TA • Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Cheng Ke watched Jiang Yuduo stand up, then walk out the door. Chen Qing followed behind him, swinging his legs as he went. Cheng Ke was just about to let out a breath when Chen Qing yanked the door shut with a bang.

The loud crash startled him so badly he almost fell out of the chair. He sat there for a long while before he finally came back to himself.

Actually, the sound of Chen Qing closing the door was only pretty loud. Cheng Ke had not been completely unprepared for it. Just from the way Chen Qing swaggered around, he knew it would not be quiet. He did not know why he had reacted so strongly.

Maybe because he was uneasy.

A shell, no matter what kind of shell it was, was still just a shell. Once it was gone, he would not even have the condition of being able to pretend he was safe.

Ever since the day Cheng Ke learned the word "sense of security," he had felt he lacked it, lacked it badly.

Especially when he needed to "face" something, no matter what it was.

When he left home, he had only put on one more layer than if he had gone out naked. He had not thought much at all when he left. He had just felt stifled, unable to breathe, and figured as long as he could open the door and get out, that would be enough.

His thoughts had been simple too. Get outside first, then deal with it. Stay at somebody’s place for a few days, then deal with it. When the matter was right in front of him, then deal with it…

In the end, before he had even managed to get into position, the matter had all come crashing down on him at once, and every bit of it was some bizarre sudden event. He was left dazed and at a loss.

From childhood until now, the biggest thing he had ever dealt with was fighting with Cheng Yi. And he had not even handled that well. Cheng Yi had smashed his head open, then beaten him to the punch by going and tattling first. Furious, he had kicked Cheng Yi in front of his dad, only to get beaten by his father all the way from the second floor down into the courtyard.

…stupid.

Cheng Ke stood up, walked to the back of the door, and looked outside through the peephole. There was no one left in the corridor. He opened the door.

The key Jiang Yuduo had given him was very cute, with a cat-head keychain dangling from it. He took out the key and tried the lock, unlocking it and locking it again, then shut the door.

He held the key for a long time and could not figure out where he should put it. In his memory, he had never really held a key before. Home did not need one, his room did not need one, and whoever at home went through any door would knock first. There was even less need for keys for drawers and cabinets and the like.

In the end, Cheng Ke put the key into his pants pocket. He still had to go back to Xu Ding’s place, return the key to property management, and, while he was at it, bring over the stockpile of things he had bought.

But when he saw that stockpile, he started thinking of giving up again.

He leaned against the bathroom doorframe and looked at the things on the shelf. He could not even figure out how he had carried all that back that day.

Still, after staring for a few minutes, he took a bag and packed everything into it. He practically had no luggage left, only the few clothes he had just bought. Too little stuff would make the unease of "starting to live on my own from today on" worse. He needed some luggage.

In the end, he carried out a huge, dead-heavy bag of things. He did not even get a chance to properly feel whether it made him feel any better. All he knew was that the bag cut into his fingers and hurt.

He returned the key to property management while carrying the bag, then carried it out of the neighborhood, then stood by the roadside with it, trying to hail a cab. Five minutes passed and he did not get a single one. He started to regret it and dropped the bag at his feet, not wanting it anymore.

A taxi drove over. Cheng Ke was just about to raise a hand to hail it when two girls beside him were looking at their phones and announced the plate number: "This is the one."

Cheng Ke watched them get into the car, then watched the taxi drive off.

Ah, it was a phone-dispatched ride.

Cheng Ke took out his own phone. He had never used any of those ride-hailing apps before, because he had never needed them. He did not even use mobile payments very often.

He hurriedly downloaded a ride-hailing app, figured out how to use it, and was just about to call a car when an empty taxi drove past him.

Maybe he did not look much like someone about to hail a ride. The cab did not even slow down to see whether he was going to get in.

Cheng Ke watched the receding car and said, very emotionally, "Fuck."

The app showed that a driver had accepted the order. While waiting, Cheng Ke kept silently praying that no cars would pass by. Maybe his bad luck had already run out. By the time the map showed the accepted car was already at the intersection, no taxi had passed by him again.

