There are 365 days in a year, but Lin Yingtao and Jiang Qiaoxi are together for less than 50 days at most.
To be honest, I do feel insecure sometimes.
Morgan Stanley Hong Kong department summer 2011 interns took a few group photos together, and someone posted them online. Lin Yingtao saw them in the class group of Class 18 of Experimental High School Grade 3. The boys in the group were discussing how beautiful the ladies in big investment banks were, while the girls said that Jiang Qiaoxi looked the same as in high school: "Who said before that he went to Hong Kong to be a tutor because his family was in a bad financial situation?"
"Hey, maybe I just have nothing to do and do a part-time job."
Fehringer talked in the group, saying that he had just been to Hong Kong some time ago and finally met Jiang Qiaoxi downstairs of Morgan Stanley in Central: "He said he didn't plan to pursue further studies for the time being and might return to the mainland in the next few years."
A classmate said, Feilinger, please add Jiang Qiaoxi to the group. We haven’t seen him for many years.
“I asked, he’s in Hong Kong, he doesn’t have WeChat,” Felinger said.
Lin Yingtao enlarged those photos on her mobile phone.
Fashion magazines say that Asian men wearing suits always look big-headed and small-bodied, with bad proportions and a silly look. But Jiang Qiaoxi is not like that. When he was in high school, he wore the most ordinary blue and white school uniform. He was tall and handsome, and he attracted attention wherever he went. Now he wears a shirt and trousers, standing among a group of investment bank elites, and he is even more handsome.
She asked Jiang Qiaoxi on WeChat: "Is your internship over?"
Jiang Qiaoxi didn't reply, maybe he's still busy with work.
It was not until evening that the black-and-white photo of Jiang Qiaoxi popped up.
He sent her a picture.
"What is this?" Lin Yingtao asked.
"Pay slip," he said, and sent a cool smoking emoji.
Lin Yingtao's TOEFL score came out, 103. She reviewed for a long time and told Jiang Qiaoxi immediately.
Jiang Qiaoxi said: "Hold it, we can go out together later."
Lin Yingtao said: "Where are we going together?"
Jiang Qiaoxi said: "No matter where we want to go, we can go together."
At the end of the first semester of her senior year, Lin Yingtao was drinking Coke in a KFC at Beijing West Railway Station. She looked up and saw Yu Qiao, who was dragging his suitcase and taking the same train back to the provincial capital with her.
The most striking thing about Yu Qiao after he came back from Canada was that he no longer wore a down jacket in winter. He wore a windbreaker and did not feel cold at all.
"How cold is it in Canada?" Lin Yingtao said.
Yu Qiao looked at her and said, it’s even colder on the plane.
Yu Qiao added: "You are quite warm in Hong Kong!"
"It's so hot in Hong Kong!" Lin Yingtao turned around and glanced at the people in line, "Aren't you going to order?"
Yu Qiao turned around and looked at the crowd, then shook his head.
He ate the French fries and chicken nuggets that Lin Yingtao poured out.
On the high-speed train back home, Lin Yingtao and Yu Qiao argued about how much they spent on the KFC meal in Qunshan in 2000.
"A spicy burger and a Coke is ten bucks," she insisted. "Dushanne, you and me, and my dad, there are four of us going there."
Yu Qiao said leisurely: "It has been more than ten years, and the salary of Power Construction Group has not increased much."
Lin Yingtao glanced at him. Lin Yingtao had never really known how much her parents were paid.
Yu Qiao suddenly said: "Fortunately, none of us stayed at the construction site..."
The Qunshan Small Restaurant group planned a dinner party at the beginning of the winter vacation, but Qin Yeyun and her boyfriend went to travel to Japan and did not come.
It's senior year now, and everyone is worrying about the future.
Du Shang's undergraduate study lasted five years. While eating mutton soup steamed buns, he complained that he would have to do three years of regular training after graduation and work as cheap labor: "No, I still have to take the postgraduate entrance examination next year."
