"You are… "
His voice is getting farther and farther...
He's getting farther and farther away...
The world narrowed and darkened from both sides to the middle, as if the curtains on the stage fell, a quiet closing ceremony.
Ning Ning opened his eyes.
She was sitting in the auditorium of the movie theater. In front of her, on the snow-white screen, the opening song had just ended, and "The Man in the Picture" had started.
Shi Zhongtang stood in the wooden corridor, he watched Ning Ning and Wen Yu leave, then lowered his head and opened the picture book left by Wen Yu.
Ning Ning in the painting has not yet formed, and the wisteria flowers and pillars next to it are also outlined. Behind the pillars, there is a looming mask.
He turned his head to look, not far away, behind a pillar in the corridor, stretched out a smiling face mask, smiled and said to him, "Let's make a deal."
After speaking, he took out a movie ticket, which was stamped with a bust.
"You help me save someone," Smiley said to him. "I'll tell you her secret—the reason why she wouldn't accept your secret."
Seeing this, Ning Ning in the audience couldn't help muttering: "Don't do stupid things."
On the screen, Shi Zhongtang stretched out his hand and took the movie ticket.
She saw him entering the movie theater, and saw that the poster at the door gradually changed, the title of the play changed from "Scam" to "Escaped", and he staggered out of the movie theater, suddenly lying on the ground, retching. .
With the first ticket, he changed the fate of the liar Zhou Aiguo.
He also let him know Ning Ning's secret.
"Tell me." He lay on the bed, holding the hand of the girl beside him, smiling sadly, "For you, is my life just a two-hour movie?"
Ning Ning raised her hand to wipe away her tears, suddenly got up from her seat, and walked towards the masked person closest to her.
Just like last time, before the movie was over, they had already rushed over to the scene, as if she was a piece of Tang Monk's meat, and she couldn't even distinguish the soup if she came too late.
The movie plays behind her as she walks past masked people.
"By the way, what's your name?"
Not you, she walked past a man wearing a scholar mask.
"Tell me."
Not you, she walks past a man wearing a crying mask.
"It means something to you. In a foreign land, no, in another time and space, there is someone calling your name, your real name... Don't you like it?"
Not you either, she walked past a man wearing an old peasant mask.
On the movie screen behind him, the smiling face mask appeared again.
"Let's do another deal." He took out another ticket, "Help me save someone, and I'll teach you how to keep her."
Shi Zhongtang looked down and saw the movie ticket with the half-stamp stamped on it again, but this time he didn't reach out to pick it up.
"What are you hesitating about?" asked the smiling face mask.
Shi Zhongtang: "A person can only change the fate of two protagonists at most, right?"
Smiley Mask: "Yes."
Shi Zhongtang: "If I change one, my body will get worse. I'm thinking, if I change two, will I get Alzheimer's and a bald beer belly earlier."
Smiley mask: "Haha, how can it be so scary."
Shi Zhongtang: "Then why don't you go by yourself?"
"...I can't go." Smiley Mask confessed to him, "Let's be honest, I'm the original gatekeeper of the movie theater. Once I take up this post, I'm not allowed to be laid off for the rest of my life. Normal people can't stand it, right? So I ran away, and now The backup gatekeeper is chasing me all over the world, I dare not go back, he will just tear my face off."
Shi Zhongtang: "...It sounds a bit scary, what kind of black-hearted factory underground organization are you?"
"Hahaha." The smiling face mask seemed to be amused by him, he laughed for a while, and then asked, "Then are you going or not?"
Shi Zhongtang was silent for a long time.
"...Why don't you go?" Finally, he snorted and laughed.
The moment he reached out to take the movie ticket, the movie read his heart out.
"If what stands between Princess Lingshan and Li Lang is life and death, then what stands between me and her is time..."
Is life and death more difficult to cross, or is time more difficult to cross
Ning Ning stopped in front of a person.
This man was very tall, dressed in the clothes of an ancient swordsman, he was in the crowd, she managed to find him, and then slowly stretched out her hand, trying to lift the jade mask on his face.
But she couldn't open it.
"How could this be?" Ning Ning refused to give up.
"...It's alright." Shi Zhongtang's voice came from under the mask. He held her hand and said to her with a smile, "We meet again, that's enough."
Is this enough? He became a masked man, stayed in the movie theater forever and was not allowed to go out. In the hearts of everyone, in the hearts of his relatives and friends, he was dead and committed suicide.
Ning Ning stared at him blankly for a long time, then suddenly stretched out his hand: "Ticket."
Shi Zhongtang: "Well?"
Ning Ning choked back her throat: "Give me your ticket."
Shi Zhongtang also looked at her for a long time, then laughed: "No."
"give me!"
"No!"
"Give it to me!!"
Shi Zhongtang suddenly held Ning Ning's shoulders, turned her in the opposite direction, made her face the screen, and like a boyfriend watching a movie with his girlfriend, he wrapped her around her from behind and said affectionately, "Look. "
On the screen, Shi Zhongtang entered the cinema for the second time.
Second ticket.
The second time changed the fate of the protagonist.
