I walked to the stern and sat next to Zhong Yuan.
He was sitting cross legged, staring at the water with unbroken concentration. Our clothes had dried under the sun, but there was still a cool breeze and I sneezed a couple of times.
Zhong Yuan neither moved nor spoke.
I rubbed my nose and smiled shyly. Rubbing his forearm, I said, “ Umm…I’m really really sorry…”
Zhong Yuan still gazed at the distance. He did not look at me or react in any manner. I knew that he was really angry this time so I spoke guiltily, “ I am sorry. I know you rescued me, I was too rash. I …I won’t be like this in the future. Don’t be angry anymore, ok?”
Zhong Yuan gently gripped the side of the boat with his fingers but still did not speak.
I bit my lip and said, “ Why don’t you deduct my salary then?”
This time, he turned his face completely so his back was to me. I saw his shoulder twitching . Clearly he was trying to suppress the anger in his heart. His back was stiff. This time, I was scared. It seemed that I had offended him deeply.
Even the offer of a wage deduction was unable to appease him. Heavens, what should I do now….
The boat rocked gently as it moved forward. I saw some lotus shoots next to me. Immediately, I leaned forward to pluck them. Who knew that the roots of a lotus plant were really strong!As I bent forward to pull them, the boat moved backwards and I was about to fall in the water again. Zhong Yuan stretched out his arm casually and pulled me back, the lotus stem in my hand.
I sat down and smiled at him with all my charm, “ Thank you..”Zhong Yuan did not say anything. Instead, he turned so I could see only a profile of the arrogant expression on his face. I suddenly realised that he looked quite handsome in profile.
Of course, this wasn’t the time to appreciate his looks. I held the lotus stem and asked him courteously, “ Do you want to eat lotus seeds?”
Unexpectedly, there was no answer.
I peeled off a lotus seed, removed the green core in the middle and brought it to his mouth, “ You want it?”
The evil man could not resist the temptation and he opened his mouth and chewed the seeds. I felt victorious, so I peeled another one and brought it near his mouth. Very casually, he opened his mouth , so that I ended up feeding him again. But his face was still gloomy.
God, this guy was really tough to please!
I carefully peeled some more lotus seeds, really hoping that my meticulous service would manage to appease him and eliminate his anger. Unfortunately, this guy was as hard hearted as iron. His mouth moved only to chew the lotus seeds, but the expression on his face was as unforgiving as before. He had yet to utter a single word. I was gradually getting discouraged and wondering whether I should try some other tactic.
Just at that moment, Li’l Second’s boat crossed ours. Li’l Second stood on the boat and looked at us. Then she taunted loudly, “ Ha ha guys, I can see what you are up to…”
Her comment made me feel awkward and my face felt as if it was on fire. I realised that the two of us were sitting really close…
When I hesitated, Zhong Yuan finally deigned to sweep a glance across Li’l Second , then muttered indifferently, “ Ignore her, let us continue.”
I was speechless. Li’l Second, you did really well. At least this guy was finally willing to speak to me. So I ignored the others and diligently returned to my sacred duty of serving the big boss. As I peeled another seed, I smiled coquettishly, “ Zhong Yuan, are you still upset ?”
Zhong Yuan’s face was expressionless, “ What do you think?”
I fed him the lotus seed, “ I think you are a generous soul, he he…”
There wasn’t a single ounce of humility in Zhong Yuan so he accepted my praise calmly and then said, “ If you think that I am generous, why don’t you do something to make me happy?”
I was immediately alert, “ What, what?”
Zhong Yun did not speak, but smiled in an evil manner.
Five minutes later, I had placed a huge lotus leaf on my head, I was holding a lotus stem in my mouth and my palms were hanging downwards in front of my chest like a puppy. With this odd posture, I was facing the camera.
Zhong Yuan held his mobile and smiled, “ Mu er, smile.”
So I smiled, but at the same time, I did not forget to bite the stem so the smile was quite miserable.
With a click, Zhong Yuan’s phone recorded my historic moment. In my life, I have done many shameful things, but every time I remembered them, they were just images ingrained in my brain. This time, this shameful event was recorded in a photo. As I looked at it, I felt like crying.
Many years later, when we were married, Zhong Yuan printed this ridiculous photo and framed it. The frame was placed at our bedside, so that I was forced to admire it every day before going to sleep.
