45 Chapter Forty-Four (Two chapters combined)
Who is he trying to seduce?
"Smack!"
Li Yingqiao slammed the car door shut without hesitation, only to find a section of her pale yellow skirt stuck in the crack of the green taxi door, like a butterfly with its wings caught, unable to move.
The next second, the door opened again. Annoyed, Butterfly expressionlessly pulled her skirt inward, slammed it back in, and then shut the car door with a bang without hesitation.
Yu Jinyang leaned back in the passenger seat. In the rearview mirror, his expression shifted from one of stunned surprise to one of unexpected laughter as he watched her get into the car.
Only after the taxi carrying her disappeared from the rearview mirror did he absentmindedly turn the rearview mirror inside the car to check his face. He saw a cinnamon-colored red spreading at the corner of his lips, like a master calligrapher's cinnabar brushstroke, crookedly seeping onto his lip peaks; or like the scales of a butterfly fluttering past a clothesline, leaving their dust on the scholar's blue cloth shirt.
The butterfly came and went freely, but the scholar was at a loss.
***
In the evening, Tang Xiang, who had been back from her trip for a few days, paid for the ice cream cone with the little duck she bought at the scenic spot before quietly closing the door behind her and leaving the room.
She noticed her son, still dressed in his old clothes, slumped on the sofa staring blankly at a bottle of red wine. She went over and sat down next to him. "What's wrong? Something on your mind? I've been busy appeasing your dad and Ice Cream Cone lately, so I've neglected you a bit. You seemed a little off when I came back this time. Come on, tell your mom what's wrong."
In fact, after he returned to China, the mother and son had many such long, heart-to-heart talks, mostly with Tang Xiang talking and Yu Jinyang listening. Since Yu Renjie's incident, Tang Xiang's pressure has increased day by day—her husband's physical and mental health issues, a pile of accounting problems in the company, changes in key employees, and a curious child who asks eight hundred questions every day.
Although Yu Renjie pretends to be carefree and thinks he's seen it all, he still needs sleeping pills to fall asleep at night.
Tang Xiang was worried that he was damaging his organs by taking too many sleeping pills, so she switched him to melatonin. Later, he developed a tolerance to melatonin, so she had to go back to the doctor to get sleeping pills again.
“Your dad is just talking. The other day he was driving his wheelchair downstairs when a stray cat in the neighborhood stretched out its paw at him. He couldn’t sleep all night, saying that even a cat looks down on him now. Out of all the people walking around the neighborhood, it just stretched out its paw at him.”
Some things, if said too often, even Tang Xiang herself wouldn't believe. A person's best period of good fortune is actually only about twenty years. Either the east wind prevails over the west wind, or the west wind prevails over the east wind.
Yu Renjie's most illustrious years have passed. Their family's life now resembles the aftermath of a temple fair, leaving behind a mess for them to clean up. Scattered among the sunflower seed shells, there might even be a "囍" character that has been stepped on countless times.
Yu Renjie later had a late-night heart-to-heart talk with Tang Xiang. Looking back now, he feels quite sorry for his son. When the family was doing well, A Yang was in school and didn't need much money from the family. Since he wore a school uniform, they didn't buy him any expensive clothes.
“I went through his closet that day, and he had so few clothes that they didn’t even fill a tenth of my closet when I was young. I, on the other hand, have changed cars several times. Back then, he was always studying with Liang Mei and her group. Whenever he received a little New Year’s money, he would think about getting some high-tech equipment for his great-grandmother, buying food for the cats and dogs, and even asking me to buy him the complete Conan set. It seems like he doesn’t have any expensive hobbies besides dancing.”
“When he went abroad and needed money the most, we couldn’t even afford his living expenses, and he almost got into trouble himself. Sometimes I think it’s ridiculous. I was determined to send him abroad, but he ended up working part-time while studying. Now that he wants to start his own business, I can’t support him with the same lavish spending as before. The only time I had some money was when I bought a theme park for Ice Cream Cone. Don’t you think Jin Yang feels the same way?”
Tang Xiang said that if he were capable of comparison, he wouldn't have come back, and he wouldn't have been so willing to bring you ice cream cones. Besides, you gave him an apartment in Shanghai right after he graduated from high school, which puts you in the top 20% of fathers in China. If you hadn't stopped your son from going to Beijing to find Qiaoqiao, you could have squeezed out another 10%.
