Chapter 67

Yan Zhao put the Elizabethan collar on Snowball’s neck. The white cat wobbled a few steps, then plopped down on the ground – the drowsiness from the anesthesia and the new weight from losing its testicles made it unable to maintain balance.

Having been raised for more than half a year, even if the cat is rebellious, it’s still a sweetheart. Yan Zhao carefully picked it up and put it in its favorite cardboard box.

Snowball meowed weakly, its eyes filled with grievance and pity. Yan Zhao stroked its head, and the cat squinted its eyes, purring contentedly.

When its brother returned, Wang Zai abandoned the scratching board and swaggered over to Snowball. Tilting its head for a look, well, its brother had become a sister.

Wang Zai was excitedly meowing: “Meow meow!”

Snowball was still a little grumpy: “Meow woo woo…”

Yan Zhao was speechless: “Wang Zai seems a bit happy…”

Shen Yuanting tapped its head: “You little bastard who takes pleasure in others’ misfortune.”

Wang Zai innocently widened its eyes and started licking Snowball’s fur, trying to create an atmosphere of brotherly respect.

Yan Zhao scooped it away: “Don’t lick your brother’s wound.”

Wang Zai wriggled into Yan Zhao’s arms, leaving his clothes covered in cat fur.

In the evening, Yan Zhao opened his suitcase and started packing his clothes. He checked the weather forecast, and the temperature in City X was still around 25°C these days, and it wouldn’t cool down in the short term. So he picked out some soft, breathable T-shirts, folded them twice, and put them in the storage bag.

Shen Yuanting found a slightly thicker denim jacket from the wardrobe, folded it neatly, and put it in the suitcase.

Yan Zhao said: “Ah, no, it’s almost full. We can just buy a jacket when we get to City X.” He didn’t like to carry a large suitcase, preferring to travel as lightly as possible.

Shen Yuanting pretended not to hear, helped him tidy up the other messy things, made a small space, and put the commonly used medicine in it. He asked him, “Did you set the alarm? You have to sleep until 8 o’clock at the latest tomorrow.”

Yan Zhao said, “It’s set for 6:30. I’ll get up with you.”

Shen Yuanting: “You haven’t been able to sleep in for months, why don’t you take the time to rest?”

Yan Zhao said: “I won’t see you for months, it’s better to take the time to look at you more.”

Shen Yuanting smiled slightly.

The next day, Shen Yuanting tied an apron and fried a poached egg while Yan Zhao brewed coffee. The two cats were curled up on the dining chairs, with their tails lazily swaying.

Yan Zhao: “I never thought I’d spend a morning like this before.”

Shen Yuanting: “What did you imagine your mornings would be like?”

Yan Zhao: “Just me, alone. I never thought I’d be in a relationship.”

Shen Yuanting lowered his eyelashes: “…That’s something I should say.”

Yan Zhao still wasn’t used to the taste of black coffee, so he added a creamer ball to his own.

He served breakfast on the table and gave Wang Zai an order: “When I’m not home, be a good big brother and don’t bully Snowball.”

Wang Zai’s yellow eyes rolled around, seemingly agreeing innocently.

Shen Yuanting patted its head, and Wang Zai flipped over, clasping his hand with its paws.

As they chatted leisurely, Shen Yuanting mentioned he would drop him off in the morning, and Yan Zhao, while eating a sandwich, said: “Forget it, going back and forth, you’ll hit the morning rush hour.” Getting stuck in traffic was undoubtedly one of the top ten most annoying things in life.

Shen Yuanting just sipped his coffee, indirectly saying: “Sometimes, being considerate is not the same as being understanding.”

Yan Zhao knew he wanted to spend more time together, so he said: “Then come, but if you get stuck, don’t blame me. It’s your own doing.”

Shen Yuanting sent Yan Zhao to board the plane, this seemed to have become a habit for the two. Yan Zhao sat on the plane overlooking the gradually shrinking city, knowing that he couldn’t capture his figure from that scene, but he was also very at ease.

There was someone waiting for him.

Yan Zhao thought he was shooting in City X. But when he arrived at the meeting point, he realized he was mistaken. The real shooting location was in a remote small town outside the suburbs of City X.

They had to pass through a mountain forest, where the mountain roads were rugged and steep, with rusted guardrails on the edges that provided no protection.

On their way up, a car from the opposite direction tried to scam them, causing the filming crew’s convoy to be blocked on the road.