After spending a few days with the group, I had finally started believing what Lu Zijian had once said about his roommates, that they were all badasses. This description not only fit Zhong Yuan, but also the two brothers, Passerby A and Passerby B. Both the brothers were studying Computer Science, but both were extremes.
Passerby A was a genius hacker. I wasn’t sure about the extent of his expertise, but whenever Zhong Yuan talked about him, the look on his face was one of wondrous appreciation. So he must have been brilliant. Although Zhong Yuan was evil incarnate, he was an authority on such stuff. If Zhong Yuan was praising someone, that person must be a genius. This of course meant that Zhong Yuan was a hacker himself, capable of hacking anything apparently. It was said that once he tried to hack Passerby A’s account. The outcome was that not only was he unsuccessful, he was forced to bow down to him and learn many things. That made Zhong Yuan quite skilled in this area.
If Passerby A was a genius, his brother was a wizard. Apart from software, he was involved in many other fields from astronomy to geography, from entertainment to international politics, and had a thorough knowledge of every field. Not only was he learned, he was also of a literary bent of mind. These two inclinations made him write a booklet to showcase his spirit of research and dedication. The name of this booklet was ‘ Complete X Manual.’
This booklet categorised X into four sections – primary, intermediate, advanced and the grand finale. The primary section could be summarised as ‘ silly X’ , the intermediate as ‘ X for X’, the advanced part could be summarised as ‘looking at X without looking at it’ and the grand finale was ‘ other people do X, he does not’. Then he demonstrated the four levels of X in terms of behaviour, psychology, influence and viewing. The final conclusion was that it was not shameful to view X, it was shameful not to view X.
I was completely awestruck . ( miumiu – I have no idea what this means)
So I began to worship the two brothers. There were rare talents.
Zhong Yuan was eating a watermelon. When he heard this, he casually asked, “ Mu Er, don’t you worship me ?”
I smirked, “ Why should I?”
Zhong Yuan smiled, “ You will soon know why.”
Later I learnt from other people that the rule for survival in the dormitory had four principles –
Don’t compete with Lu Zijian in Basketball.
Don’t compete with Passerby A in anything computer related
Don’t compete with Passerby B in X
Don’t ever compete with Zhong Yuan…in anything !
……
In the evening, the cook told us he had run out of soy sauce, so Zhong Yuan and I went to fetch soy sauce. As an object of his long time suppression, he had taken my obedience for granted.
From our residence, the nearest shop was about fifteen minutes. The path passed through a small forest. Although there was moonlight, the woods were still quite creepy, and I had goosebumps all over. I followed closely behind Zhong Yuan. After walking for a while, he abruptly stopped and turned to look at me, “ Are you scared ?”
I almost bumped into his chest. I stumbled and stammered, “No…no..”
He clasped my hand, “ Come on.”
His grip was quite strong. I could not wrestle my hand out from his grip, so I just walked along with him. The strangest thing was that I really didn’t feel scared any more. This proved that Zhong Yuan had all the intrinsic qualities of a ghostbuster.
As per the cook’s instructions, we went to a shop that made soy sauce by the bulk. In the small shop, a fat girl was on duty. When she saw Zhong Yuan, she smiled shyly, then dipped the sauce bucket in the large vat. She furtively gazed at Zhong Yuan from time to time, and in her absent mindedness, spilled some of the soy sauce on herself. With a blank expressionless face, Zhong Yuan pointed that out to her, “ You spilled the sauce. “
The girl blushed . She quickly covered the lid and handed the bottle to us. She had given us almost two pounds of the sauce for the price of one. Good! I always liked a good deal.
As we turned back, the girl reluctantly accompanied us till the door and then stood there for a long time, watching us walking away. I was holding the soy sauce with one hand. With the other hand, I tugged Zhong Yuan’s hand, “ Zhong Yuan, she is looking at you.”
Zhong Yuan made no response.
I gained some courage and poked him again, “ Hey, how about you marry her ? See how good she is, she gave us two pounds of soy sauce for the price of one.”
Zhong Yuan shrugged off my hand in annoyance, “ Are you selling yourself for one pound of soy sauce ?”
“ No, I am talking about you..”, I smiled.
Zhong Yuan abruptly grabbed my arm and pulled me closer with such strength that I winced in pain . He looked down on me and said, “ I already know who I will marry.”
I felt that the content of his speech was incongruous with his expression. This was just a meaningless statement, but he was looking at me in such a weird manner that I felt a chill through my heart. He seemed to be trying to read my thoughts.
