This time, he became very calm when he heard the name, closed his eyes, and said after a long time: "Please stay with me for a while." He changed the subject easily.
"You don't like me calling you by that name?" She tried to turn the conversation back to the topic.
“I don’t dislike it.”
"If you don't dislike it, then you like it?" she asked.
"Shh!" This time he didn't even give her a vague answer. He made a gesture to keep quiet and prepared to fall asleep.
Xieyi looked at him angrily. This man always evaded her like this. Even though she was so angry, she really fell asleep obediently. A few minutes later, Li Zeliang opened his eyes.
In fact, he didn't feel sleepy at all. He gently pulled his arm away from the back of her head and walked to the living room.
When Xieyi woke up again, she found that he had gone out and there was a note he left on the table.
"I've asked for leave for you. You don't have to go to work today. The refrigerator is empty. There's only milk and cookies. Eat them first. I'll go out for a walk."
At the end of the note were the words "Ayan". Xieyi reached out to touch the signature and recited it softly. He really liked this name.
"Where are you?" She called him.
"Just returned to the outside of the community."
"Would you like to go shopping with me?"
"I don't like shopping," he confessed.
"Just think of it as accompanying me this time." She acted coquettishly.
He was silent for a moment and asked, "Where are you going?"
For the first time, the man learned to surrender and achieved a temporary victory.
So, Xieyi quickly packed up and dressed, closed the door, ran downstairs happily, and when he walked out of the community gate, he saw Li Zeliang standing opposite the zebra crossing from a distance.
She often saw him in formal clothes, with his whole body standing straight, but at this moment he was wearing very casual clothes, which looked completely different from when he was at work.
He was waiting for the red light on the street, but no one knew what he was thinking about. His eyes were elsewhere and he didn't see Xie Yi.
She was standing across the street, opened her mouth, and shouted at the top of her voice: "A Yan..."
The person who was waiting for the traffic light next to her looked back at her strangely.
She saw Li Zeliang also turned around when he heard the voice, and found her waving at him in the crowd, and he raised the corners of his mouth and smiled slightly.
Amid the endless stream of vehicles, Xie Yi stared blankly at his smiling face. It was the first time she felt that his eyes were full of smiles, and there was no feeling of gloom at all.
The two of them walked side by side on the busiest pedestrian street in City C.
Xieyi pointed to the McDonald's takeout stand next to him, where there was a long line, and said, "I want to buy an ice cream cone."
"I'll wait for you." He said it without any self-awareness and frankly.
Xie Yi glanced at him and asked, "Why don't you go buy it?"
"I don't eat."
"But I want to eat."
He glanced at her sideways, "I want to know, how do you get by when you're not with me?"
"At worst, I'll find another man to buy it for me." While threatening, Xie Yi walked towards the two blond handsome guys who were coming towards him. "Hello!" Just as he was about to find a topic to continue chatting, he was pulled back by Li Zeliang with a dark face.
"Shen Xieyi..." he said unhappily, "You..."
"What's wrong with me? Foreigners are definitely more generous than you. If you don't believe me, let's try it?"
"How dare you!" He was a little angry.
"If you buy it for me, I won't dare to eat it." She changed her tone and looked at him, "Buy it, buy it."
"… "
"Ayan, buy it for me."
After using the trick, Xie Yi was satisfied to see Li Zeliang pay and queue up at the window. Fortunately, they were in a different place and had few acquaintances, otherwise anyone who saw them would be surprised.
In fact, she didn't really like sweets now, especially children's stuff, but she was greedy for his scarce pampering. She walked down the street with a cone in her hand, and next to her was the unnatural Li Zeliang. There were a lot of people on the pedestrian street, and occasionally one or two people would look back at him and point and talk in a low voice.
No matter how good the prosthesis was, it still made his legs look a little strange. She understood in an instant why he didn't like shopping, and she felt a little guilty.
It turned out that he was very stubborn in words, but he was actually accommodating her in this way in secret.
Someone bumped into Xieyi's shoulder when she passed by, and she accidentally touched Li Zeliang's hand when she turned sideways. Compared with hers, his hand was cooler. She took a bite of the crispy outer shell of the cone, leaned close to him in the crowded crowd, and when she touched his hand again, she took the opportunity to gently hook it. At that moment, his eyes looking forward seemed to have no fluctuations, and his steps did not hesitate at all.
Thump, thump, thump... She counted her heartbeats, and never felt time pass so slowly and so unbearably. She didn't expect that she and he had done the most intimate things between men and women, and now she would be so nervous to hold hands. During this time, she almost imagined all the embarrassing scenes that would happen if he didn't like her like this, and would he throw her away? Make fun of her? Or walk away? Just when she was about to lose heart, he had already held her hand. His fingertips were slightly cold, but his palm was moist and warm, and his movements were gentle.
She suddenly felt happy, and her heart felt sweet, just like the creamy ice cream at her lips.
"Are your legs tired?" she asked, holding his hand.
"fine."