Yu Renjie glanced at her sullenly and said, "So, you blame me too."
Since the father and son fell out over this matter, Tang Xiang had never brought it up before; this was the only time. Rationally, she sided with her husband, but in her heart, she was on her son's side. She herself felt it was difficult to be completely fair and objective in her assessment of Qiaoqiao, so she said she would not comment.
The only exception was when they returned from their 14th wedding anniversary vacation in Hainan during the Spring Festival, and learned that Li Yingqiao had returned to Beijing early. Yu Jinyang said he wanted to leave earlier, and Tang Xiang knew he had changed his train ticket to Beijing; the ticket information was on her phone. She originally wanted to keep it a secret for him, but Yu Renjie was particularly perceptive in this matter and immediately noticed, and sure enough, he launched into a tirade.
He also said something so harsh that it made her tremble: "You want to go find her? Fine, come back and wait to collect my corpse."
At that time, Li Wusheng reported his last wooden toy factory. Coincidentally, the Fengtan government issued a document to build a civilized county, making environmental reform imperative. Yu Renjie was forced to close his original factory and asked someone to help him to Li Boqing, the local tyrant of Fengtan. In the end, Li Boqing extorted a large sum of money from him before he reluctantly obtained the permit to rebuild his factory in the industrial park.
Because of this, Yu Renjie was forced to sell their house in the city center, and all the money went into Li Boqing's pocket. As for whether Li Wusheng got a share, both she and Yu Renjie knew very well, because after that, Li Shuli suddenly started preparing to open a gua sha clinic. Of course, she believed that Shuli was unaware of the shady dealings involved.
They never told Yu Jinyang any of these things. He was too young then to understand the intricacies of business and the frustrations involved. It was pointless to talk about them when he grew up. These old stories should have been buried under the sauerkraut jar and left to rot on their own. There was no need to shoot themselves in the foot again.
But that night, Tang Xiang also expressed her attitude to her son for the first time: "Mom will not interfere with your decision. But I hope you can deal with Dad's emotional problems before going to Beijing, at least don't let him fight this so intensely. When I was a child, your aunt and I were also at odds, but your maternal grandparents always dealt with me first. At first, I thought they were biased towards me. Later I realized that they wanted me to compromise first."
"Similarly, on this issue, I hope you can put yourself in Qiaoqiao's shoes and consider things from her perspective. If you don't resolve Dad's problem, then you're essentially transferring these conflicts to Qiaoqiao, which is even more unfair to her. Do you want Dad to compromise or Qiaoqiao to compromise? Son, you can't have it both ways; someone will always feel wronged. Besides, Qiaoqiao isn't someone who will compromise."
Yes, if Li Yingqiao had known his father's attitude, he would have stayed even further away. Yu Jinyang didn't have that much confidence in himself, and that very night he canceled his ticket to Beijing. Tang Xiang watched him put down his phone and rubbed his head.
Just like many years ago, Tang Xiang was stroking his fluffy back of the head: "Tell me, your dad is too busy to take care of himself right now, and the ice cream cone can't even get a signal. In this family, it's just the two of us who can depend on each other now."
In fact, it was her son who had been comforting her for the past six months. Tang Xiang also sighed, the little boy who used to say with tears in his eyes on the train, "Mom, I will come to find you with all of Dad's money," has now grown into a towering tree that provides shade for her.
Yu Jinyang twitched the corner of his mouth, picked up the bottle, and said in a low voice, "It's nothing, I'm just bored."
"Qiaoqiao's back?" Tang Xiang looked at the bottle of red wine, half full, the one they drank in their senior year of high school. She picked it up and placed it blatantly in front of him. "Let's talk about her. How's Qiaoqiao doing now? Has she changed a lot since she grew up?"
Yu Jinyang said, "Yeah. It's gone awry."
A slap followed by a kiss—that's how they use a family secret recipe.
Tang Xiang exclaimed, "What do you mean?"
Yu Jinyang turned to look at her: "When Aunt Shuli slapped our dad, did she do anything else?"
Tang Xiang exclaimed "Ah!" again, "How would I know? Your dad didn't explain it in such detail."
Yu Jinyang turned back expressionlessly, arms crossed, and asked, "Then who did you learn this from?"
Tang Xiang suddenly realized: "Qiaoqiao slapped you?"
Yu Jinyang glanced at her: "Mom, why do you sound a little excited?"
