WC ⋆ Chapter 63

Xu Huaying stepped in to mediate: “Xiao Qi, give him a piece of your mind.”

“If I do, you won’t want to hear it,” Qi Lin said.

Jiang Yishen widened his eyes. “When have I ever not wanted to hear it?”

Qi Lin said, “Then I’m talking about you being the one who brought up the breakup.”

Jiang Yishen was so agitated he nearly shot to his feet. “I knew it! You never brought it up, and I didn’t push you, so you just kept it bottled inside.”

Xu Huaying glanced left and right, then finally slid the plate of rice rolls in front of Qi Lin and told him to stop struggling to pick things up with his chopsticks.

“I wasn’t bottling anything up. It’s all in the past, and there’s no need to bring it up again.” Qi Lin thought to himself: sure enough, he doesn’t want to hear it.

Jiang Yishen felt like he was throwing a punch into cotton. “Didn’t you just bring it up yourself!”

“That’s a separate matter. What I was talking about was the underlying logic of the breakup, not the breakup itself. I wasn’t trying to talk about the breakup either — I just wanted to say, don’t do that again in the future.” Qi Lin patiently laid it out for him.

Jiang Yishen listened for a long time, then finally said, “Isn’t that still about the breakup?”

Qi Lin gave up and focused on eating breakfast.

“Don’t ignore me!” Jiang Yishen pushed forcefully into his space. Seeing that Qi Lin wouldn’t even turn his head to look at him, he reached out and grabbed his bowl.

His food had been snatched away. Qi Lin was completely baffled. He raised his hand to grab it back. “Are you in primary school? You clearly understood what I meant — what is there left to argue about?”

“You’re calling me childish again.” Jiang Yishen was seething with grievance.

Qi Lin realized that the two of them always argued at cross-purposes. For him, an argument existed to resolve a problem: he stated the problem, Jiang Yishen received it, and there was no need to keep going. The same applied in reverse.

What he had just explained was plain and easy to understand. Jiang Yishen had obviously gotten it — he was just being pushed along by inertia, his emotions not yet settled, still stubbornly splitting hairs.

Qi Lin stared at the shrimp dumplings and rice rolls that Jiang Yishen had taken, and thought over his options.

“I don’t think you’re childish,” he said at last.

“You said I was like a primary school student.”

Qi Lin furrowed his brow and made his move, setting down his chopsticks and going for the takeaway box. “You’ve got quite the grievance! You broke up with me — don’t I get to feel aggrieved?”

Jiang Yishen had a look on his face that said he knew it. “See, you do want to talk about the breakup!”

“…Fine, then let’s talk about the breakup. You decided on a whim to end it, not a moment’s buffer, not a single warning — what was I supposed to do?”

Jiang Yishen held the takeaway box up high. “You agreed at the time! I thought you had no feelings for me anymore. If you had said no, we wouldn’t have broken up.”

“You were the one who brought it up in the first place. Between the two of us, who do you think would be more convinced the other had no feelings left? Do you think ‘let’s not break up’ is easy to say out loud?”

“Can’t you tell whether someone has feelings or not? I was bouncing off the walls every day — you were the one who never once came to find me.”

“I didn’t come find you because I was afraid of bothering you when you were busy! The way you were bouncing around, you looked busier than a monkey!”

“Isn’t that exactly when you should check in on someone?”

At that, Qi Lin’s hand paused mid-reach for the shrimp dumpling. He realized he needed to emphasize something very important. “When I’m busy, even seeing a monkey makes me want to smack it. Don’t come looking for me and making things worse.”

“Being busy is exactly when you need company!” Jiang Yishen couldn’t comprehend it. “You don’t need me at all?”

Qi Lin took a deep breath, stopped pulling at Jiang Yishen’s arm, sat back up straight in his chair, and smoothed his sleeve. “Forget it, let’s not argue in front of Auntie.”

Xu Huaying made a gesture for them to continue. “A good argument is healthy.”

Qi Lin was unmoved. He stared at the tabletop in silence.

“Jiang Yishen, give the food back.” Xu Huaying made a brief foray into the battle. “How old are you, snatching things from people.”

Jiang Yishen reluctantly handed the bowl back to Qi Lin.

Qi Lin looked at the bowl in front of him and suddenly found it all rather funny. He couldn’t hold back a laugh.

“Some things just need to be said out loud.” Xu Huaying pressed her hands on the table and stood up. “Seek common ground while reserving differences[[1]] — once you know, there won’t be any lingering resentment. Alright, alright. Coffee?”

A coffee machine sat on the edge of the dining table. Xu Huaying took out some coffee beans from the cabinet and poured them in, pressing buttons as she spoke. “The beans from this grind are very fragrant. Last time I was going to bring some over, but since you’re here now, give it a try.”

A rich coffee aroma drifted out. Jiang Yishen watched her busy figure, hesitated for a moment, then asked, “Mom, are things going alright for you over here?”

“Mm-hmm.” Xu Huaying took a sip of coffee and raised the corners of her eyes. “Showing concern, are we?”

Jiang Yishen said flatly, “Just asking.”

“Don’t worry, your mom can still afford the rent on this place.” Xu Huaying lifted her chin.

“Oh.” Jiang Yishen was a little at a loss for words. He nudged Qi Lin with his elbow.

Qi Lin picked up the thread. “Auntie, how many days off do you have?”

“Three days.” Xu Huaying was always a little gentler with Qi Lin — probably because the way Qi Lin spoke was so soft and unhurried, it made people feel a pleasant tickle. “I’ll boil dumplings for lunch. After you eat, go out and have a look around. When are you leaving?”

They hadn’t actually thought about when to leave. After all, this day was just a short side trip for them.