I coughed and bowed my head, trying to pull my hand back. Zhong Yuan’s palm slipped down my wrist and he gripped my wrist tightly. This time I didn’t try to pull out as we had reached the small forest by now. As the moonlight cast mottled shadows on the branches, I felt a bit scared. I was about to say something to break the silence when I heard strange sounds from the depths of the wood near us. It seemed like two people, a man and a woman were moaning in pain.
Curious, I tried to peek further when Zhong Yun grabbed my hand and started walking away rapidly. I was almost dragged along with him. The intermittent sounds gradually faded and soon , we were out of the woods. The moment we were out, I suddenly realised what the sounds were. I coughed in embarrassment. Wow, the folks here were really unrestrained…
In my defence, I was listening to a live version for the first time in my life, so it took me sometime to figure it out. As I figured out the truth, I blushed. As a matter of fact, I was very innocent in all these matters..
When Zhong Yuan saw me blushing, he remarked in a condescending manner, “ Now you blush? ”
Ah, so my guess was correct. At this point, I didn’t know what to say. Those sounds were still running through my mind..ah , ah , oh oh…. I realised that the sex education classes at school were so abstract that even after studying it for two years, the live version was unrecognisable. The old adage was true, practical experience always stumps theory.
As my mind was immersed in all these thoughts, Zhong Yuan dragged me back to the house.
Everyone was in the yard enjoying the weather. When they saw us, their expressions were curious. I was wondering why when Li’l Second spoke up, “ Why are you guys holding hands ? And why is your face so red, blockhead three? “
I realised Zhong Yuan was still holding my hand and immediately pulled my hand out.
Then, Boss smiled and echoed, “ Forget about holding hands. You guys must have been hugging each other.”
Passerby A grabbed a chopstick from the table and placed it like a mike in front of Zhong Yuan, “ How was the feeling of being hugged , Mr Zhong ? “
I was sure Zhong Yuan would not comment, but he brought his face closer to the chopstick and responded seriously, “ The hug felt very soft and comfortable.”
I was very annoyed at his response and blurted out without thinking, “ Soft and comfortable? Are you a sanitary napkin ? “
Everyone was speechless.
A group of crows flew over my head in single file…
I walked to the stern and sat next to Zhong Yuan.
He was sitting cross legged, staring at the water with unbroken concentration. Our clothes had dried under the sun, but there was still a cool breeze and I sneezed a couple of times.
Zhong Yuan neither moved nor spoke.
I rubbed my nose and smiled shyly. Rubbing his forearm, I said, “ Umm…I’m really really sorry…”
Zhong Yuan still gazed at the distance. He did not look at me or react in any manner. I knew that he was really angry this time so I spoke guiltily, “ I am sorry. I know you rescued me, I was too rash. I …I won’t be like this in the future. Don’t be angry anymore, ok?”
Zhong Yuan gently gripped the side of the boat with his fingers but still did not speak.
I bit my lip and said, “ Why don’t you deduct my salary then?”
This time, he turned his face completely so his back was to me. I saw his shoulder twitching . Clearly he was trying to suppress the anger in his heart. His back was stiff. This time, I was scared. It seemed that I had offended him deeply.
Even the offer of a wage deduction was unable to appease him. Heavens, what should I do now….
The boat rocked gently as it moved forward. I saw some lotus shoots next to me. Immediately, I leaned forward to pluck them. Who knew that the roots of a lotus plant were really strong!As I bent forward to pull them, the boat moved backwards and I was about to fall in the water again. Zhong Yuan stretched out his arm casually and pulled me back, the lotus stem in my hand.
I sat down and smiled at him with all my charm, “ Thank you..”Zhong Yuan did not say anything. Instead, he turned so I could see only a profile of the arrogant expression on his face. I suddenly realised that he looked quite handsome in profile.
Of course, this wasn’t the time to appreciate his looks. I held the lotus stem and asked him courteously, “ Do you want to eat lotus seeds?”
Unexpectedly, there was no answer.
I peeled off a lotus seed, removed the green core in the middle and brought it to his mouth, “ You want it?”
The evil man could not resist the temptation and he opened his mouth and chewed the seeds. I felt victorious, so I peeled another one and brought it near his mouth. Very casually, he opened his mouth , so that I ended up feeding him again. But his face was still gloomy.
God, this guy was really tough to please!
