Chapter Ninety-Five: On the Eve of Battle Preparations

After six in the evening, Kaisheng became an empty shell. Only the four windows of the Customer Service Department on the second floor cast a warm yellow glow, slanting onto the withered lawn below and merging with the color of the grass itself.

Yishu sat at the same desk where she had spent the past five years. The computer, keyboard, and all the office supplies were just as before, except the wallpaper on the monitor had changed from a landscape painting to a popular male celebrity’s photo shoot. It was probably switched by the young girl who had just left her job. Yishu searched online for a simple image of blue sky and sea, setting it as the new background.

She glanced around the office. The curtains, stained with ink marks, had never been replaced. The cacti on the desks had faded from lush green to a withered, aged hue. The layout was almost the same as half a year ago. Yet everything had been quietly changing. These unnoticed changes, abandoned by time, were only now released, as if from another lifetime. Was this an unfamiliar sense of familiarity, or a familiar sense of strangeness?

Few colleagues remained whom Yishu still recognized. She counted them one by one: Yang Wendan, Zeng Shiting, Miao Caizhen, and Han Rong. There was also a short-haired new girl, just hired before their trip to Textile City, but as they weren’t acquainted, Yishu didn’t include her.

Nighttime always crawled by more slowly than the day. Yishu glanced at the lower right corner of her monitor: 22:03.

She had just resolved a difficult client issue. Now, all energy drained from her body, she slumped in her chair like a mollusk.

There’s no denying that people’s hostility nowadays was everywhere, radiating at all times.

Yishu picked up the mouse, scrolling back over her chat with that troublesome young customer.

— If you won’t give me a discount, I won’t buy it.
— Just a few bucks off? I’m not a beggar.
— Are you including curtain rods? I saw on the page it comes with rods?
— There must be no error in the measurements, not even one millimeter. No color difference.
— Can you ship tomorrow? I need it urgently!

Yishu was forced to recall her long-unused scripts. Revisiting the vigorous days of old was not some kind of passionate nostalgia. Once past, those times were best left to occasional memories, not to stir the present into chaos.

The water in her cup had lost its warmth. Yishu took a sip, the chill seeping into her bones.

After ten, the customers still inquiring or placing orders came in sporadic flurries, like post-frontal rain after a storm—intermittent, but never gathering momentum.

The office was filled with a mix of sausage, bread, and spicy snack aromas. Yishu touched her hollow stomach, remembering she hadn’t managed to eat dinner. She’d rushed from Textile City to Kaisheng, grabbing two vegetable buns from a street stall in the snack district.

There was leftover food in her lunchbox from midday. In this season, at least, there was no risk of spoilage. She rested her hand on the lid, feeling its coldness. After a moment, she blinked away her fatigue, deciding she wouldn’t stoop to eating leftovers just yet.

Once things quieted down, idle chatter filled the air.

Yishu took her cup and left her desk. She enjoyed walking alone in the darkness, finding tranquility after the clamor. As a child, she had feared ghosts and monsters, but now, in her twenties, such ignorance no longer troubled her.

She listened to her heartbeat, to the wind, and to the rain.

Only one light was on in the tea room, accompanied by the water heater’s alternating red and green indicators. Steam drifted like white mist, enveloping her face with its youth and uncertainty.

The last subway left at 12:05 a.m. Liu Hanzhang had specially approved for Su Yishu and Guo Yamei to leave an hour early.

It was a twenty-minute walk from Kaisheng to the nearest subway station. The two of them walked, one ahead of the other, along the tiled path, neither speaking.

The smell of decaying leaves drifted through the air.

Guo Yamei quickened her pace and soon was dozens of meters ahead, her figure swallowed by the night.

Xu Shixi had gone to Rongcheng, leaving the house empty and lonely. Such loneliness only grew with the size of the space. Yishu gazed at the sky, where countless stars shone, but the moon was absent. If a bright full moon hung in the sky, perhaps both she and Xu Shixi, in their separate cities, could find solace in gazing at the same moon and entrust some longing and sorrow to it.

With free time, she found herself forgetting the words she wanted to say. Or perhaps, even if she remembered, she couldn’t bring herself to speak them.