A black Volkswagen pulled up beside him. He stepped aside a little. The driver honked once and lowered the window.

"Is that you?" the driver called to him.

"What?" Cheng Ke looked at the driver.

"You’re the one who ordered the car, right?" the driver asked.

Cheng Ke froze. "I ordered a taxi."

"You ordered Express," the driver said. "Check the plate number and model."

"…Oh." Cheng Ke looked at his phone. Sure enough, it listed the model and plate number.

After he got in, the driver glanced at him with a smile. "You don’t use this much, do you?"

"I’ve never used it," Cheng Ke answered honestly.

"Really," the driver said, a little surprised. "This is so convenient. It’s actually rare for young people to have never used it."

"I’m probably not young," Cheng Ke said.

When Cheng Ke was carrying that dead-heavy bag and taking out his apartment key, he suddenly felt uneasy. He stared at the lock, hesitated, then put his ear against the door and listened.

Jiang Yuduo always made him feel a little mentally unwell. Now that he was living in a place where the lock could not be changed and Jiang Yuduo still had a key, he kept worrying that the moment he opened the door, he would find Jiang Yuduo sitting on the sofa, with the big guardian lawman standing next to him.

It was very quiet inside. He could not hear anything. Cheng Ke thought about it and felt a little ridiculous, but when he opened the door, he still very carefully peeked inside first before going in, then locked the door from the inside.

He threw the things in his hands onto the floor and collapsed onto the sofa, closing his eyes and letting out a long breath.

He did not know how long he had lain there. His back was starting to feel numb before he sat up again. Glancing at the time, he realized he had probably fallen asleep. Two hours had passed since he came in.

He was hungry.

Cheng Ke got up and went around the kitchen. There were utensils, but he could not tell whether they were complete. He then put his stockpile of things into the bathroom, and in an instant the shelf was packed full. It looked just like a supermarket shelf.

He stared at it for a long while before taking everything back down and putting it into the cabinet.

When he came out after circling the bedroom and returned to the living room, Cheng Ke suddenly felt irritable.

Very irritable.

He had thought that once the place was rented, the key was in hand, and he had moved in, that would be the end of it.

But then he realized he still needed to buy a quilt, pillows, sheets, and duvet covers, and after coming in, he had not changed his shoes because there were no slippers…

"Ah!" Cheng Ke threw himself hard into the sofa, then kicked viciously twice at the armrest. "So fucking annoying!"

"This one’s good, this sauce is good with rice," Chen Qing said, picking up a bottle and putting it into the supermarket cart. "There are bits of meat in it, really big pieces."

"If you want to eat meat, why not just buy meat?" Jiang Yuduo said. "Why pin your hopes on the tiny bits in a rice sauce? Is there even a bite’s worth if you add it all up?"

"Pretty much," Chen Qing said. "My mouth isn’t that big."

"I don’t want to talk to you," Jiang Yuduo said. "I’m begging you, go home and eat dinner at your own place tonight."

"My aunt’s at my place. I don’t want to go back, it’s annoying as hell," Chen Qing frowned. "Whenever she’s in a bad mood, she comes to my place to pick at my faults. No idea where she picked up that habit."

"I’ve never seen you when I’ve been in a good mood," Jiang Yuduo said.

"There’s cat food over there," Chen Qing pointed ahead. "Want to buy some for the kitten?"

"It eats meals." Jiang Yuduo said.

"Why would it eat meals if there’s cat food?" Chen Qing asked.

"If I don’t buy it, there won’t be any. If there’s none, it eats meals." Jiang Yuduo looked at him. "I picked up a stray cat and I’m even buying it cat food. Before, it ate trash."

"You also bought it canned food," Chen Qing said.

"You," Jiang Yuduo pointed at him, "go stand in line at the cashier."

"Yes, sir." Chen Qing nodded and turned to leave.

Jiang Yuduo pushed the cart toward the shelf with infant formula. He had heard that kittens needed goat milk, and cow’s milk would give them diarrhea and kill them.

