Chapter 237 - A Perfect New World (I)
Chi Xiaochi sits in the food court opposite the entrance to a public secondary school, eating spicy skewers with top quality XO from the warehouse.
Chi Xiaochi, 14, is already the size of a high school student, and the low plastic table at the spicy kebab stall is a bit constricting for him, so his legs have nowhere to rest but on the sides of the chair.
His hair was freshly shaved, and he smelled a little of lemon soap as he sat in the greasy, muggy air, like a refreshing breeze.
Anyone passing by, male or female, can’t help but look at him more than once, wondering if they’ve been mistaken.
When you get a good look, you can’t help but be surprised.
Chi Xiaochi has a knack for filtering the human eye and treating everyone like a cabbage, so he ignores all the inquisitive and awe-inspiring looks and just sips his wine.
Needless to say, the name ” Chi Xiaochi” was enough to let him know exactly what was going on.
…… Lord GOD threw them into a parallel world.
If the existence of worlds is likened to the strings of a lute, parallel worlds are two strings that are infinitely close to each other, resonating in the same key, almost identical.
The first world line experienced by Chi Xiaochi is one that is already quite close to the original world.
In that world, there is Nebula Entertainment, there is the Beimang Cemetery, there is even Song Zhihuai, whom Chi Xiaochi knew, but there are still many significant differences, such as the fact that in that world Lou Ying is not dead.
According to Lou Ying, Chi Xiaochi will only get further and further away from the original world line as the tasks become more difficult.
Unexpectedly, he passed through nine worlds and ended up back in a world that was infinitely close to the point of origin.
He lifted a hand to stroke his freshly slate-cut hair.
The hair is freshly shaved and the short stubble feels pleasant to the touch, like a small hedgehog that has just sprouted soft spikes.
So much time has passed that Chi Xiaochi has forgotten that she didn’t like long hair when she was a child.
With long hair, he was too hot and not manly enough.
Chi Xiaochi couldn’t help but wonder why he wanted to grow his hair long later in life.
By the third glass of wine, he finally remembered.
The long hair was asked by Sun when he first shot the film, in order to fit the character’s image.
In his debut film, he plays a young man who grows up in a small fishing village, sees the world outside as a child, but is sent back home by his parents, and has a heart that is higher than the sky, ambitious and sensitive.
Long hair is one of the ways in which that fishing village boy fought against his little world.
Chi Xiaochi has been wearing her hair long ever since.
The reason is different from that of a fishing village boy, but also simple: it makes for good theatre.
If the plot calls for him to shave his hair short, he will; if he needs to grow it long, he can go straight to the stage, which is better than wearing a wig.
Like forgetting the reason for growing her hair long, Chi Xiaochi has forgotten so many things that she doesn’t know how to play her original self.
Sitting at a road stall full of sandy air, he fills a disposable plastic cup with amber liquid and reads quietly while sipping his wine and tuning out the world line by himself.
Chi Xiaochi, the original owner, was 14 years old.
My father was a toothbrush factory worker and my mother, who also worked in a toothbrush factory, became a female worker in a small food factory after being laid off from her job.
This couple, a counter-example to the development of modern marriage.
Because they were pregnant with Chi Xiaochi, two men and women, neither of whom wanted to be responsible nor were very good at it, married, gave the child a very perfunctory name and let him grow wild perfunctorily.
That’s why Chi Xiaochi has never liked to stay at home since she was a child.
He would go for an afternoon walk on the abandoned railway tracks near the silos until he was covered in a halo of coloured sunset clouds.
As a child, Chi Xiaochi was romantic, sensitive, full of unrealistic fantasies, and with her striking appearance, a little monster cast in the wrong direction in a silo that smelled of grease in all seasons.
Until one day he waited for another little monster two years older than him.
Lou Ying, whose parents died in an accident, moves in with her sister-in-law, just down the street from Chi Xiaochi’s family.
Chi Xiaochi took an instant liking to this brother and took it upon himself to pick his door, cheekily greeting and striking up conversations.
Soon the little monster and the little monster were playing together.
In the words of Chi Xiaochi, “Good-looking people should hang out with good-looking people.”
He and Lou Ying grew up together in this way.
”Growing up together” is a word that feels light when you’re in it, but only when you look back on it years later can you feel that different, heavy and joyful feeling.
They ate ice cream together, had a little blind stray dog together, and played games together.