Tang Xiang immediately raised her eyebrows, her face hardening as she shouted, "No, Mom is strongly condemning her! How could she hit someone? Don't just sit there, don't say anything more, call the police! You hit someone, huh? Come on, A-Yang, take your household registration book, Mom will take you to their house to demand an explanation..."
Yu Jinyang looked at her with a resentful expression: "..."
Tang Xiang calmed down and said with a smile, "The ice cream cone told me about it."
"Nonsense, what could she possibly know?"
"Ask yourself that question. You seem distracted. Where did you put the tissue you used to wipe the lipstick stain? You can't remember, can you? It was in the ice cream cone room."
Damn, I forgot about that. Yu Jinyang glanced at her silently, then sighed, "It's not what you think. She was just joking with me. We were just arguing."
"Oh, you two even managed to kiss in the middle of your argument. You really are a perfect example of keeping things separate."
"..."
Tang Xiang's lips were barely upturned, but when she saw his ears turn red, she broke into a laugh: "I can probably guess what you two will argue about. It's nothing more than that you couldn't tell her the whole story from back then. If she knew that your father had this attitude and said these kinds of things, she would definitely not dare to mess with you and would stay far away from you."
He sighed and gave her a thumbs up: "You know her better than I do. I almost blurted it out because of her. If she knew what Dad said, she'd probably be so scared she'd run back to Beijing overnight."
Tang Xiang was stunned: "But that just shows that Qiaoqiao is smart. Isn't that what you've always admired about her? She'll definitely say, 'What the hell? Yu Jinyang, you haven't contacted me in all these years. What nonsense are you talking to me about now?'" Tang Xiang said in a high-pitched voice.
"It still has to be you," he chuckled. "But she wouldn't be so clingy—"
The next second, his face darkened, he coughed, and mimicked Li Yingqiao's tone from the barbecue stand earlier, "Yu Jinyang, you're too calm. If you just calm down and think about it, Li Yingqiao is too unpredictable. It's probably for the best if she disappears. I've already moved on from what happened when I was eighteen. It's more appropriate for us to be friends now. That's how she is."
After saying that, he laughed again, so happy that he simply put his head back on the sofa and lazily looked at the ceiling, saying, "And when she gets angry, she calls me by my full name, as if she's afraid I won't recognize it, just repeating 'Yu Jin Yang Yu Jin Yang Yu Jin Yang' like she's chanting a mantra."
Tang Xiang laughed out loud: "I've been saying this since you two were little. Qiaoqiao is just that cute. But what she said isn't wrong. What can an eighteen-year-old understand? Back then, when I thought you were so stubborn about going to Beijing to see her, I actually told your dad to let you two date. But with both of you being so stubborn back then, you would have broken up long ago. For example, you're in Shanghai and she's in Beijing. The long-distance relationship problem alone is enough to give you two a hard time."
Yu Jinyang deeply agreed: "Sigh, I've always said since I was little that Dad's brain isn't as sharp as yours."
He sighed again, turned to look at Tang Xiang, and frankly admitted, "But back then I wasn't really that convinced of her. I even made a bet with her to see who would be better off in ten years, since I had a much better starting hand than her. It wasn't until I went to university and met more and more people that I realized what 'a prodigal son returning home is more precious than gold' really meant. I mean a 'prodigal son' like Li Yingqiao who suddenly turned to studying."
Not everyone can achieve a comeback simply by wanting to; most people are like "the late emperor who died before completing his great undertaking." This is because willpower can be hijacked by emotions, stifled by peer pressure, worn down by pain, and even eroded by the passage of time.
Whether it was him, Gao Dian, or Zheng Miaojia, they all had moments like this in recent years. Otherwise, Zheng Miaojia wouldn't have said she wanted to give up painting, which she had insisted on since childhood, and Gao Dian wouldn't have returned to Fengtan after his business failed; his obsession was to return home in glory.
But people seem to be strange; the thinner the blue robe, the more unrealistic ideals and thoughts they have. After all sorts of "yellow robes" are put on them, without much hardship or pain, many of these thoughts are unconsciously extinguished.
They no longer possess the unwavering loyalty of their youth. Even those who retain some courage have carefully sealed it away through a series of worldly embellishments, fearing ridicule. Li Yingqiao, however, is a gifted individual capable of parading a gall bladder through the streets, using his gaze to silence those who mock him.
