soft hedgehog

Chapter 55 Downtime

It's New Year's Eve again.

The apartment is far away from Chinatown, Liang Yuchen and nstance sister and brother did not go to join in the fun, and chose to stay at home to try to be quiet.

The three of them bought a pair of the simplest red paper couplets, a few taels of meat stuffing, and a catty of dumpling wrappers from a Chinese supermarket one day in advance.

It's a pity for nce, and he was still complaining when he was learning how to make dumplings in the kitchen: "Every home on TV has aercut, can you send some for me when you return to China?"

There is no thirteen incense sold here, and even the pepper powder is hand-ground by Liang Yuchen with a coffee bean grinder.He used chopsticks to stuff the dumplings in one direction, his arms were slightly sore.Show nce the demonstration after stirring, put a ball of stuffing in the center of the skin, dip the chopsticks in water on both ends, press the skin with both hands and pinch it tightly.

"That will have to wait until next year," he said, "I might be able to bring it back for you, instead of posting it."

"Next year too," Nce took a step back and gave him a funny bow, "Thank you, brother."

Liang Yuchen couldn't help laughing: "Stop watching martial arts dramas."

It was getting late outside the window, the suburban road was silent, only the lights in this small apartment were still on.

With a time difference of more than ten hours, there is no Spring Festival Gala to watch right now.At [-] o'clock in the evening, the dumplings finally came out of the pan, a few were broken, but overall they looked like that.They each had a plate of dumplings and a stack of vinegar. Instance sat cross-legged on the carpet, and the other two sat side by side on the sofa behind her, watching medical dramas together.

nstance was full of praise for Liang Yuchen's craftsmanship, and after eating one, he turned around and gave a thumbs up, boasting exaggeratedly that he could be a chef in a star-rated restaurant, and nce echoed beside him.

Liang Yuchen didn't take it seriously.He knew that his craftsmanship was average, and someone in the courtyard in Beiyao Hutong once gave him an evaluation.

After a while, the episode aired that the middle-aged man who lost his beloved wife took revenge on the hospital with a gun, killing and injuring several people. I'm interested, but I don't think it's real enough. It's rare to see such a vicious person in real life.

The two put away the dishes, and Liang Yuchen rolled up his sleeves to wash the dishes. nce rushed to do it, he said no, he was used to washing at home in the past.

Nce asked curiously: "Doesn't your mother wash?"

Liang Yuchen said: "She usually doesn't want to get her nails wet, and she will let me wash them. Do you know how to do nails? nailbeauty"

After finishing speaking, he regretted his slip of the tongue, worried that nce thought he was complaining that the mother in his mouth was treating him badly, and was about to add an explanation, but heard nce realized: "Then your mother must trust you very much. It wasn't washed well."

Liang Yuchen was slightly taken aback, feeling touched in his heart, and smiled at him gently: "Yes, you are very smart."

After washing the dishes, the two went to the balcony to watch the stars. Nce's house has an astronomical telescope.

nce is not as tall as Liang Yuchen, standing side by side with him looks like his younger brother.This is what Instance said, but Liang Yuchen doesn't think so.

He leaned on the balcony, smoked a cigarette, and asked nce: "Do you mind?"

Nce didn't answer, and turned his hands away to close the sliding door of the balcony more tightly - so as not to get smoke into the living room.After the reunion, I went to watch the stars alone, saying that I wanted to find the Cowherd and the Weaver Girl.

Liang Yuchen was smoking a cigarette, with his deep facial features hidden in the smoke, he said to nce: "Would you like me to give you a Chinese name."

Nce's eyes were still in front of the camera: "I have a Chinese name, Wu is comparable to Lun."

Liang Yuchen coughed while laughing: "It's still an ancient name."

"Doesn't sound good?" Nce looked away at him in confusion.

Liang Yuchen hummed: "This is a name only foreigners would take."

"What's that called?" Nce was in a hurry, staring at him seriously, "Wu worry free?"

He knows such a few fragmentary idioms, and his stomach will run out of goods immediately.

Liang Yuchen thought for a while and said, "Let's call him Wu You."

In fact, Wu's surname is also uncertain. The only Chinese person nstance knew when he was adopted was Wu, so he was given the surname Wu as well.But anyway, I have had my surname for 22 years, so there is nothing wrong with just keeping my surname like this.