Xu Shixi never brought his work problems or even negative emotions before Yishu. He was always the steady, responsible, mature man.

That evening, as Yishu hurried from Textile City to Kaisheng, she was surrounded by crowds. Couples clustered around the handrails and poles, seeking stability against sudden stops.

Yishu watched them, letting her imagination wander. She reached into her pocket for her phone, but a sudden lurch threw her off balance and she fell into the arms of the man beside her.

— Are you alright?

The voice was so much like Xu Shixi’s. Her mind, just clearing, slipped again into a mire of fantasy.

Once off the bus, she collected herself and called Xu Shixi.

— Have you finished everything in Rongcheng?
I miss you.

— It might take a few more days.
I miss you too.

Neither of the two, yearning for each other, said aloud the words “I miss you.” There was no need; all their longing dissolved into an ocean of yearning, becoming wind and rain that drifted to the other’s side.

On the last subway, the car was nearly empty, as if reserved for a single passenger.

At Kaisheng, loneliness was a crowd’s solitude; at home, it was solitude for one.

She opened her contacts, yet found no one she could confide in. Wasn’t that a kind of sorrow?

Yan Lu had her own life now, with Lu Xugao. Yishu no longer felt it appropriate to insert herself between them.

Yihui’s days were spent as a contented waiter at a teahouse, accompanied by Cheng Shuguang. It was less work than romance.

Searching for the meaning of life was ultimately futile. Perhaps living happily was the true essence of it. Listening to Yihui’s stories over the phone, Yishu heard a new openness in his voice, as if he no longer cared to hide anything.

If this was what he wanted, Yishu had once calmly wondered, should she try to stop him? She remembered Xu Shixi telling her that no one should interfere in another’s life, for even one’s own “right” way might, through time and experience, prove not so right after all.

Yishu stepped out of the elevator, letting go of her idle thoughts.

“Why are you only just back?” The door was about to close when Tang Chao blocked it with his foot.

“None of your business.” Yishu kicked his foot off the doorframe. “Move, I want to rest.”

“My sister and Shixi have gone to Rongcheng. I don’t feel safe alone at home.”

“Worried about me?” Yishu was incredulous. “I’m perfectly healthy—no need for your concern.”

Catching him off guard, she delivered a powerful kick to his foot on the frame. The backlash sent a sharp pain through her toes, contorting her face, yet she still feigned indifference.

“Anyway, since your sister’s out of hospital, you should get back to school. Don’t waste your time here.”

“Are you worried about me?” Tang Chao’s eyes lit up.

“I’m really not.” Yishu drew out her words. “I already have too many people to worry about. One more and I’ll die young.”

Tang Chao ignored her, content in his own constructed world.

“Wait a second.” He held the door. “Aren’t you worried something might happen between my sister and Shixi?”

A piercing needle shot through her temple. Was the moisture at the corner of her eye tears, or blood?

“If something were going to happen, it would have happened eight years ago—not now!” Yishu still guarded the exit. “Eight years ago, just a kid—”

“What about a kid?” Before she could finish, Tang Chao shoved her, breaking her defense.

The door knocked Yishu backward. She turned, eyes wide, unable to react to her impending fall. She simply closed her eyes and braced for the outcome.

In a flash, a pair of warm, strong hands wrapped around her waist.

She opened her eyes and looked into his.

He looked back at her.

“I’m not a kid anymore,” Tang Chao’s breath fell warm on her face, carrying a distinctly masculine, sunlit scent.

Yishu’s heart raced. She struggled free from his embrace, but lost her balance and stumbled backward again.

“Careful!” Tang Chao reached out, catching her hand and pulling her back with deft strength.

Being this close to someone, she realized, made it impossible to see their true face. All she saw in his eyes was her own reflection.

She forgot to breathe, her face flushing crimson. She forgot to move, her body stiff, but she knew she needed to keep her distance.

“I told you to be more careful.”

Yishu braced her hands against his chest, pushing him out the door, then closed it firmly behind him. The sound of the door slamming echoed down the dark, narrow corridor, like a climbing vine stretching into the distance.