Chapter 8

After hanging up, Ji Zhou finally noticed three unread messages sitting quietly on his phone.
Mianmian: [Good morning~]
Mianmian: [Mm, no—right now it should be good afternoon.]
Mianmian: [Have you eaten, bro? What did you eat?]
Ji Zhou stood by the glass window, fingers moving: [Not yet.]
Mianmian: [[Image]]
Mianmian: [Let me show you mine—honey-glazed BBQ rice bowl.]
Ji Zhou opened the picture. The rice bowl looked appetizing; a girl’s slender, pale fingers hovered above it in a “V.”
Joice: [Mm.]
Mianmian: [You have to eat properly too.]
Joice: [Okay.]
The nurse came out after disinfecting the room. Seeing Ji Zhou still in the corridor, she asked curiously, “Brother Ji, why aren’t you going to eat?”
Ji Zhou put away his phone. “I just ordered takeout.”
“What did you order?”
“BBQ rice bowl,” Ji Zhou said.
After a pause, he added, “Someone said it’s really good. I’ll try it.”
The young nurse seemed to catch a whiff of gossip and joked, “Someone? Your girlfriend?”
Ji Zhou’s thoughts drifted for a moment. He shook his head. “No.”
As he grew older, he felt less and less longing for marriage and love. He could never forget the greenhouse on a summer afternoon when he was ten—under glaring sunlight, two bodies entwined.
The takeout arrived half an hour later. Ji Zhou sat in the break room about to eat when another message came.
Mianmian: [[Image]]
Mianmian: [Clean-plate campaign.]
Mianmian: [Getting ready to go out for my dental appointment.]
Joice: [Mm.]
Mianmian: [Is it that if I don’t ask you questions about teeth, all you can say is “mm” and “okay”?]
Joice: [No.]
Mianmian: [Then say something nice.]
Ji Zhou thought for a moment and typed: [Nice.]
Mianmian: [Are you doing “abstract comedy” with me?]
Joice: [No.]
Mianmian: [I’m suddenly kind of suspecting you’re a system-assigned robot.]
Joice: [Robots don’t eat. I do.]
Mianmian: [6]
The corners of Ji Zhou’s lips lifted. For some reason, he felt a little happy. He set his phone down, mixed the rice in the box, and found it tasted better than he’d expected.
In the afternoon he had a short meeting. Ji Zhou got home a bit late. The moment he opened the door, the familiar aroma of food drifted out.
Tong Wen poked his head out and called, “Bro, you’re back? Mom’s here.”
Before his words even fell, Li Meiling came out untying her apron. She said to Tong Wen, “Go bring the soup out.”
Tong Wen obediently responded, “Oh.”
“Auntie.” Ji Zhou walked over.
Li Meiling looked him over carefully, her heart aching. “You’ve gotten thinner again. Work is hard, isn’t it?”
“Not really,” Ji Zhou said.
“When you get off work, you come home and there’s no one to talk to. You can’t keep going like this.” Li Meiling said. “If there’s someone suitable, go meet her. You should still date. Otherwise I’m always uneasy—I feel like you’re lonely.”
“Oh, Mom, stop worrying about it,” Tong Wen said as he set the soup down, blowing on his reddened fingers. “My brother’s been chatting with a girl he gets along with lately.”
“Really?” Li Meiling asked in delight. She looked to Ji Zhou to confirm. “Is that true?”
Ji Zhou reacted a beat late, but still nodded. “Yes.”
“What kind of girl is she?” Li Meiling took Ji Zhou’s hand and guided him to sit.
Two pairs of eyes fixed on him, full of expectation and curiosity.
Ji Zhou answered seriously, “Someone who talks a lot.”
Li Meiling: …
Tong Wen: “Talkative is good—complements you.”
Ji Zhou smiled faintly. “Mm.”
Dinner was cooked by Li Meiling.
Ji Zhou’s mother had passed early, and he was almost completely estranged from his father. Li Meiling felt sorry for her nephew and wanted to give him more care. But the older Ji Zhou got, the more distant he became with her—always saying he didn’t want to trouble them—yet he never refused Tong Wen even once.
Li Meiling knew that deep down, Ji Zhou still longed for company, so she never stopped Tong Wen’s once-a-month “running away from home.” Either way, he could only come to Ji Zhou; it also meant someone could keep him company.
When she had time, she would come over to cook a meal. No matter what, she wouldn’t let him go without feeling even a trace of family warmth.
After dinner, Li Meiling grabbed Tong Wen by the ear and made him go back to apologize to Tong Jingcheng.
It was said Tong Jingcheng hadn’t slept well for three straight days. Lying in bed, he held Li Meiling’s hand and talked at length: “How did I raise our son into this?”
Li Meiling was bothered beyond endurance. With Tong Wen not answering calls, she could only come in person to catch him.
Ji Zhou escorted them downstairs. Tong Wen went to get the car. Li Meiling chattered at Ji Zhou for a long time, and finally sighed. “Xiao Zhou, don’t punish yourself for other people’s mistakes. It isn’t worth it.”
Ji Zhou’s expression stayed calm. “I know.”
After the car drove away, the phone in his pocket vibrated.
Ji Zhou took it out and glanced. It was the “talkative lady” he’d just described.
Mianmian: [I went to the hospital to apply medicine. I feel much better, and food tastes good again too. The doctor told me to wait for the swelling to go down before pulling the tooth.]
Mianmian: [When the time comes, can I choose general anesthesia?]
Joice: [Not really recommended. Unless you have a special condition that makes it impossible to cooperate with the extraction, or your wisdom tooth is especially difficult and can’t be done under local anesthesia in the outpatient clinic, only then would we consider general anesthesia.]
Mianmian: [Then can’t you consider my heart’s capacity? What if I’m very nervous, very anxious, and can’t cooperate with the doctor?]
In summer, the days were long. It was already almost eight o’clock, yet it still wasn’t fully dark.
There was no elevator in Ji Zhou’s complex. The motion-sensor lights lit up floor by floor with each footstep; the dim yellow glow on the white walls gave the space a gentle softness.
Joice: [You can do it.]
Mianmian: [Does that count as encouragement?]
Joice: [Mm.]
Mianmian: [Then can you say a couple more encouraging words?]