After he came out, he fell directly to the ground, convulsed without image, as if he had epilepsy, and the woman passing by immediately walked around him. Coincidentally, that woman was the woman who broke in at the banquet later and said she loved him. There's no need to wait until he's old and bald, now she doesn't recognize him and doesn't dare to approach him.
"Wow, why is this scene." Shi Zhongtang hurriedly raised his hand to cover Ning Ning's eyes, "Don't look, don't look, wait for the next scene."
"Give me the ticket." Ningning's tears wet his fingers, "I want to change your destiny."
"...No need." Shi Zhongtang pressed her chin to the top of her hair and smiled softly, "I'm doing well now."
Ningning: "You lie! What's so good about being a masked person!"
"I didn't lie to you." Shi Zhongtang looked at the screen opposite, looking at herself being kissed by her, and said with a smile, "After I became a masked man, my movies have been showing, and ah, because I was cheated I came in, so the movie theater gave me a little privilege, I could sit in the audience and watch it, or I could go in the movie like other masked people."
"...But I still prefer to be in movies." His voice gradually became gentle, like the music slowly flowing from the piano keys, "I can see my father and brother, I can act, I can meet you, I can once I fell in love with you again. Haha, I really earned it when I think about it. Others can only fall in love once, but I have already fallen in love 12 times..."
"Can't you just give me the ticket!" Ning Ning couldn't forget this, "I let you out, you can go to see your father and brother, you can continue acting, you can... you can meet me... "
"...In that case, I'm already a fast-drying old man." Shi Zhongtang said softly, "How can I make you the happiest woman in the world when I'm like this, so that's fine..."
Is this really good? Always live in the past, always repeat the past life.
"...Don't you feel pain?" Ningning turned around.
"It's not painful." The mask covered his current expression, but even if he didn't hide it, the talented actor would probably pretend to be happy. He was afraid that she wouldn't believe it, so he repeated, "It's not painful."
As he spoke, he hugged her tightly.
A pair of hands slowly climbed up his back, and Ning Ning hugged him tightly.
They hugged together on the movie screen, and they hugged together off the movie screen, like a reflection in the water, like a reflection in a mirror... Everything ends up being nothing but the moon in the water and the flower in the mirror.
Time will forever freeze this feeling in the past.
This is a first love that blooms but can't bear fruit.
Da, da, da, the slow footsteps sounded from far to near, the two followed the sound and looked, it was the gatekeeper.
He looked at Shi Zhongtang coldly, his fingers crunched by his side, and the threat was palpable, as if he could tear the mask off his face again at any time.
"Ah! Father-in-law!" Shi Zhongtang yelled at him.
puff! A puff of smoke rose from the gatekeeper's head, and the mask did not ignite spontaneously.
"I didn't break the rules, you can't burn me." Shi Zhongtang smiled and pushed Ning Ning's back, "Go ahead."
Ning Ning stumbled and fell into the arms of the gatekeeper.
The gatekeeper was like an old hen protecting his cubs, he almost ran out with someone in his mouth, half dragging and half pulling Ning Ning out of the door. He was furious and kept educating him along the way.
"I told you, don't approach this man casually, he's a playboy! There's not a single word of truth in his mouth, it's all exaggeration, exaggeration!!"
"You don't have to feel guilty about him. Since he was targeted by the liar Pei Xuan, he will be tricked into the cinema sooner or later. It's the same with or without you!"
"How dare you call my father-in-law, I want to burn him, burn him..."
"Dad." Ning Ning called softly.
The gatekeeper's anger stopped abruptly, and the mask that was breathing fire returned to its original appearance.
It was a snow-white mask.
It is incomparable to Shi Zhongtang's jade mask, which is the kind of inferior mask that costs five yuan apiece on the mask stand.
Ningning looked at this mask, how could she forget it? Boss Qu once bought the same mask from a mask stand, put it on his face, and smiled at her: "Okay, now we are the same."
"You're Boss Qu, right?" Ning Ning looked at him and said, "You're dad, right?"
"Me!" The gatekeeper was suddenly very excited, and the word "I" blurted out, trembling for a while, and said sternly, "... I'm not."
"You are!" Ning Ning cried, "Don't lie to me, you are!"
The gatekeeper was at a loss, and kept wiping away her tears with his sleeve, shaking while wiping and saying, "What's so good about Boss Qu? He's so old, so bad, he's done so many wrong things..."
"But he's here to help me wipe my tears." Ningning suddenly grabbed his sleeve and looked at him with red eyes, "and you don't have to be bad, you don't have to do so many wrong things... Dad, take your Give me a ticket!"
The gatekeeper... that is, Boss Qu, his whole body froze, as if he had woken up from a sweet dream. The reality was so cruel that he was cold all over.
"...I don't have a ticket." He said in a low voice.
"No, you lied to me again!" Ning Ning stared at him, but was disappointed and sad to find that, unlike just now, he didn't look like he was lying.
"...Everyone has votes, only the gatekeeper does not, anyone can be saved, only the gatekeeper can't." Boss Qu said coldly, "And I don't need to be saved, I want to stay here, I want revenge!! "