Pat Me Please

Su Chang left again, for the second time.

This time, Yu Zhou clearly heard the automated female voice announcing “door closed” because Su Chang closed the door gently instead of slamming it.

She even remembered to take her coat and bag that she had placed in the entrance with graceful movements when she left.

It was like an ordinary farewell on a daily basis, just like when she went to work while they were living together.

But Yu Zhou knew that she would never come back.

As she mentioned before, Yu Zhou is a person who loves introspection. As a writer, she fully understood Su Chang’s meaning.

What Su Chang minded was that in every choice Yu Zhou made, she was always treated as someone Yu Zhou could easily abandon.

When Yu Zhou felt attacked, her self-esteem was hurt, she never thought of facing it together with Su Chang. Rather, she wanted to distance herself from Su Chang, each time.

It was as if Su Chang were the source of all the harm.

Su Chang’s feelings were understandable. She thought those trivial words were just like sand in the eye, very uncomfortable, making people brood over them and even cause someone to cry bitterly. But how could anyone choose to give up their eyes just because they didn’t want to face the speck of sand?

If Su Chang were her eyes.

The fact was that the apple of her eye had never been Su Chang. Perhaps Su Chang was just a few eyelashes she could easily pluck off.

But Su Chang treated her as her eyes.

She always thought there was an exceptionally romantic phrase “you are the apple of my eye.” Translated into Chinese, it was “you are my pearl in the palm”. Su Chang didn’t like this translation because she thought “the apple in the eye” seemed to have a more precious feeling that would make people smile when they thought of it.

Yu Zhou was the apple in her eye, the light in her eye, and later, her eyes.

Unfortunately, Su Chang had never been Yu Zhou’s firm choice.

So Su Chang’s words almost persuaded Yu Zhou.

She kept thinking about whether she didn’t like Su Chang enough, or whether she didn’t love Su Chang enough. If she truly loved Su Chang, why couldn’t she muster up the courage to hold her hand?

Why couldn’t she see the efforts Su Chang had made for her?

Why did she always ignore Su Chang’s feelings?

But her heart clearly reminded her that she was so distressed that she was almost dying. If it wasn’t because of love, what could it be?

She couldn’t understand it. She had written almost two million words about love, but she still couldn’t write her own story well. So she blindly thought what Su Chang said was right. Perhaps she didn’t like Su Chang enough, maybe she should let her go.

In this way, everyone will feel a little better.

So Yu Zhou got up and took a bath, washed her head, cooked a serving of instant dumplings and then started mopping the floor. While mopping, she thought to herself: should she find a job? She attributed her current emotion to having too much idle time. If she had a fixed nine-to-five routine, she presumed that she wouldn’t have time to see all those sarcastic things.

If she could make money from her actual daily life, perhaps she would value real life more.

Yu Zhou suddenly felt that those who relied on the internet to survive were really remarkable, because they didn’t have a fixed amount of money transferred to their bank account every month, which was like the emergency money that pulled you back from the virtual world to the real life world time and time again.

It reminds you that you are still a living person with face-to-face social relationships.

It also reminds you that in real life, you would not be subjected to such fabricated malice.

Moreover, looking in the mirror, if Yu Zhou went to work every day, she would have to look at herself in the mirror. But if she stayed at home all the time without going out, perhaps only once every two or three days, or once every three or four days. In any case, she didn’t take a good look at herself in the mirror every day.

So how did Su Chang make it through? Although she was busy with her work in real life, she didn’t have many friends, just work relationships and the bonds were not very deep. How did she avoid becoming a symbol on the internet amidst such a large online influence?

Somehow, the topic went back to Su Chang.

Yu Zhou mopped the floor even harder and suddenly remembered what Su Chang said when they had first seen the house. She really liked the French window because she thought it would look great if Yu Zhou sat cross-legged on the couch with her laptop, writing while the sunlight streamed in.

That’s because Yu Zhou would often laugh out loud while writing, and then Su Chang would glance at her. Yu Zhou in her glance would be even prettier if the sunlight could be added.

Yu Zhou stopped and stared out of the French window, lost in thought.

As expected, Su Chang never contacted her again and Yu Zhou never went online again.

What she didn’t know was that on that day, when Su Chang offended her senior colleague by cancelling work, some impulsive newcomers in the studio heard some gossip and made sarcastic comments on Weibo.

First, someone posted a vague Weibo message:

“So arrogant, huh.”

Then a few studio colleagues reposted it with innuendos:

“Shh, it’s a secret.”

“Aren’t you afraid their fans will attack you?”

However, the disturbance wasn’t too big. The forum discussed it for a bit but no one had a clue, so it soon dissipated. During this time, someone had suggested that it might be Su Chang, but no one responded or agreed, even Su Chang’s fans didn’t want to get involved. As a result, this comment was soon buried in the thread.

The novel by Ba Da Qin Chai hadn’t been updated for more than twenty days and many readers were urging for new content.

Xiang Wan naturally noticed that something was wrong. She, who was  extremely intelligent, called Yu Zhou and quickly figured out the ins and outs of the situation.