Yu Qiao was preparing for an interview at China Eastern Airlines, and Cai Fangyuan asked, "You want to go to China Eastern Airlines?"
"The base is close." Yu Qiao said.
Lin Yingtao ate the lamb on a skewer and said to Du Shang, "I saw on the news that medical disputes are very serious now. Be careful when you go to the hospital."
Duchamp said, "Hey, even if I go, I will hide behind. I am a doctor now, I can't afford to be beaten again!"
Lin Yingtao took out her phone and everyone sat together to take a group photo. Lin Yingtao sent the photo to Jiang Qiaoxi. Before he could reply, Cai Fangyuan suddenly asked from the opposite side: "Hey Lin Yingtao, when are you getting married?"
Lin Yingtao raised her head and was stunned: "Ah?"
Her reaction made the three boys laugh. Du Shang looked at Cai Fangyuan and said, "Why are you asking such a stupid question? How big is a cherry?"
Cai Fangyuan was puzzled and put down the mutton skewer: "Hey, Jiang Qiaoxi told me last winter vacation that he wanted to propose to you, and it's been a year and he still hasn't proposed?"
Lin Yingtao's face suddenly turned red.
In 2012, Lin Yingtao spent the Chinese New Year in Hong Kong for the second time. She hugged Jiang Qiaoxi on the Airport Express and asked him what he would do if the world ended in 2012.
Jiang Qiaoxi touched her hair and let her face lean on his chest: "Then let's have fewer regrets."
Jiang Qiaoxi still had to do an internship during the winter break, but he might have made an agreement with his supervisor. In the past two weeks, he left work on time every day, but he often worked at home at night. Lin Yingtao sometimes woke up in the middle of the night, sat up in her suspender nightgown, and saw Jiang Qiaoxi still sitting at the dining table, with his back to her, concentrating on reading data.
Lin Yingtao got out of bed and put on her slippers. She walked behind him, feeling very distressed.
She hugged his neck from behind.
Jiang Qiaoxi paused typing on the keyboard, his neck drooped, he reached out and held Lin Yingtao's hand, then felt a gentle kiss on his cheek from the side.
After three months of separation, every time they made love for the first time after reuniting, Lin Yingtao would feel pain. She didn't know whether it was because her body still had difficulty adapting to Jiang Qiaoxi's size, or because Jiang Qiaoxi had been separated from her for so long, coupled with the high pressure from work, and often overdid it.
She curled up in bed, flipping through the books Jiang Qiaoxi used for the CPA exam. She asked Jiang Qiaoxi what the difference was between CPA and CFA.
Jiang Qiaoxi finished his shower and sat in bed. With his slender fingers, he checked his mobile phone mailbox for the last time. He took the book from Lin Yingtao, turned off the bedside lamp, and hugged Lin Yingtao into his arms: "We have a wounded person in our family, go to bed early."
Lin Yingtao opened her eyes in the darkness, her face pressed against his chest. After a while, she asked, "Are you really asleep?"
Jiang Qiaoxi closed his eyes and smiled: "Cherry, I see you are in pain, don't bother me."
On Sunday, Jiang Qiaoxi came back from the company and went to the hospital with Lin Yingtao.
My cousin is sitting in a wheelchair, playing bridge with some old classmates who came to visit him. His fingers are still not very flexible, and my cousin believes that playing bridge can exercise his brain activity and enhance the sensitivity of his fingers.
Jiang Qiaoxi stood at the door of the ward, unbuttoned his suit, and put his hands in his pockets. He said to Lin Yingtao helplessly, "He just likes playing cards."
When the cousin saw Jiang Qiaoxi and Xiaolin came together, he put down his cards and was very happy. He asked his classmates to bring a walker and demonstrated to Xiaolin how to use the walker to get out of bed and walk. Jiang Qiaoxi was watching outside the door and couldn't help but go in and lend him a hand.
"Have you practiced well?" Jiang Qiaoxi helped his staggering cousin back to the wheelchair. He raised his eyes and asked him, "Did you just play cards?"
