this time we’re going to play something new, no dice rolling, it’s boring, all we do is shout out numbers all the time.”
“Let’s play Truth or Dare,” she suggested.
"Tch, I thought it was some kind of interesting game. This is just a very old-fashioned drinking game. I thought you were planning something big, but this is all?" Xiang Zhinan didn't respond.
The blonde girl said mysteriously, "It's old wine in new bottles! We'll just put this bottle on the table and spin it around. Whoever the bottle points to, we have to answer that person's question or a designated dare. But here's the important part."
"The person pointed to by the bottle can't choose Truth or Dare; the person spinning the bottle has to choose. The person pointed to doesn't have a choice. How exciting is that?"
"It's alright, so who wants to go first?" Xiang Zhinan said.
In the end, they resorted to the most old-fashioned method: rock-paper-scissors, to determine who the blonde girl would spin the bottle first, and then the task would be passed on to the person whose finger landed on the bottle.
The blonde girl bent one knuckle and placed it on the bottle. Everyone at the table stared intently at her hand and the bottle's opening, barely daring to blink. The scene was tense for a moment. The blonde girl took a deep breath and, without hesitation, decisively exerted force with her wrist. The moment she released her hand, the bottle spun rapidly, so fast that only a blur could be seen.
A few minutes later, the bottles on the table finally started to stop.
When the results came out, the girl with the bun hairstyle was so excited she almost jumped up. "Wow, Brother Nan's luck is just incredible!"
The blonde girl smiled and said, "I don't really have anything to ask you. Nobody's interested in your stuff. How about a dare instead? That'll suit your personality better."
"Let me think." The blonde girl seemed to have come up with some prank, and her lips, which had been pursed, suddenly curved upwards into a semi-circle. "Make a drooling expression about your shoes and tell them how much I admire them."
In the end, the blonde girl was mostly uttering breathy sounds, clearly amused by the image she had conjured up in her mind.
Upon hearing this, Xiang Zhinan's lips twitched slightly. "As expected, Sister Lan is a tough woman who doesn't talk much. She's been holding back something big, waiting for me here."
"Hey, hey, hey, don't say that. Everyone can see I didn't cheat."
"This is to set an example for us, to fire the first shot and also to launch a counterattack." Huang Shiyu's words were a double entendre, neither revealing nor showing off, yet easily leaving Xiang Zhinan speechless. People who can make a name for themselves in the business world naturally have their own set of skills for dealing with things.
Xiang Zhinan was never one to mince words, and after listening to Huang Shiyu's words, he took off his shoes even more decisively, holding a pair of black shoes in his hands. The shoes in his hands seemed to blend into the bar, and unless you looked closely, no one would know that a funny scene was unfolding at the table.
"I admire you so much."
What should have been a comical scene actually seemed rather endearing because Xiang Zhinan's face was quite pleasing to the eye.
Next, it was Xiang Zhinan's turn to spin the bottle. He decided to show off his skills, and it took him two minutes just to rub his palms together. Just when everyone was about to hit him, the bottle on the table finally moved.
This round of yellow rain was pointed to by the wine bottle that was turning south.
"What do you think of me?" Xiang Zhinan asked her without hesitation.
The blonde girl said, "Xiang Zhinan, why are you asking such a simple question?" She was probably so surprised that she forgot to call him "Brother Nan."
"Can't I know?" Xiang Zhinan said indifferently.
"Yes, very good," Huang Shiyu said.
"Huh? That's it?" Xiang Zhinan looked at her for a while, and only after confirming that Huang Shiyu had no intention of speaking again did he manage to ask her this question.
"Yes, all is well." After a moment of contemplation, Huang Shiyu added, "Keep your innocence; it's something others don't have."
She left out the second half of her sentence, which I myself didn't say.
Li Xingzhou leaned back in his chair and glanced at her. Although Xiang Zhinan was between them, it didn't affect him at all.
The clock on the wall went round and round, the people around them changed one after another, and the wine bottles on the table spun round and round. Of the five people on the table, apart from Li Xingzhou, the others had all experienced Truth or Dare to some extent. At this moment, everyone on the table focused on Li Xingzhou and wanted to bring him down.
However, Li Xingzhou remained calm, taking in all these gazes without a care. He leaned back in his chair, slightly raising his chin, and looked at the spinning wine bottle on the table with a detached expression.
The implication seemed to be a silent message: if you want to bring me down, go ahead and try.
Huang Shiyu looked up at Li Xingzhou with a hint of curiosity, wondering if Li Xingzhou usually used this tactic to pull others off the battlefield and seize the market in the business world.
The wine bottle on the table was spinning at a speed almost approaching that of a tortoise. Li Xingzhou was also staring at the wine bottle, because it was slowly turning from Huang Shiyu toward Zhi Nan and him. If nothing unexpected happened, it would either be him or Zhi Nan.
A few seconds later, the bottle came to a stop.
"Wow!" The blonde girl jumped up from her seat excitedly, grinning from ear to ear. She had spun the bottle this round, and her excitement didn't dim even in the dim light. She thought for a while before asking the question she wanted to ask: "What's the thing that's hardest for you to let go of?"
This was clearly a very insightful question. If there were any reporters lurking around, they would most likely have all started recording on their phones, just waiting for Li Xingzhou to speak. But unfortunately, this explosive news will only circulate around this small dinner table today.
Li Xingzhou wasn't in a hurry to answer the question. Instead, he slowly and methodically straightened the wrinkles on his cuffs. After a while, he realized he couldn't smooth them out, so he rolled up the wrinkled cuffs to about a third of his forearm, revealing a small section of his arm. His expression remained as indifferent as ever, and his voice was also lazy and languid.
"She stole my time."
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Author's Note: Sorry, everyone. I usually update every other day. If I haven't updated by midnight the following day, it means I've been too busy three times, so please don't wait up! I definitely won't abandon the story; that's a promise.
The song mentioned in the article is "Fingerprint".
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