"Damn, that’s expensive." He stared at the various milk powders on the shelf for a long time, then took two bags of goat milk powder and put them into the cart.

The aisles between the shelves were a little narrow. He dragged the cart backward to get out, and while he was at it he took another bag of infant formula, not knowing what he was buying it for, only feeling that it looked very good to drink.

Just after he backed out of the aisle, before he even had time to turn around, Jiang Yuduo bumped into someone behind him.

"Sorry." He said it once.

The person behind him did not say anything.

They could not even say "It’s fine"?

For someone like him, who was rarely polite, to be courteous for once and then run into someone who did not respond!

What terrible manners!

He turned around and glared.

Jijia.

No, Cheng Ke.

Cheng Ke was holding a basket and standing behind him, looking at him with an expression that was impossible to tell whether it was shock, irritation, helplessness, or disgust.

"You don’t even know how to say ‘it’s fine’?" Jiang Yuduo glared at him.

Cheng Ke was still looking at him. The complicated expression changed into outright shock. A few seconds later, he finally said, "It’s fine my ass, you ran into my wound. You should be thanking the heavens I didn’t smack you."

Jiang Yuduo glanced at his waist. That was a surprise.

He felt like he had gauged the angle pretty accurately that day. It should have only punctured the clothes and not hit the body. He actually got hurt?

"Your waist is that thick?" he asked before he could stop himself.

"What…" Cheng Ke was first stunned, then seemed to suddenly lose all interest in talking. He turned and walked away.

"There’s a cart," Jiang Yuduo said when he saw the basket was full of things. "Why are you carrying a basket?"

Was it harder to tail someone with a cart?

Carry a basket, casually slip things in while tailing someone and trying to keep it inconspicuous, then accidentally fill it up?

Cheng Ke turned back and walked over to stand in front of him. "Do you have any paper and a pen?"

"Yeah." Jiang Yuduo said.

"Lend them to me." Cheng Ke said.

Jiang Yuduo narrowed his eyes and took out a cigarette wrapper and a ballpoint pen.

Cheng Ke took them, lowered his head, and wrote three characters on the paper before handing the paper and pen back.

Risperidone.

"What?" Jiang Yuduo asked.

"You can buy it at a pharmacy," Cheng Ke said. "It treats schizophrenia."

"Fuck your mother." Jiang Yuduo said.

"Whatever." Cheng Ke turned and left.

The basket was very heavy. Cheng Ke’s hand was getting sore from carrying it, but Jiang Yuduo was still watching him from behind, so he could not walk away looking too pitiful.

It was not that he did not want a cart. He had simply never seen where the carts were. After entering the supermarket, he had only seen baskets beside the shelves, and there had only been one.

It was not until he had gone past two rows of shelves that he threw the basket onto the floor and said, "Fuck."

It was too damn heavy.

He glanced to the side. A little girl in supermarket uniform was putting goods from a cart onto the shelves.

"Do all of these have to go up there?" he asked.

"Yeah," the girl answered.

"Can I use this cart?" he asked again.

"Huh?" The girl froze.

"I have too many things," he said, pointing at the basket. "Do your carts only appear after stepping on some kind of switch?"

The girl laughed. "The carts are right by the entrance. There are two whole rows over there, after you come up from the elevator."

"…Oh." Cheng Ke suddenly felt awkward. Was he blind? He had actually not seen them?

"Use this one." The girl took out the last item.

"Thank you." Cheng Ke was deeply moved and quickly moved the things from the basket into the cart.

He nearly could not remember what else he needed to buy next. He stared at the things in the cart again before remembering that he needed to buy underwear.

As for where the underwear was, he wandered around for a long time and still could not find it.

This supermarket was pretty big, with countless shelves, like a maze. At first he had thought the supermarket was probably U-shaped. After wandering for a while, he thought it might be a square loop. After wandering some more, he thought perhaps it was concave. In the end, when he came out from between two shelves and ran into Jiang Yuduo again face-to-face…

he felt like this supermarket must be the fucking character for fuck it.