Lou Ying would stay with him, go to the toilet with him and give him problems.
Chi Xiaochi feels like she has an extra brother.
No, even having a biological brother may not be as good as Lou Ying.
Chi Xiaochi once asked Lou Ying why he was being nice to him.
When he asks this question, Lou Ying’s eyes droop slightly and she looks a little sad.
”I’m telling you, you mustn’t tell anyone.” Little Lou Ying said, “My mother had my brother, or sister, in her belly …… when something happened to her. It was so small, so small that even my mother didn’t know it was there. The first time I saw you, I couldn’t help thinking that if it was still there, would it be as cute and as good as you in the future.”
When Xiaochi heard this, he almost became a puffer fish in aggravation, “Well, I’m your younger sibling’s replacement, aren’t I?”
”At first, I did have a little …… thing for you but not anymore.” Lou Ying quickly gathered himself and gently smoothed his fur, “You’re not anyone, you’re just Chi Xiaochi .”
Afterwards, Chi Xiaochi went home to reflect on the incident and felt that she had behaved badly and had not taken care of Lou’s feelings and should have given him some compensation.
Somehow he came up with the ghostly idea that he shouldn’t just be a brother, but a sister too.
The teacher ordered a batch of red dresses for the girls in the dance team and ordered two extra ones in a larger size. Chi Xiaochi borrowed one and made a bet with Lou Ying that whoever lost would go out dressed as a girl for a day and then pretend to lose to him.
The plan went quite well, but the only problem was that Chi Xiaochi had overestimated his tolerance.
Within a quarter of an hour of walking out of the house, Chi Xiaochi was no longer able to do so, tugging at the hem of her skirt, too ashamed to take a step, her face red with shame, and refusing to go any further.
Lou Ying saw that his head was smoking and he didn’t want to watch him being embarrassed, so he took off his thin jacket, covered his face and carried him back.
The two were very close when they were young.
This want of favour has also attracted criticism.
There was a lot of talk about Chi Xiaochi being a local native chicken and Lou Ying being a golden phoenix that accidentally flew into the mountain Ga Ga, one destined to stay and the other to fly out sooner or later, but in the end they went their separate ways.
Some good people even saw Chi Xiaochi coming downstairs to play with Lou Ying and said with a smile, “Xiaochi, you’ve come to look for your Lou brother again? What will you do when your Lou’s brother becomes a phoenix and flies away?
Chi Xiaochi said clearly, “What the hell do I have to do with you?
But I don’t blame these people for chewing the fat.
Lou Ying has never come off the top spot in the district since settling down to study locally.
Chi Xiaochi’s attitude to learning is clear: “I hate learning.”
Lou Ying asked him, “Don’t you want to go to the same college as me and come with me.”
Chi Xiaochi, playfully, “I’m not going to study after I finish high school. I’ll go to your university and sell popsicles and daily necessities, and then you’ll only be allowed to buy my family’s and no one else’s.”
Lou Ying cried out, “Going to university is a very important thing. You are very smart kid, it’s better not to just decide your future.”
Chi Xiaochi asked him which university he wanted to go to.
Lou Ying names a university.
Chi Xiaochi thought for a moment, “Then I’d better go and sell popsicles.”
It was a joke, but Lou Ying’s words made Chi Xiaochi a little more ambitious and a little more reluctant from then on.
Lou Ying was a good boy in the eyes of part of the building.
But excellence, in itself, is the cause of jealousy.
The other part, who do not believe that there is such a good boy in the world, can only stare in disbelief as they cannot pick out fault in his studies, manners and daily behaviour.
Aunt Chu’s semiconductor incident has finally given these people a chance to vent their frustrations.
Because of the semiconductors, Lou Ying’s reputation in the silo was in tatters, with everyone talking excitedly about Lou Ying’s unclean hands and feet, and then pretending to sigh at the end of the day that she was still a child of no parents and hadn’t been brought up properly.
Chi Xiaochi was furious and tried to take revenge on Lou Ying, but Lou Ying stopped her.
He had been brought up by his parents with a good temper and good manners that were not so easily shaken.
Because of the loss of both parents, he has a sense of understanding that is rarely found in children of his age, in addition to his scholarly elegance.
Lou Ying is genuinely not angry and genuinely doesn’t think it’s worth it.
In the end, Chi Xiaochi was even angrier than he, the man in question, had been.