“But you two are both great. Look how handsome my son is now. And you two have mature values and views on relationships. The timing, location, and people are all right. If you start dating again, it will be hard to say,” Tang Xiang said. “That’s why I say your dad brought this on himself.”
Was I that ugly before?
"Uglier than now, should I wake your sister up so you can pee in her reflection and see?"
Yu Jinyang turned his head away, “…”
After thinking for a moment, he turned back and said unwillingly, "I just feel that even if the eldest brother doesn't mention the second brother, how much does she really like me? I've seen her keep busy these past few years. In terms of calmness and restraint, she's number one, and I'm at most number three."
"Who's second?"
"Vito Corleone, the one who was having dinner before he killed someone."
"Stop talking nonsense," Tang Xiang said sleepily, and began to pat his head perfunctorily. "Son, listen to your mother. You are not in a position to think about these things yet. Listen to Qiaoqiao and start by being friends. Don't worry about your father. After going through such a mess, he is now so worried about his life that he has set an alarm for taking his medicine, afraid that the medicine will not be effective enough."
"..."
"quack--"
Tang Xiang regretted bringing a duck back from the scenic spot. She finally got up and said, "Why is that duck still quacking? I'll go check on it."
"...Who told you to buy live ducks? That shopkeeper is really ruthless, isn't he? Couldn't he give you a pair of ducks?" He also stood up.
Tang Xiang scolded him: "Now you see everything as a pair."
Yu Jinyang was both amused and exasperated: "What the hell? This is common sense from junior high school textbooks. A single duck will quack, but two or more will create a group silence effect."
Tang Xiang: "To tell you the truth, I tried to win one ring in the ring toss game at the scenic spot."
Yu Jinyang: "..."
The duck quacked all night until dawn, and all four members of the family, except for the youngest, couldn't sleep soundly.
Yu Jinyang woke up just as dawn was breaking. The ducks in the living room were still quacking, one after another. Speechless, he raised his arm to his forehead, trying to wake himself up for a moment. He checked the time and it was only six o'clock. So he grabbed his phone from the bedside table, watched a few girl group dance videos, and practiced a few moves while still lying in bed.
Midway through, I sent Li Yingqiao a message: "Does the scenic area have a venue for them to learn dance? My studio is going to paint a portrait of Zheng Miaojia today."
The reply came at nine o'clock: "Yes, contact Pan Xiaoliang."
She was just like a customer service representative who only replied when she was supposed to be at work.
Yu Jinyang was feeding Ice Cream Tong breakfast. He shoved a mouthful of porridge into her mouth, but couldn't get the spoon out. Ice Cream Tong protested, so he let her hold the spoon and play with it for a while. Then, she spat the spoon out onto the ground. Yu Jinyang got annoyed and shouted, "Tang Shutian!"
"Yu Jinyang, what are you doing?" The ice cream cone poked his cheek.
He turned his head away coldly, preventing her from touching it: "Pick it up yourself."
“Brother, you’re setting a bad example.”
Did I spit the spoon on the ground?
"You didn't protect your own mouth."
"..."
Yu Jinyang silently stood up to change his clothes. He rummaged through the closet for a long time but couldn't find a pair of pants he could wear. The drawstring on his sweatpants had been pulled out by the ice cream cone, and he couldn't put it back in. They were loose and unwearable. He searched high and low for a while and finally found a pair of sweatpants he wore in college. They were a bit small, but at least they were wearable. So he replied to the culprit with a message.
321: "So, does this mean we're friends who can't even contact each other on WeChat from now on?"
The innocent dung beetle hops around: "Of course, I'm happy to serve you."
321: "AI, are you calling Li Yingqiao? Calling Li Yingqiao."
The innocent dung beetle, Beng Qiaqia, grew impatient: "Yu Jinyang, are you ever going to stop?"
He then chuckled.
321: "Okay, wrong, I just finished learning the dance. Let Pan Xiaoliang arrange it."
The idea of a girl group dance was put on the agenda. But few people in the Ape Team could dance. Zhong Su and he had both worked in underground street dance groups in Chicago. Although he didn't have more than ten years of dance experience, he at least knew how to beat.
Gao Dian and Pan Xiaoliang had a harder time, with two steel plates. Pan Xiaoliang didn't understand rhythm, but at least he didn't improvise. Yu Jinyang taught him, and he considered himself quite patient, demonstrating the movements while explaining to him: "Step your left foot forward a little, don't step down directly... The first four beats are empty beats, the arc of this wave can be smaller, slowly rise from the bottom."