"What do you mean okay?"
"Not tired."
"What if I'm tired?"
"Then let's go back." Just after he finished speaking, the cell phone rang and he glanced at Xieyi.
Xieyi smiled and said, "Go ahead and answer it. Maybe it's something important." Then he went to the door of the shop next door to admire the window display.
"Mr. Li." The caller was Xue Qigui, "That matter..."
"I looked at the plan and there was nothing that was unfeasible, and the conditions they offered were very generous."
"Indeed."
"When doing business, risks are inevitable."
They talked for a long time, during which Li Zeliang turned around and saw Xie Yi standing in front of the window. In the window of the jewelry store in front of her, there was a glass counter with two golden cartoon figures inside.
She seemed very curious and bent down. Perhaps she only paid attention to the counter and forgot about the window. When she bent down slowly, her forehead hit the glass with a bang.
At the same time, he couldn't help but raise his head slightly as she did.
Her first reaction was to look around pretending to be calm. After making sure that no one noticed her ugly appearance, she rubbed her forehead in pain.
"Mr. Li?" Xue Qigui talked for a long time, but saw that Li Zeliang did not answer.
He was distracted for a moment, so Xue Qigui had to repeat what he had just said.
After finishing the discussion and hanging up the phone, he walked over and asked, "What are you looking at?"
"A pair of cartoon bears, so cute, they are made of gold." She pointed at them and laughed. She has always been vulgar and has loved golden things since she was a child.
Zhan Dongzhen once gave her a pair of elegant, sparkling earrings as a birthday present. They matched her small earlobes perfectly, but she said dejectedly, "They are so bad, and I can't eat them."
Zhan Dongzhen was dumbfounded. "It can be exchanged for many kilograms of rice."
"I like gold."
"Want to go in and take a look?" Li Zeliang asked. It seemed that he was more familiar with the hobby of freehand painting.
“I won’t watch it, and I won’t buy it.”
The clerk in the jewelry store saw the two standing in front of the window and talking, so he came out with a smile and asked, "Miss, can you come in and sit down for a while?"
"Buy it if you like it." He led her inside calmly.
Xieyi suddenly remembered that the person standing in front of him was a wealthy bachelor, the kind who lacked everything except money.
Xieyi didn't act coyly and bought things happily.
The clerk said that there were three sizes of the little bear, each weighing a certain amount of grams, and then placed them in front of Xie Yi one by one.
"I want the biggest one." She pointed.
"Small ones look better," he suggested.
Xie Yi glanced at him and whispered, "You are so stingy."
"… "
Li Zeliang surrendered with both hands and took out his wallet to pay the bill.
Xieyi didn't refuse in any coy manner.
She has always believed that men and women have equal status in the family and society. If you are just ordinary friends or colleagues, as long as you don't want to be involved in someone's emotional life, you must distinguish the financial accounts and don't try to take advantage of the other person.
But if he is the different person in her heart, then of course he should pay the bill.
It was rare to meet two such straightforward buyers, and the saleslady happily sent them out. As they left, they looked at the small yellow croakers one by one, feeling envious.
Back home, Xieyi laid on the table, staring at the two golden bears, and said dejectedly, "The small ones are really cuter." Greed does not end well...
In the evening, on the sofa in the living room, Xie Yi leaned on Li Zeliang's chest and asked, "Are you going back tomorrow?"
"Let Xiaolin ask for leave for you, and we can stay a few more days."
"are you free?"
"If there is anything, they will contact me," he said.
Xie Yi listened to his heartbeat, and after a while he said, "Why should I call you A Yan?"
"My childhood name."
"When I was a kid?"
"When I was in school, my name was Li Nanyan, but I changed it later."
"Why did you change it?"
"When I asked for divination, the fortune teller said that the name meant bad luck, so my family changed it."
"Your family is superstitious."
Li Zeliang smiled.
"I don't like the first name." Xie Yi said, "But I still like to call you A Yan."
"Someone didn't say that before." Li Zeliang said casually. At that time, she said she liked the name Li Nanyan more.
"Who is it?" Xieyi asked.
"No one."
"Girlfriend? First love?" Xie Yi became interested. "You promised to tell me about your past."
He thought for a moment, "There's actually nothing to say, and I don't know how to say it."
"Then I'll ask you the question."
"What good will it do me to answer?" he asked.
It turns out that this person is a businessman at heart, and he is free to criticize in his heart.
"You can ask me later," she begged, "I'll just ask three."
Li Zeliang twirled her hair with his fingers and nodded.
The agreement was reached.
"How many times had you been in love before you met me?" the first question.
"What is the definition of love?" he asked her.
"Uh..." This question stumped her, so she had to change it, "Who is the person who wrote 'Ayan' on the note?"
"Is this the second question?" he asked her for confirmation.
"No, you didn't answer the previous ones, so you can only be considered the first one." She said angrily.
"Answer the latter one?"
"Um."
"Ex-girlfriend."