The cousin was very impatient and complained to Lin Yingtao about Jiang Qiaoxi, saying that this little cousin was no longer as cute as before ever since he started his internship and getting paid by an investment bank.
"You just want to act cool! You haven't even graduated from college yet, why are you pretending to be an adult?"
Lin Yingtao smiled and said, "Cousin, I think so too!"
Jiang Qiaoxi stood aside, listening to their accusations, smiling helplessly.
My cousin's wife said, "You need Qiaoxi to look after you! Otherwise, you will just play cards every day!"
The cousin raised his eyes to look at his wife and said pitifully, "We haven't played for three years." He looked at Lin Yingtao again with a look of "Sister, look how miserable I am."
Before, without his cousin, Jiang Qiaoxi seemed unable to digest many things in his life. He relied heavily on this "life mentor" to the point where he would stop moving forward and lose his direction without him.
Now, he has grown up. He is sixteen years younger than his cousin, but he has become the belief and support for his cousin to persist in rehabilitation.
Lin Yingtao sat on the sofa, watching Jiang Qiaoxi roll up his shirt sleeves, bend down, and accompany his cousin to exercise with a walker. Jiang Qiaoxi no longer called him "brother", but "Jiang Ruocheng", as if they were of the same generation, and he must persist.
The cousin's wife gave Lin Yingtao a key to her house. Lin Yingtao went there on Monday, carrying brown sugar and jujubes bought from the supermarket, and used the cousin's wife's steamer to steam the jujube buns her mother taught her.
She left a lunch box at her cousin's house.
When Jiang Qiaoxi came home from get off work, he saw Lin Yingtao sitting at the dining table waiting for him. On a plate on the table were four round little buns that looked like four little rabbits, with rabbit ears cut out of them.
On the morning of New Year's Eve, Jiang Qiaoxi went to the company and came back in the morning. Lin Yingtao was a little lazy, she was still lying in bed, watching him pull his tie, lowering his head, she was pressed down by him, and he buried his head to smell the scent of her neck.
Lin Yingtao said coquettishly, "Stop making trouble, mom and dad are going to video chat with us."
It was snowing in the provincial capital. Lin Yingtao sat next to Jiang Qiaoxi, frowning as she looked at the computer. She couldn't see her parents' faces at all, but only the big snowflakes swaying outside the window.
Lin Yingtao said: "Dad, Mom, I want to talk to you!"
However, Father Lin said off-screen: "Qiaoxi, it's been a long time since you last saw snow! Look, it's snowing really hard today!"
Lin Yingtao was sitting there, and she felt Jiang Qiaoxi's hands gently hugging her from behind.
"Yes, Uncle Lin," Jiang Qiaoxi smiled and raised his voice, "You and Auntie should be careful when you go out these days!"
Mother Lin said beside the camera: "Why go out? It's too cold."
Lin Yingtao said, "Dad! It's not like Jiang Qiaoxi hasn't seen snowflakes on TV before. Hurry up and close the window. I feel cold just looking at it!"
Lin Yingtao hugged Jiang Qiaoxi's shoulders. After talking to her parents, Lin Yingtao leaned into Jiang Qiaoxi's arms and said with a frown, "Dad is so stupid."
Jiang Qiaoxi bent down and kissed her lips, saying, "Don't you like Uncle Lin very much?"
Lin Yingtao looked up at him and said, "Dad is like a child sometimes."
The day was January 22, 2012. Lin Yingtao suddenly realized that Jiang Qiaoxi’s birthday was just over a month away.
She said: "I wish I could stay in Hong Kong for one more month."
Jiang Qiaoxi said: "What's wrong?"
Lin Yingtao said: "In another month, it will be your 22nd birthday."
Jiang Qiaoxi blinked and suddenly said, "Yes, I'm almost twenty-two."
He lowered his eyes and looked at Lin Yingtao.
Lin Yingtao sat in his arms and felt a little scared by his gaze.