Satisfied, Nce straightened up and smiled at him, holding the binoculars and thanking him for the name: "That sounds good, you are so kind, thank you."

Like a primary school student with a limited vocabulary, expressing gratitude naively.

But the smile on Liang Yuchen's face dispersed along with the smoke ring.

Nce noticed that there was a difference in his expression, and asked, "What's wrong?"

The stars are too far away for the naked eye, so it is better to keep the memories in your heart.

"It's nothing." He gradually came back to his senses, and the smoke came to his lips, "From now on, you will speak this sentence in English."

nce asked: "Which sentence, sounds good?"

He said no: "The sentence in the middle."

—

A few hours later, it will be Chinese New Year's Eve.

The Ji family is much deserted with one person missing. Although Liang Yuchen didn't talk much before, Ji Tong is far from being as silent as he is now.Hu Aihua asked for excitement, and invited Ye Xiulan's mother and son downstairs again. This time, it didn't seem like the Ji family was helping the Ye family, but it was more like the Ye family helping the Ji family.

The elders were busy in the kitchen, and the younger generations were driven into the living room.

Zheng Beibei wore a black turtleneck sweater today, with green opal earrings, neither Chinese nor Western, but chic.Two kumquats in rock sugar were held in her hand and coiled like a string.Sitting bored, she asked, "I heard that you are going to take the postgraduate entrance examination?"

Ji Tong is peeling the orange carefully, picking off the white tendons outside the pulp little by little.

"The current plan is to study French and take the postgraduate entrance examination of our school. This way the difficulty is relatively small."

Zheng Beibei hummed: "It's also pretty good."

"What about you?"

"Me? I plan to cross majors and study psychology."

Ji Tong was quite surprised: "I haven't heard you say that."

Zheng Beibei was half serious and half joking: "I'm not a teenager, how could I tell you everything."

Friendship grows stronger and then fades, fades and grows stronger, there is no long-term relationship that does not need to be maintained.

Ji Tong handed her the peeled orange in his hand: "Eat it, it's quite sweet."

Zheng Beibei looked down at Chengzi, took it, and said, "Thank you."

Then it was divided into two, and half was handed back to Ji Tong.

Eating oranges together, she told Ji Tong the story of supporting education during the summer vacation.Not only talking about tragedies, but also about helpless things and interesting things.It is said that there was a rural child who was unsophisticated and wanted to buy bicycles when he saw other people, so he wrote to a sponsor far away in the city to ask for the money to buy bicycles. Funding cut off.He also said that the school had donated to entrepreneurs in two grades to look at the group photos of poor students. Unexpectedly, they looked very carefully and found that some of the children's clothes in the photos were exactly the same. They suspected that they were trying to cheat and make them I couldn't laugh or cry, and explained to the other party that the children there didn't have many clean clothes, and when taking pictures, they wore a few clothes in different shifts.

Ji Tong was gradually fascinated by what he heard, sometimes angry and sometimes emotional, he couldn't even taste the taste of oranges in his mouth.

After the lecture, Zheng Beibei said: "After reading them, I realized that my own affairs are nothing serious at all. After I finish studying psychology, I want to be a psychological counselor for left-behind children in rural areas."

I can't help much materially, but I can always contribute some spiritually.

Ji Tong asked her: "Aunt Xiulan also agrees?"

"I have to go if I agree with you or not, and do something. It's better than looking at the letters they wrote to me and doing it anxiously."

Ji Tong envied her courage.

If Zheng Beibei noticed his envy, he probably wouldn't envy Ji Tong for having a happy family.

He thought for a while and said, "I have more than 1 yuan in my card. My dad gave it to me. Can you donate it to the children on my behalf?"

Zheng Beibei was overjoyed when he heard it: "Really?"

"Well," Ji Tong nodded, "I will also contribute a little bit."

At ten o'clock in the evening, Ye Xiulan's mother and son bid farewell and left, and Ye Xiulan returned Ji Tong's red envelope.

After they left, Ji Tong put the red envelope on the tea table and watched TV with his mother in the living room.The party was boring, and Hu Aihua fell asleep after watching it.The door of the big bedroom was open, and Liang Changlei was in the room wiping the gold medal in the foreign language competition that Liang Yuchen had won.Ji Tong walked over and sat quietly by the bed.