Xie Lianxue came back from not far away, closed the car door, and said: “Poor mountains and rivers breed cunning people; if you don’t scold them, they really think they’re the emperor. Alright, we can go now.”

Yan Zhao thought, he reminded Shen Yuanting not to get stuck in traffic, but he was the one who got stuck first. From the moment they entered the mountain, the signal gradually weakened, and on the screen, the message “Have you arrived at the company?” was followed by a loading icon.

Yan Zhao looked out the window at the yellow earthy slope, with a few green spots growing sparsely on it. In the distance on the guardrail, there was a signpost saying “Beware of falling rocks”.

Yan Zhao asked: “It must be dangerous here during the rainy season.”

Xie Lianxue replied: “Not just then, it’s dangerous all year round. The locals have planned to rebuild the road, but the funds have been delayed.”

The two chatted for a bit, but didn’t discuss this issue much.

The town was really rustic, not the deliberately created antiquity of tourist spots, but a kind of atmosphere of poverty and backwardness. It seemed as if yellow sand was swirling around the entire town, and the sky was gloomy.

It seems not all secluded places are idyllic paradises.

The first piece of advice Xie Lianxue gave him was, “After you get the water from the faucet, remember to let it settle and precipitate.”

Yan Zhao glanced at the water basin in the yard, which was filled with water, and there was a thin layer of sand at the bottom.

Yan Zhao was resigned to Xie Lianxue: “Where on earth did you find this place… I see Ying Hongyu is also filming nearby, and even the mountains there are at least twenty years ahead of this place.”

Xie Lianxue: “Being twenty years ahead still means it’s stuck in the year 2000. Don’t complain, we have some time before the rainy season starts. Let’s finish shooting quickly and leave.”

If it weren’t for the outdoor scenes required by the script, Xie Lianxue wouldn’t want to stay in this corner either. It wasn’t even convenient for him to wear skirts.

《The Red Parrot》 was the script Yan Zhao was shooting this time.

The story was set in a border town, which borders a neighboring country. It’s a mixed bag of people, and beneath the facade of peace was a murky undercurrent.

The male protagonist, You Wenguang, was born into an ordinary family, but his life turned upside down when his father became addicted to drugs and his mother died from domestic violence, leaving his family shattered.

During a gang fight, You’s father became a victim, while You Wenguang survived thanks to his looks, and became the captive of the drug lord Q. Every week, he would be injected with a fixed amount of “Red Parrot”, which allowed him to stay sane and not go crazy like other drug addicts. However, if he ever went against Q’s wishes, the pain of drug withdrawal would be enough to break his spine. At the age of fifteen, he fired his first gun, blowing up the head of a debtor.

On the surface, You Wenguang had submitted to Q, but in secret, he had made contact with a police informant. After lying low for five years, he finally found an opportunity to eliminate his enemy and killed Q with his own hands. Just as he was about to turn himself in and face judgment for the sins he had committed over the years, he was stabbed in the abdomen by a passerby — before he died, he vaguely remembered that the first gun he fired was the one that killed this person’s father.

The shooting period was tough; the weather in City X was strange, with scorching sun during the day and relentless rain at night. Going to sleep with a dry quilt, one would wake up the next day to find it as damp as if it had been soaked in water overnight. Some people in the crew had rice grain-sized water blisters in the seams of their fingers, densely packed, not itchy, but unsettling to look at.

Another thing that everyone couldn’t stand was the poor signal here, they couldn’t make phone calls or send messages, and there was only one public telephone booth to contact the outside world.

Yan Zhao ran to the telephone booth more diligently than he returned to the dormitory, even the old lady who guarded the telephone booth recognized him.

The old lady liked him very much and often talked to him. Once she said that all the young people had left, unwilling to stay in this backward place, only the older generation stubbornly remained in their hometown.

So Yan Zhao suddenly realized that there were hardly any young people in the town. They were either children who were still naive about the world or old people who were on the verge of death. Perhaps before long, the former would be taken to the city by their parents and never return, while the latter would die out while guarding their land.

After a week, the crew needed to go into the city to buy supplies to improve everyone’s living conditions.

Hearing this, Yan Zhao’s eyes lit up: “I want to go into the city too!”

The crew member scratched his head and advised him, “It’s a six-hour round trip on bumpy mountain roads, not comfortable at all.”