When Jiang Yuduo saw him, he was not the least bit surprised. He looked very calm, even leaning one arm on the cart as he smiled at him.

Cheng Ke pulled at the corner of his mouth, but could not manage a smile.

"Looking for something?" Jiang Yuduo asked with a smile.

"Underwear." Cheng Ke answered.

"Over there." Jiang Yuduo pointed behind himself.

Cheng Ke looked over and saw a wall full of bras.

Jiang Yuduo probably could tell how furious he was inside, because he added, "Bras and underwear are together. You don’t even know that?"

"Good night." Cheng Ke said and pushed the cart away.

Jiang Yuduo turned his head and watched for a while, starting to doubt his own judgment a little.

Although there had been many details since Cheng Ke showed up that could not be explained, and no matter how he thought about it it felt wrong, he still really could not connect a person like that with all the people from before.

If Cheng Ke really had a problem, then this time he was truly playing by none of the usual rules. It was simply novel and unique.

After Cheng Ke disappeared between the shelves, Jiang Yuduo sighed, turned, and pushed the cart toward the cashier. From far away he already saw Chen Qing standing by the cashier and waving at him.

"You’re way too slow," Chen Qing said. "I already let a whole soccer team go ahead of me."

"I have to choose, don’t I? It’s all stuff I’ll be eating every day," Jiang Yuduo said. "I’m not like you, with no taste buds."

"I do have taste buds," Chen Qing said, dragging the cart over and pushing it up to the cashier. "My taste buds just aren’t very developed. In simple terms, I’m just not as picky as you."

"I’ll wait for you outside." Jiang Yuduo handed his wallet to Chen Qing and walked out of the supermarket.

It got dark early now. It was just after work, and outside already had the look of lights beginning to come on.

Jiang Yuduo reached into his pocket for a cigarette while glancing around.

He did not like nighttime. He did not like overcast weather. He did not like fog. In short, he did not like any space that was not saturated or bright enough.

It made him afraid.

Even now, with countless people coming and going around him, with people talking, people laughing, children crying, and people arguing across the street, with the field of vision packed full everywhere he looked…

he was still afraid.

Because no matter how many people there were, nobody saw him. Even if he stood here and unzipped his pants to piss into the street, there might not be more than a few people who would notice. And before he finished peeing, those few people might already have walked far away.

Jiang Yuduo lit a cigarette and held it in his mouth. When he put the cigarette pack back into his pocket, he felt Cheng Ke’s cigarette-wrapper paper and took it out to look at it.

Risperidone.

Fuck your mother.

He flicked his lighter and lit the scrap of paper, watching the three neatly written characters Cheng Ke had written slowly twist and disappear in the flame.

How the hell did you even pronounce the character teng?

"Third Brother," Chen Qing called him. "Let’s go."

Jiang Yuduo stubbed out his cigarette, turned around, and saw Chen Qing carrying two large bags over.

"That much?" He took one bag and weighed it. It was pretty heavy, so he reached out and took the other one too. After comparing them, he decided the first bag was lighter and handed the other one back to Chen Qing.

"That’s too obvious, Third Brother," Chen Qing said, looking at him.

"You don’t even have a car and you still want to come over to my place for dinner," Jiang Yuduo said. "I’m already going against my principles by helping you carry one bag, okay?"

"Oh, right!" Chen Qing turned around abruptly as they walked, his face full of excitement. "You know after I finished paying and looked back, who I saw?"

"I know," Jiang Yuduo said.

"Jijia!" Chen Qing said. "I actually saw Jijia! Didn’t expect that, did you?"

Jiang Yuduo glanced at him but said nothing.

"Oh, you mean you knew already," Chen Qing said, stunned. "How did you know?"

"Because you fucking…" Jiang Yuduo barked, keeping his voice down. He kicked at the leg Chen Qing had swung in front of him. "When you see him, you get so excited you jump three feet in the air! What, you in love with him?"

"Hey!" Chen Qing hopped aside. "Don’t break my leg."