"Tongtong, what's the matter?"

He sat in a restrained posture, with his palms clasped between his knees, looking tense and cramped. He paused for a while before asking the question that had been lingering in his mind for a long time.

"Uncle Liang, did my brother call back?"

The sound was not loud and did not wake Hu Aihua up.

Today is New Year's Eve, he thought, no matter how indifferent his brother is, he will always make a phone call with his biological father.

Liang Changlei put down the trophy and said, "I've played it in the morning. It's midnight at his side, and he said he's going to sleep, so we won't wait for New Year's Eve here."

Ji Tong raised his head suddenly, and asked expectantly, "What else did he say?"

"It's good to say he's there, just busy, let's not miss him."

"anything else?"

"And said he rented a car."

"anything else?"

Liang Changlei raised his head slowly: "Tongtong, what exactly do you want to ask?"

What do you want to ask...

Of course, I wanted to ask Liang Yuchen if he mentioned himself on the phone, and if he asked a word or two about him.

But he couldn't ask, he could only lower his eyes and remain silent.It was he himself who pushed Liang Yuchen away forcefully, and it is really hypocritical to ask these questions now.

Liang Changlei asked, "Did you guys quarrel?"

Ji Tong hummed: "My brother should be angry with me."

Liang Changlei interceded for his son: "I know you are often angry, and you don't like him taking care of you all the time. But uncle can guarantee that your brother does everything for your own good. I have never seen him care about others so much."

Ji Tong's nose was sour, his eyes were almost wet, and he restrained himself from nodding his head: "I know."

How much he wished that Liang Yuchen would still be willing to take care of him, he must be obedient.

Sitting in the room watching Liang Changlei wipe the trophy for a long time, he returned to the living room and woke Hu Aihua up: "Mom, go to sleep in the room."

His mother woke up in a daze: "Isn't it waiting for zero o'clock?"

"I'll just wait by myself."

Hu Aihua went back to the room and closed the bedroom door, leaving him alone on the sofa.

He also turned off the lights, only the TV was still on, flashing one picture after another, and the room was like a small theater.

He remembered that year's New Year's Eve when he lay on Liang Yuchen's lap and stayed up all night. Liang Yuchen was so excited about playing match [-] games that he rubbed his chin with his fingers, saying that he wanted to check whether his hair was fully grown.He also remembered that Liang Yuchen gave him a red envelope at midnight, saying that he would transfer the medical expenses first, so that he could beat him without any worries.

As he thought about it, his eyes became clouded again, and he even began to get angry at Liang Yuchen's heartlessness.

Is it because if you can't be a lover, you can't be a brother?The sage books didn't teach Liang Yuchen that he couldn't love him, did they teach that these two relationships are either one or the other?

He hates a person's roundaboutness.

After struggling for a long time, he couldn't hold back any longer, and wanted to try calling again. If he got through, would he even say "Happy New Year"?

On New Year's Eve, a happy new year should always be allowed.

He knew the phone number by heart as early as the days of insomnia. He dialed it, but unexpectedly got a shutdown reminder instead of no one answering.

How could it be downtime?

Zero o'clock was approaching, and he didn't have time to think about it, so he quickly wiped his eyes with his sleeve, and charged all the remaining one thousand yuan in the card into Liang Yuchen's old mobile phone number.

It's a pity that when the battery is fully charged and then called again, the shutdown becomes a shutdown.

Maybe Liang Yuchen didn't forget to pay the fee, but just wanted to suspend the used number.

The family members were all asleep, and he couldn't wake up his stepfather to ask his brother if he had changed his number, so he could only sit on the sofa.At this moment, he really wanted to prevent the zero point from coming, even if he tried his best.

It's a pity that Zero Point doesn't care whether you greet with a smile or tears, it won't help you delay even a second.What should come will come sooner or later, the past can only let it pass.

He fell back on the sofa, imagining that his brother was fascinated by playing Match [-], and covered his eyes with his hands, imagining that his brother was playing tricks on him.

The room was quiet, and he whispered: "Brother, happy new year, I hope you are all well and everything goes smoothly."