Yan Zhao: “It’s okay, I have motion sickness medicine.”

Just as the crew member was about to agree, another voice said, “I want to go into the city too.”

He turned his head to see it was Xie Lianxue.

When Director Xie arrived, he was elegantly dressed in flowing skirts, but now he couldn’t be bothered to dress up, wearing pants he had taken from the assistant director and using a hemp rope as a belt, looking rough.

But there were only two seats in the truck, one for the lead actor and one for the director. Who would sit?

Yan Zhao and Xie Lianxue stared at him simultaneously.

The crew member: “…I understand.”

Three hours later, the signal in the top right corner of the screen finally changed from zero to available, and Yan Zhao was nearly moved to tears.

Xie Lianxue sent him a memo, and the two split up to buy supplies. Yan Zhao was filling his shopping basket with toilet paper while video calling Shen Yuanting.

Shen Yuanting thought he had lost weight and asked for the second time, “Is the accommodation condition of the crew good?”

Yan Zhao: “It’s okay, similar to a student dorm, with a private bathroom. The food is alright too, free-range chicken and duck, pollution-free.”

However, the reality was that the dormitory was smaller than his home’s bathroom, with eight people sharing bunk beds, the only TV was broken, and the fan stopped working after two days. There was indeed one private bathroom, but with over a hundred people in the crew, waiting in line for a shower could last from evening till dawn. The food was just so-so, no different from ordinary film crews.

Basic necessities were already a struggle, let alone entertainment activities.

Yan Zhao sighed: “Working from sunrise to sunset, I feel like I’ve become an ancient person.”

Though this “ancient person” could trace their lineage back to the skulls in the B city museum.

Yan Zhao praised Shen Yuanting for his foresight; it was cold in the town at night, and he had to wear the denim jacket Shen Yuanting had stuffed into his luggage. Shen Yuanting was not much of a talker, mostly listening to Yan Zhao, but across the distance, he could feel the cherished emotions from the other side.

After paying, Yan Zhao returned to the car. In City X, the tallest building was just a department store; the rest of the buildings were low and dim, with the sky clearly visible at a glance.

Yan Zhao remembered and said, “You can see the stars here at night, lots of them, very bright.”

Perhaps this was the only gift nature left to this city. It had been forgotten and abandoned by people, so nature gave it the most beautiful stars. But when it comes to daytime, when everyone hds to hustle for a living, how bright the stars were was insignificant.

But the weather wasn’t good now, gloomy with overcast clouds.

Yan Zhao reached out, grabbing a handful of damp air: “It looks like it’s going to rain here.”

Shen Yuanting instructed him, “You’ll have to take the mountain road, right? Wait for the rain to stop before you go.”

Yan Zhao: “Yeah, I know, don’t worry about me. Are you at home? I want to see Wang Zai and Snowball.”

Shen Yuanting said, “Not at home.”

Yan Zhao thought that made sense, considering it was work hours.

Shen Yuanting sent him some recent cat videos: “Make do with these.”

When Xie Lianxue came back, he found that Yan Zhao was still on the phone, and casually said: “You two seem to have a good relationship.” Unlike his little rascal at home, who is heartless and lungless, he even asked him about Yan Zhao’s news just now, doesn’t he know that the call time is hard to come by?

When they came, it was Xie Lianxue who drove, and when they returned, it was Yan Zhao.

Yan Zhao reluctantly said, “Going back to the crew now, hanging up, take care of your meals, and don’t drink coffee at night, or you won’t be able to sleep later.”

Shen Yuanting: “Okay, be careful.”

After hanging up the phone, Yan Zhao looked up at the sky, and the rain was already drizzling down. He asked, “Should we wait for the rain to stop or go now?”

Xie Lianxue checked the weather forecast: “It says the rain will stop in half an hour, a little rain won’t matter, it’s more dangerous when it gets dark. Let’s go now.”

The car drove on the mountain road, and after six, the last sliver of light in the sky was still stubbornly holding on. In the distance, thunder rumbled.

The windshield wipers methodically turned the raindrops into a curtain of water, and Yan Zhao felt uneasy, as if suffocating from lack of oxygen, though he couldn’t figure out why he felt this way.

To distract himself, he started chatting with Xie Lianxue about the movie when suddenly a cold breeze blew in his face. He glanced to the side and saw Xie Lianxue had opened the car window, unsure if he was looking at the sky or the mountains.