"Also," Jiang Yuduo said, pointing at him, "don’t call him Jijia anymore!"

"Why not?" Chen Qing said. "I’m not calling him that in front of him."

"I’m afraid of hearing it too much!" Jiang Yuduo smacked him on the back. "If I see him, I’m going to call him Jijia!"

"…Oh." Chen Qing nodded. After thinking about it, he leaned closer to him again. "Third Brother, I actually don’t quite get why you can’t call him Jijia in front of him. It’s just a nickname. We call Gouzi 'Gouzi' too, don’t we?"

"Embarrassing," Jiang Yuduo said.

Chen Qing did not speak. He was silent for a very long time. Just when Jiang Yuduo was almost forgetting what the two of them had been talking about before, he suddenly slapped his thigh. "I get it. Calling him Jijia makes it look like we’ve never seen money before, right? Like we keep remembering that he’s got some fancy watch!"

Jiang Yuduo held it in for a long while, then sighed.

"But you really don’t have a watch worth over a hundred thousand," Chen Qing added.

Jiang Yuduo turned his head. Chen Qing quickly raised a hand to shield his head.

"Fuck your ancestors," Jiang Yuduo said with a laugh of annoyance. "When you were hanging yourself in your past life, did I kick your stool out from under you or what?"

Jiang Yuduo did not really like staying in the kitchen. The space was too small, it felt suffocating, so when Chen Qing usually came over to freeload a meal, he sat in the living room and waited to eat, even though Chen Qing’s cooking was an insult to the ingredients.

"Third Brother!" Chen Qing shouted from the kitchen. "How about making the ribs sweet and sour?"

"Whatever, as long as they’re cooked," Jiang Yuduo said, looking at the contract in his hands. Attached to the end of the contract was a copy of Cheng Ke’s ID card.

"Don’t be too hard on the ribs."

Cheng Ke really was named Cheng Ke. Jiang Yuduo stared at the birth date for a while, then mentally calculated Cheng Ke’s age.

Fuck.

He was already twenty-seven.

He really had not looked it.

Jiang Yuduo tapped Cheng Ke’s photo with his finger. Any random seventeen-year-old kid here had stronger survival skills than this young master.

At the very least, they would not be unable to find the underwear section in a supermarket.

A wave of chili smell drifted in through the window. Jiang Yuduo coughed for a long time, then got up and went over to close the window. Just as he was about to walk away, he sensed someone outside.

He had not moved the curtains. Right now the living room lights were off, so his shadow could not be seen from outside. He tilted his head and looked out through the crack in the curtains.

A figure quickly retreated into the passageway between the two buildings diagonally across the street and vanished.

Jiang Yuduo frowned, went back to the sofa, and turned on the TV.

"It’s done, time to eat," Chen Qing said, carrying a pot of soup out and setting it on the table.

"Stay over at my place tonight," Jiang Yuduo said.

"Huh?" Chen Qing looked at him, then immediately moved to the window and looked outside. "You saw someone?"

"Not sure," Jiang Yuduo said.

"Then I’ll stay," Chen Qing said, taking out his phone. "I’ll call a few more people and have them keep watch outside."

"You know what," Jiang Yuduo pressed at his brow, "why don’t you just make a banner and hang it on the window. Write, ‘I’ve already seen you.’"

Chen Qing froze, then put his phone back into his pocket. "Fuck, when can you talk to me properly?"

"When can you make some room in that brain of yours for your intelligence?" Jiang Yuduo got up and went into the kitchen, carrying out the food Chen Qing had mangled.

"Third Brother," Chen Qing sat down beside the table, "I have an immature suggestion."

"Then wait until it’s mature before suggesting it," Jiang Yuduo said.

"If you think there’s something wrong with Jijia," Chen Qing said, "we’ve got a key, right? When he’s not there, we can go in and look around, see if there’s any clue."

Jiang Yuduo did not speak, just looked at him.

"How about it?" Chen Qing asked.

"Don’t call him Jijia," Jiang Yuduo said.

"…Oh." Chen Qing nodded.