But Gao Dian not only doesn't understand rhythm, he also thrusts his hips, which is terrifying.
"Don't thrust your hips!" Yu Jinyang practically shouted into Gao Dian's ear through a megaphone.
These past few days, Zhong Su has truly experienced what it means to be dazzled by something only to be completely overwhelmed by it. Yu Jinyang had just finished demonstrating for them, and Zhong Su had filmed numerous videos, posting them in the ape-like group chat. His dance movements weren't actually that exaggerated; his muscles moved naturally and fluidly, completely at his disposal. Dancing, in fact, had a certain commanding quality to it. Each of his movements possessed a relaxed, flowing quality. Zhong Su had seen him perform Breaking floor work before and knew how strong his core was. To be noticed by a wealthy woman in a Chicago underground dance group was certainly not to be underestimated.
Turning around, Pan Xiaoliang faced the mirror and, after a cat-like face-washing frenzy that disregarded everyone else's safety, suddenly stood on tiptoe and took a series of clumsy little steps, followed by a dramatic, vertical jump, his feet sticking out like a mutated dung beetle. Then, he started waving like an electrocuted maggot, finally stopping in front of them with a perfect, yet utterly incomprehensible, wink.
Great, I don't have to eat dinner again.
No, would anyone actually want to watch this?
Zhong Su couldn't help but worry that if he jumped up, others would just see him as someone like Pan Xiaoliang. Despite the praise, he had grown up being the center of attention. It was fine for everyone to embarrass themselves when they were like apes, but he genuinely didn't want to be a background figure. So he found a reason and was the first to offer to leave the group.
Yu Jinyang could sense this subtle emotion to some extent, but when Li Yingqiao asked him about it, he naturally couldn't explain it clearly. This subtle emotion was not suitable to be discussed openly.
If he talks about it, it's his problem; if he doesn't, it's Zhong Su's own issue. When they were studying in Chicago, there were more delicate moments between them than this. Seeing that he couldn't get the full story out of him and fearing it would delay the video's release, Li Yingqiao had no choice but to urgently pull in a replacement from another department to fill the gap.
After several days of intensive training, no matter how patiently Yu Jinyang taught, the able-bodied man still quit. With three men going on strike in succession, Li Yingqiao couldn't help but doubt his abilities. She had just sent him a WeChat message—
Meow, have you been away from work for too long and ended up dancing in our cow and horse minefield?
But she soon realized that this time it wasn't Yu Jinyang's fault either. Unlike Zhong Su, who was, after all, Yu Jinyang's friend, this strongman chose to cultivate on his own when he was upset, and would never take his anger out on his friend.
But this strongman, who seemed to have taken some kind of poison from somewhere, started spreading rumors about Yu Jinyang while having lunch in the scenic area's office: "I've said it eight hundred times! If you can't jump, you can't jump! Why does he have to add so many waves? Is he showing off his flexibility? If he can twist like that, he should go serve rich women; he'd definitely make more money than here."
"Wearing sweatpants like that, who are you trying to seduce? If you really like doing live streams, then don't go do it, don't pollute my work environment!"
"..."
Those two sentences silenced everyone. Li Yingqiao wasn't there at the time; only Pan Xiaoliang, Wu Juan, and a few other people from other departments were present. Yu Jinyang and Gao Dian had just returned from buying milk tea downstairs, and they stood at the door, unsure whether to go in or not. He himself didn't feel anything was wrong, but he felt he'd been having a run of bad luck lately, wondering which deity he'd offended, as everything seemed to be going wrong.
Moreover, he was already numb to such talk in Chicago. The black guys in the underground dance troupes could swear ten times dirtier than that, with words like "father" and "mother" embedded in their words.
Unexpectedly, before they could react, a girl in a floral short-sleeved shirt stood up and threw the soup from her bowl at the burly man opposite her, right in his face.
Gao Dian first let out a strange shout: "Holy crap, Juanmei is so fierce!"
The next second, realizing what she meant, she glanced meaningfully at Yu Jinyang beside her: "Meow, Juanmei... seems to like you..."
[Author's Note]
Little Pastry still knows nothing, nothing at all.
(Question mark][Question mark][Question mark]) The author was also shocked by his own word count. How did I manage to update twice again?
I'm sending out 300 red envelopes today.
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