After hearing the gossip, the parents showed a rare display of responsibility by telling Chi Xiaochi to keep his contacts with Lou Ying to a minimum at the dinner table, adding that their Chi Family children could get poor grades, but they could not be brought up with bad morals.
Chi Xiaochi is furious to the core.
He stood up at the table and said, “When Lou and I used to play well together, you guys didn’t care about me at all, but now you’re acting like you’re doing me a favour after hearing a few rumours. Do you really care about me, or are you afraid I’ll lose face?
Not surprisingly, after being slapped hard, his parents contacted Zhu Shoucheng, who lived next door, and asked him to tutor Chi Xiaochi during the summer of his second year and ordered him not to see Lou Ying again.
Zhu Shoucheng, a maths teacher at a public school, is in his fifties, with some grey hair, but still tall and fit.
Chi Xiaochi is already well developed, with the top of her hair only reaching his chest, and even Lou Ying, just above his chin.
His wife died young, leaving him with only a son and daughter-in-law living in the city, while he chose to live alone as a widower and teach in a secondary school in the urban-rural area, which, in his words, was “a hard place to leave”.
In the silos, he was synonymous with being a highly respected and learned man, and a warm-hearted man who was well respected by all.
But to Chi Xiaochi, Zhu Shoucheng was like a black pagoda. Although he had two or three lessons and was gentle with Chi Xiaochi, always having orange juice and milk chocolate ready for him when he went to his home for tutoring, Chi Xiaochi still didn’t like the smell of him.
Of course, Chi Xiaochi doesn’t take such things too seriously.
His biggest worry was how to tell Lou Ying about it in a polite way.
Then came the day.
That day was no different from any other day.
They went to feed the dogs together, during which they met Zhu Shoucheng and accidentally brought the matter to the surface.
Lou Ying advised Chi Xiaochi to listen to his parents and also made an appointment with him to meet him on the rooftop at 8pm for a small group tuition session.
Chi Xiaochi returned home full of joy.
Chi Xiaochi wanted to take a nap and go to Zhu Shoucheng for tutoring at three o’clock, but soon after she laid down, the squeaky fan on her head stopped.
Chi Xiaochi woke up to the heat of the day, clicked the fan knob a few times and pulled the light cord to confirm that the power was out.
Chi Xiaochi was not surprised when the old silo was in a similar state, and expertly fished out his thick telephone book to call the local electricity office to report the problem.
However, when I picked up the receiver, it was silent.
Chi Xiaochi had no choice but to get off the phone and roll back into bed.
Without the fan, the air heats up quickly and the cooler turns into a pie pan on fire, with sweat staining the cracks.
After tossing and turning in bed for a while, Chi Xiaochi suddenly hears a knock at the door.
He climbed up sweating, clutching a bamboo-faced pillow, “…… Lou brother?”
”Xiaochi, it’s me.” Outside was Zhu Shoucheng’s friendly voice, “Did you take a nap? The power is out, it’s hot, I have green bean ice at home, would you like to come.”
Chi Xiaochi hesitates for a moment, climbs up, puts on his I-frame vest and shorts and opens the door.
Outside the door, Zhu Shoucheng, with his back to the light and his teeth bared, smiles at him unmistakably.
Chi Xiaochi glanced at the wall clock behind her, which read two o’clock, held the back of her hand to block the light, and discussed with Zhu Shoucheng, “Teacher, I’ll go early today, can I leave class early?”
Lou Ying gave him a chocolate for lunch and if he could get out of class an hour early today, he would like to buy Lou Ying some chicken cake while the bakery is still open.
The curve of Zhu Shoucheng’s smile remains unchanged, as if it were a mask glued to his face.
The eyes behind the mask looked straight at Chi Xiaochi and said to him, “Yes.”
There are hardly any idle people in the silos, and during the day everyone has to run for their livelihood.
The most lively time of the day is in the evenings, when middle-aged women are busy getting high on melon seeds, middle-aged men are busy drinking, and young couples are busy making out while their children are out playing, and pots and pans are clanging together to create a smoky, flavourful atmosphere.
But on summer afternoons, apart from the chirping of cicadas, there is dead silence.
Chi Xiaochi follows Zhu Shoucheng, textbook in hand, into the daylight and into the Zhu family home with its thick iron gates.
With a loud bang, the iron door separated him from the world outside.
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