Xieyi's heart skipped a beat, and he felt a little strange. He couldn't help but ask again: "Who is she? How did you know each other? Why are you not together anymore?"
"You asked three questions in one go. Which two do you plan to ask me to answer in the remaining two chances?"
Xieyi weighed the pros and cons and said helplessly: "When you answer 'how did you two know each other', you need to tell me in detail and not give me a perfunctory answer, otherwise I will really get angry."
“We’ve been in the same school… all along,” he said.
Yes, they had always been in the same school, whether in high school, college or in Germany. He had once misunderstood that there was such a coincidence in the world, but later he realized that she had been deliberately following in his footsteps.
"But I have forgotten how we first met," he added.
"You're cheating!"
"I really forgot." He said sincerely.
"… "
Xieyi suddenly felt like a deflated ball. This man just loved to play Tai Chi with her and kept his mouth shut.
"You have one last question," he announced.
"I won't ask anymore." She said sullenly.
"Then you voluntarily give up your rights."
Not only did he not try to comfort her, he even said something like this to add insult to injury. Xieyi was so angry that she raised her head and bit his chin hard until he frowned in pain. Xieyi then let go of her teeth contentedly and said, "I'll save the last question for later." After that, she ran to the bathroom.
She couldn't always be oppressed by him without any resistance, right
Li Zeliang looked at her back and sank into memories.
When did he and she meet for the first time? After so many years, he really couldn't remember clearly. Was it in the fall or summer? It seemed that they were still in high school. In the last two semesters of graduation, his father sent him to the faraway city B to entrust him to his aunt in order to prevent him from being disturbed by family factors.
He leaned on the sofa and heard her running water in the bathroom to take a shower. He supported his chin with his hand and thought about it again.
It seemed that day was the last day of the school sports meet.
The boys in his class entered the finals of the 4×100m relay. Although he was a good runner at that time, he didn't like to be in the limelight. However, the beautiful head teacher kept trying to persuade him. Finally, he had to go on the field. Unexpectedly, because it was the last chance to participate in the school sports meeting, everyone else tried very hard, from the preliminaries, semi-finals to the finals.
He couldn't even remember which baton he was running, the second or third? The relay race has always been the finale of track and field events, with many people watching. He also tried his best, almost on par with the runners from another class, leaving the other groups far behind. But just when he was about to hand over the baton, a girl shouted excitedly, "Li Nanyan, come on!" and then rushed into the track from outside in great excitement. He was about to hit her, but it was too late for him to retract his feet, so the two of them collided heavily, and the baton flew away.
After the two were taken to the infirmary, classmates kept questioning and scolding the girl for him. She kept apologizing to them, then lowered her head and didn't dare to look at him. He saw that when the girl lowered her head, there were tears in her eyes, and there was a hole in her clothes at her elbow, which was oozing blood. His knees and palms were scratched by the plastic track, and his whole body seemed to be falling apart, so he could imagine that she must have been seriously injured.
He was so indifferent that he asked reluctantly, "Hey, are you okay?"
I didn't expect that just such a casual greeting would make her look up, bite her lips, and burst into laughter.
"Senior, my name is Su Xieyi."
"Oh." He responded casually.
"We've met before." She completely forgot about the pain and reminded him excitedly.
"Hmm." He wasn't interested.
"I'm in Class 7, Grade 1. My classroom is at the staircase on the second floor." She chirped, "You pass by our classroom door every day..."
He began to have a headache and regretted why he had provoked her just now. Fortunately, the school doctor showed up in time and interrupted Xie Yi's harassment. The school doctor peeled off the cloth covering his wound bit by bit, and he pulled the corner of his mouth in pain.
She pouted and apologized guiltily: "I really didn't mean to do that. I just jumped out of excitement and ended up causing your class to lose the ranking."
"Nothing. It's meaningless anyway." He said calmly.
This was the earliest communication he could remember. Later, she said that they had indeed met somewhere else before that. Unfortunately, he could never remember what else.
At that time, Xieyi was only 14 years old. She was the youngest in the class in both age and height. She looked like a dwarf with two pigtails. But she was very popular and participated in all kinds of justice, so many boys disliked her.
She never studied hard, always argued with the teacher in class, and it was common for her to ask her parents to come. One day, he went to the office to hand in the test paper, and happened to see Xieyi standing in the office, and the person sitting next to her was probably her mother.
The teacher said, "She actually took several girls in the class to the family's house to argue. Although the boy shouldn't have bullied the country girl like that, these things should also be reported to the teacher and let the teacher solve it, right?"
The teacher's last words were actually directed to Xieyi: "If you do this, parents will come to the school and complain that it has caused psychological trauma to their children. What do you think we should do? How come all the bad things in the class are related to you, Su Xieyi?"
Upon hearing this, Mother Su apologized to the teacher in a good-tempered manner.
But Xieyi didn't say a word from beginning to end, just kept his head down.
When he passed by, Xie Yi noticed it and looked up at him. Her originally twisted eyebrows relaxed and she winked at him secretly.