I carefully peeled some more lotus seeds, really hoping that my meticulous service would manage to appease him and eliminate his anger. Unfortunately, this guy was as hard hearted as iron. His mouth moved only to chew the lotus seeds, but the expression on his face was as unforgiving as before. He had yet to utter a single word. I was gradually getting discouraged and wondering whether I should try some other tactic.
Just at that moment, Li’l Second’s boat crossed ours. Li’l Second stood on the boat and looked at us. Then she taunted loudly, “ Ha ha guys, I can see what you are up to…”
Her comment made me feel awkward and my face felt as if it was on fire. I realised that the two of us were sitting really close…
When I hesitated, Zhong Yuan finally deigned to sweep a glance across Li’l Second , then muttered indifferently, “ Ignore her, let us continue.”
I was speechless. Li’l Second, you did really well. At least this guy was finally willing to speak to me. So I ignored the others and diligently returned to my sacred duty of serving the big boss. As I peeled another seed, I smiled coquettishly, “ Zhong Yuan, are you still upset ?”
Zhong Yuan’s face was expressionless, “ What do you think?”
I fed him the lotus seed, “ I think you are a generous soul, he he…”
There wasn’t a single ounce of humility in Zhong Yuan so he accepted my praise calmly and then said, “ If you think that I am generous, why don’t you do something to make me happy?”
I was immediately alert, “ What, what?”
Zhong Yun did not speak, but smiled in an evil manner.
Five minutes later, I had placed a huge lotus leaf on my head, I was holding a lotus stem in my mouth and my palms were hanging downwards in front of my chest like a puppy. With this odd posture, I was facing the camera.
Zhong Yuan held his mobile and smiled, “ Mu er, smile.”
So I smiled, but at the same time, I did not forget to bite the stem so the smile was quite miserable.
With a click, Zhong Yuan’s phone recorded my historic moment. In my life, I have done many shameful things, but every time I remembered them, they were just images ingrained in my brain. This time, this shameful event was recorded in a photo. As I looked at it, I felt like crying.
Many years later, when we were married, Zhong Yuan printed this ridiculous photo and framed it. The frame was placed at our bedside, so that I was forced to admire it every day before going to sleep.
After spending a few days with the group, I had finally started believing what Lu Zijian had once said about his roommates, that they were all badasses. This description not only fit Zhong Yuan, but also the two brothers, Passerby A and Passerby B. Both the brothers were studying Computer Science, but both were extremes.
Passerby A was a genius hacker. I wasn’t sure about the extent of his expertise, but whenever Zhong Yuan talked about him, the look on his face was one of wondrous appreciation. So he must have been brilliant. Although Zhong Yuan was evil incarnate, he was an authority on such stuff. If Zhong Yuan was praising someone, that person must be a genius. This of course meant that Zhong Yuan was a hacker himself, capable of hacking anything apparently. It was said that once he tried to hack Passerby A’s account. The outcome was that not only was he unsuccessful, he was forced to bow down to him and learn many things. That made Zhong Yuan quite skilled in this area.
If Passerby A was a genius, his brother was a wizard. Apart from software, he was involved in many other fields from astronomy to geography, from entertainment to international politics, and had a thorough knowledge of every field. Not only was he learned, he was also of a literary bent of mind. These two inclinations made him write a booklet to showcase his spirit of research and dedication. The name of this booklet was ‘ Complete X Manual.’
This booklet categorised X into four sections – primary, intermediate, advanced and the grand finale. The primary section could be summarised as ‘ silly X’ , the intermediate as ‘ X for X’, the advanced part could be summarised as ‘looking at X without looking at it’ and the grand finale was ‘ other people do X, he does not’. Then he demonstrated the four levels of X in terms of behaviour, psychology, influence and viewing. The final conclusion was that it was not shameful to view X, it was shameful not to view X.
I was completely awestruck . ( miumiu – I have no idea what this means)
So I began to worship the two brothers. There were rare talents.
Zhong Yuan was eating a watermelon. When he heard this, he casually asked, “ Mu Er, don’t you worship me ?”
I smirked, “ Why should I?”
Zhong Yuan smiled, “ You will soon know why.”
Later I learnt from other people that the rule for survival in the dormitory had four principles –
Don’t compete with Lu Zijian in Basketball.
Don’t compete with Passerby A in anything computer related
Don’t compete with Passerby B in X
Don’t ever compete with Zhong Yuan…in anything !