However, she didn’t say much about it. After three more days, on a weekend, she said she would come back for dinner and asked Yu Zhou if she could make her corn and rib soup.

She also mentioned that the ones ordered from outside weren’t that good and that Yu Zhou’s cooking was the freshest.

This feeling of being needed was like a lifesaving medicine, even though Yu Zhou might not have realized it.

So, she got up early and cleaned the house. Then she went shopping for fresh ribs and corn, as well as some vegetables. She knew that Xiang Wan didn’t really like meat and preferred green vegetables. Ribs were her favorite meat.

When Xiang Wan arrived, the corn and rib soup was still cooking. Yu Zhou went to open the door for her, told her to sit down before she went back to the kitchen to chop vegetables. Xiang Wan changed her shoes and followed her in. As she washed her hands, she asked, “What else do we need to prepare? No need to cook too much.”

“Not too much, I’ll just stir-fry a few dishes. Help me peel some garlic, it’s in that drawer, you know where it is, right?” Yu Zhou replied, chopping quickly.

“Sure.” Xiang Wan smiled before she bent down to find the garlic.

The two of them finished cooking together and the meal started earlier than expected. The steamed rice wasn’t ready yet, but Xiang Wan was so hungry that she said they shouldn’t wait anymore, so they ate with empty bowls while chatting about recent events.

“Um,” Yu Zhou brought up the topic first because she was afraid Xiang Wan would ask her about it. During their meal, she mentioned, “You know about that drama, right? It was cancelled.”

“I know, it’s temporarily cancelled,” Xiang Wan added “temporarily.”

Yu Zhou wanted to say it wasn’t temporary, but after thinking about it, she didn’t speak up.

But Xiang Wan didn’t continue the conversation. Instead, she slightly curved her eyes as she asked, “You know the Voice Festival, right?”

“Oh? I know. It’s the annual event for voice actors, streamers and other voice professionals, right? Where you also receive awards.”

“Yes. The organizer has invited me to participate in this year’s event in November.”

“They invited you so early?”

“I don’t know, they gave half a year’s notice,” Xiang Wan replied.

Although she didn’t understand the process, Yu Zhou still found it amazing. She said, “You’re really impressive. In just one year of debuting, you’ve been invited to attend this grand festival.”

“Really?” Xiang Wan held the bowl, tilted her head slightly when she asked with a smile.

“What do you mean?”

“Why did you say ‘you’re really impressive’ instead of ‘I’m really impressive’?” Xiang Wan asked with a meaningful, gentle tone.

Yu Zhou blinked her eyes, not quite understanding.

“I am the one you took in. Everything I know is taught by you. You’re responsible for my food, clothing and shelter. You suggested I became a CV and now I’ve achieved success. Isn’t it your greatness?” Xiang Wan raised her eyebrows, asking with a playful smile.

“No, it’s not like that,” Yu Zhou frowned, feeling that this logic was warped. “I did help you, but your achievements are earned by yourself. Do you know the saying ‘you can’t help a spineless person’? If you weren’t gold, could I make you shine by just painting you?”

“You still need to work hard to be capable,” she said seriously.

“I see.” Xiang Wan hooked the corner of her lips.

“You…” Yu Zhou squinted her eyes slightly.

“So you do understand this principle,” Xiang Wan said softly.

Her voice was still as clear as falling snow.

A thought crossed Yu Zhou’s mind, but she remained quiet.

Xiang Wan took a piece of green vegetable into her bowl, pondered for a moment before she said, “The rules of society are what you taught me. We exist in social relationships and can never become isolated islands. We make friends, open our hearts, give and receive.”

“We exchange feelings for feelings and seek mutual benefits. We can never resist interacting with others or refuse the help and care offered by friends.”

“When you need help and someone offers kindness, what should you do? Should you fiercely tell her to take her hand back, staying in the dark alone, or should you take her hand, leave the deep well first and extend your olive branch when she needs it?”

“I would choose the latter,” Xiang Wan said. “Just like staying at your house peacefully, accepting Miss Su’s clothes that day.”

“You told me that if I really can’t refuse it, then accept it, but remember this ‘favor.’ Right?” She turned to Yu Zhou and asked.

Yu Zhou bit her lip, not saying a word.

“But you never told me that some help would turn into the key to your own self-belittlement. You’ve merely obtained an opportunity to cooperate and a well-executed marketing strategy to let more people know about your writing. Aren’t you confident that your work can retain its true readers? Are you not gold, but just polished?”

“I…”

“You can’t deny, or Shen Bai and Qiao Qiao would be unhappy.” Xiang Wan said slyly with a whisper.

“So you came to persuade me.” Yu Zhou said sulkily.

“I came to persuade you, and also to demonstrate some of my newly improved dialogue skills,” Xiang Wan laughed.

She didn’t intend to say more, as the reconstruction of self-esteem should be carried out step by step. Just a hint would suffice.

“You’re so annoying!” Yu Zhou picked up a piece of corn and threw it into Xiang Wan’s bowl.

Xiang Wan must be psychic, Yu Zhou was certain.