Even though Xu Huaying’s memories of right now would soon be overwritten by the next loop, Qi Lin didn’t want to brush her off. He made an effort to come up with a reasonable answer. “Tonight, I suppose.”

“Oh, three hours by plane — you should be able to make it back just before midnight.” Xu Huaying nodded.

She said they’d go for a walk in the afternoon, and she meant it. Jiang Yishen had absolutely no plan for what to do, going wherever the mood took him, and managed to drag Qi Lin through over twenty thousand steps.

Qi Lin decided this could no longer be considered a date — it was a full-on endurance test. Fortunately, there weren’t many tourists out on New Year’s Eve, so there were no long queues to stand in.

He hung off the Star Ferry half-dead, while Jiang Yishen stood beside him in high spirits, letting the sea breeze blow over him.

The wind was a bit strong that day. A wave rolled through Victoria Harbour, and the ferry pitched up and down with it, like a Slinky toy being bounced.

Qi Lin felt his soul nearly leave his body. Clinging to his last breath, he searched on his phone to see if anyone had ever gotten seasick and thrown up on a sightseeing ferry.

The scenery, at least, was truly beyond reproach. As the boat reached the middle of the harbour, the sun happened to be setting — the orange-yellow orb sinking into the sea, the silhouette of a cargo ship in the distance, the horizon wide open, the last light of the sun spread across the entire sky, and the buildings on both shores gradually lighting up one by one.

Xu Huaying was happy to take them around. Their parting came inside a subway station. She was unusually quiet. Jiang Yishen had expected her to give them a long list of reminders, or say something heartfelt, but she said nothing at all — only pulled both of them into a very tight hug.

In Jiang Yishen’s memory, his mom hadn’t hugged him like that since he graduated from primary school.

They said goodbye to Xu Huaying that evening and walked out of the subway station. The sky had gone completely dark. The night wind picked up, sweeping fallen leaves into spirals.

Nightfall meant the countdown to the loop. Five hours remained before they would turn the page on everything this day had held.

The traffic light beeped steadily, urging them forward. Qi Lin watched the people coming from the other direction — people working hard to live their own lives — while he was a traveler in time, quietly brushing past the residents who belonged here, meeting them once in a lifetime, and they would never know.

“Where are we going?”

“Where do you want to go?” Jiang Yishen held his hand tightly.

Qi Lin said, “Anywhere is fine.”

Jiang Yishen gave a soft “mm” in reply. “I’ll take you to my favorite place.”

At half past eleven at night, they boarded a bus heading up Victoria Peak. Qi Lin had long heard of this place — said to symbolize the most romantic view in all of Hong Kong, appearing in every film.

But Jiang Yishen said his favorite part wasn’t the summit. It was this bus.

They didn’t take the tram up the mountain. The city bus wound its way up in long curves, about half an hour’s journey. The entire upper deck had only the two of them. They sat in the front row, the scenery along the way spread out before their eyes.

“Going up this way, you can see the villas on the hillside,” Jiang Yishen said. “No need to watch the stop signs, no need to worry about getting off at the right station — just sit here, look at the view, listen to music, all the way to the last stop.”

He seemed to remember something and added, “You can also see the wild boars on the mountain.”

Qi Lin couldn’t help a small laugh. It felt like a fantasy had been punctured. He gazed at the trees on either side and asked, “Can we make it before midnight?”

“Maybe. No stops along the way — we should just about make it,” Jiang Yishen said, then turned his head and kissed him.

Qi Lin tilted his head under the kiss. “This is my first time here. It’s really beautiful — not quite what I imagined.”

“It is beautiful,” Jiang Yishen said. “Once you’re done with school, you won’t be able to come to this side anymore. A shame it’s only one day.”

“It’s not a shame,” Qi Lin said.

There weren’t many passengers on the bus. After heading up the mountain, it barely stopped at all. With only two minutes to midnight, the bus reached the last stop. Even on New Year’s Eve, the summit still had quite a few travelers — it looked lively enough. Jiang Yishen grabbed Qi Lin and ran upward.

There was no time to go up to the viewing platform. The two of them found an open spot along Findlay Road[[2]], the entire glittering city spread out before them, blazing with light, shimmering and resplendent. Victoria Harbour was dyed a brilliant blue-violet by the lights — its edges half-hidden by leaves, like foreground decoration in a filtered photograph.

“Is it beautiful?” Jiang Yishen asked.

Qi Lin was a little lost in the view. His gaze finally landed on the imperfect leaves at the edges, and he smiled. “It’s beautiful. I liked the road up the mountain too, so I’m in a good mood — everything looks beautiful when you’re in a good mood.”

Jiang Yishen looked at him steadily. The next moment, the world spun. The million lights beneath their feet poured and overturned, swallowing them whole.

It was as if they heard the soft click of a stopwatch resetting. Time and space rewound a full turn before their eyes — clouds flowing backward, the sea surging, everything beginning again.

January 29th, 00:00. The third loop began.

Jiang Yishen opened his eyes. The howling wind at the summit was gone. In its place were the peaceful streetlamps, and the familiar residential building behind him with red decorative pendants[[3]] hanging from every window. In the distance there seemed to be the sound of firecrackers — the warm, festive spirit of the north.

His mind was still turning over Qi Lin’s words. For a moment he had the urge to cry. When Xing Yun’s voice sounded behind him asking a question, he once again, without a second thought, grabbed Qi Lin’s hand and ran.

The scenery was gone, but the feeling remained. Right now he had only one thought, and it was Qi Lin.

“Where are we going?” Qi Lin asked.

This time the direction they ran had a clear destination. The wind cut past their ears, as if flowing down from the mountaintop. Jiang Yishen gripped his hand tight and said only, “I’ve missed you so much.”