……
In the evening, the cook told us he had run out of soy sauce, so Zhong Yuan and I went to fetch soy sauce. As an object of his long time suppression, he had taken my obedience for granted.
From our residence, the nearest shop was about fifteen minutes. The path passed through a small forest. Although there was moonlight, the woods were still quite creepy, and I had goosebumps all over. I followed closely behind Zhong Yuan. After walking for a while, he abruptly stopped and turned to look at me, “ Are you scared ?”
I almost bumped into his chest. I stumbled and stammered, “No…no..”
He clasped my hand, “ Come on.”
His grip was quite strong. I could not wrestle my hand out from his grip, so I just walked along with him. The strangest thing was that I really didn’t feel scared any more. This proved that Zhong Yuan had all the intrinsic qualities of a ghostbuster.
As per the cook’s instructions, we went to a shop that made soy sauce by the bulk. In the small shop, a fat girl was on duty. When she saw Zhong Yuan, she smiled shyly, then dipped the sauce bucket in the large vat. She furtively gazed at Zhong Yuan from time to time, and in her absent mindedness, spilled some of the soy sauce on herself. With a blank expressionless face, Zhong Yuan pointed that out to her, “ You spilled the sauce. “
The girl blushed . She quickly covered the lid and handed the bottle to us. She had given us almost two pounds of the sauce for the price of one. Good! I always liked a good deal.
As we turned back, the girl reluctantly accompanied us till the door and then stood there for a long time, watching us walking away. I was holding the soy sauce with one hand. With the other hand, I tugged Zhong Yuan’s hand, “ Zhong Yuan, she is looking at you.”
Zhong Yuan made no response.
I gained some courage and poked him again, “ Hey, how about you marry her ? See how good she is, she gave us two pounds of soy sauce for the price of one.”
Zhong Yuan shrugged off my hand in annoyance, “ Are you selling yourself for one pound of soy sauce ?”
“ No, I am talking about you..”, I smiled.
Zhong Yuan abruptly grabbed my arm and pulled me closer with such strength that I winced in pain . He looked down on me and said, “ I already know who I will marry.”
I felt that the content of his speech was incongruous with his expression. This was just a meaningless statement, but he was looking at me in such a weird manner that I felt a chill through my heart. He seemed to be trying to read my thoughts.
I coughed and bowed my head, trying to pull my hand back. Zhong Yuan’s palm slipped down my wrist and he gripped my wrist tightly. This time I didn’t try to pull out as we had reached the small forest by now. As the moonlight cast mottled shadows on the branches, I felt a bit scared. I was about to say something to break the silence when I heard strange sounds from the depths of the wood near us. It seemed like two people, a man and a woman were moaning in pain.
Curious, I tried to peek further when Zhong Yun grabbed my hand and started walking away rapidly. I was almost dragged along with him. The intermittent sounds gradually faded and soon , we were out of the woods. The moment we were out, I suddenly realised what the sounds were. I coughed in embarrassment. Wow, the folks here were really unrestrained…
In my defence, I was listening to a live version for the first time in my life, so it took me sometime to figure it out. As I figured out the truth, I blushed. As a matter of fact, I was very innocent in all these matters..
When Zhong Yuan saw me blushing, he remarked in a condescending manner, “ Now you blush? ”
Ah, so my guess was correct. At this point, I didn’t know what to say. Those sounds were still running through my mind..ah , ah , oh oh…. I realised that the sex education classes at school were so abstract that even after studying it for two years, the live version was unrecognisable. The old adage was true, practical experience always stumps theory.
As my mind was immersed in all these thoughts, Zhong Yuan dragged me back to the house.
Everyone was in the yard enjoying the weather. When they saw us, their expressions were curious. I was wondering why when Li’l Second spoke up, “ Why are you guys holding hands ? And why is your face so red, blockhead three? “
I realised Zhong Yuan was still holding my hand and immediately pulled my hand out.
Then, Boss smiled and echoed, “ Forget about holding hands. You guys must have been hugging each other.”
Passerby A grabbed a chopstick from the table and placed it like a mike in front of Zhong Yuan, “ How was the feeling of being hugged , Mr Zhong ? “
I was sure Zhong Yuan would not comment, but he brought his face closer to the chopstick and responded seriously, “ The hug felt very soft and comfortable.”
I was very annoyed at his response and blurted out without thinking, “ Soft and comfortable? Are you a sanitary napkin ? “
Everyone was speechless.
A group of crows flew over my head in single file…