On the other side of the sky, it was also gloomy, but the crystal chandelier inside the house was extremely bright.

The exquisitely dressed designer’s assistant opened a blue velvet jewelry box, displaying the custom-made product to the big customer: “Considering your requirements, we have used…”

The assistant continued speaking while observing the client’s reaction, the man’s expression remained bland, simply signaling him to continue.

The big customer provided them with a piece of top-grade lotus sapphire, a gem with very low production. Those over 5 carats could only be seen at international auctions, but this piece was a full 21.86 carats, with colors evenly split between 50% pink and 50% orange, resembling a red lotus under the twilight, truly perfect. Coupled with other gemstones and diamonds, as well as the well-known status of the main designer, there was no doubt that the price of this ring could soar to tens of millions.

The assistant was curious about who this indifferent man would give the ring to. However, she could not ask such a question and could only continue discussing the designer’s design philosophy.

When Shen Yuanting returned home, he called out, but Wang Zai and Snowball didn’t respond. He went back to the bedroom and, unsurprisingly, found two small mounds raised under the quilt. Shen Yuanting lifted the quilt, and saw the two cats were sleeping in Yan Zhao’s side of the bed. 

Shen Yuanting said, “…Aren’t you guys suffocating?”

Wang Zai lazily yawned and squinted at him, while Snowball got up and started kneading the soft quilt with its paws, beginning to knead milk.

Shen Yuanting: “…” If it weren’t so against the cat’s nature, he even wanted to force them to change the bedsheet and quilt cover.

Shen Yuanting browsed through the kitchen, where the housekeeping aunt had just bought very fresh, lush vegetables, but he had no appetite. He intended to just heat up some toast, but remembering Yan Zhao’s instructions, he instead threw a handful of noodles and a large bunch of greens into the pot.

It started raining outside, with strong winds. Snowball, afraid of thunder, curled up uneasily, with Wangzi beside it, licking its fur.

Shen Yuanting turned on the TV for Wang Zai, showing cartoons, while he himself held a book to read.

Ten minutes passed, and Shen Yuanting was stunned, trying to reread a passage he had glanced at, but he found he had no memory of the text. Reading it a second time, he couldn’t extract any meaningful information. It was as if he had suddenly lost the ability to read, those square characters just meaningless, ink-stained imprints.

Shen Yuanting simply turned on his phone to check WeChat, scrolling from the last message all the way to the top. He then opened the messaging app, where there were many messages, all from the same person. He was unwilling to delete any message from Yan Zhao, even a simple “Oh” or “1”. Those he had to be discarded were all backed up.

At the end of the message box was the first text Yan Zhao sent him:

[My friend said he saw a cat that looks a lot like Wang Zai near the trash cans of a certain community, but he can’t remember the name of the community.]

A clumsy lie.

Whether it was the Shen Yuanting of the past, who had not yet truly met him, or the Shen Yuanting of now, who had spent hundreds of days and nights with him, and even the Shen Yuanting who would spend thousands more days and nights with him, could see through the flaws at a glance.

Shen Yuanting wondered, has it been that long? That rainy night seemed like yesterday, yet also like a memory from a past life.

Shen Yuanting stared at that text message for a while, and with a crisp “pop” sound, he remembered that there was still a pot of flowers on the balcony, which Yan Zhao had just bought the day before he went to the crew. He said that this flower was very delicate, and only someone as careful as Mr. Shen could keep it alive, and asked Shen Yuanting to take care of it, and he would check his work when he came back.

Shen Yuanting suddenly stood up and rushed to the balcony to rescue the plant. The flower pot had been blown over, and the plant was wilting and lying on the ground, half-dead.

Shen Yuanting moved the plant indoors, planning to google how to rescue the plant, but his body suddenly stiffened.

The latest notification.

Landslide in City X.

Shen Yuanting emotionlessly clicked on the message. The news was brief, only a hundred words or so, vaguely mentioning that among the victims were popular stars, and currently being rushed to City X People’s Hospital.

He closed the message, pulled up his contacts, Yan Zhao’s name had an ‘a’ in front, so he was always at the top of the contact list. He called Yan Zhao, but it didn’t go through, not even a waiting beep, just the mechanical female voice repeating “The phone you have dialed is switched off” over and over.

Without a moment’s hesitation, Shen Yuanting grabbed the coat lying on the sofa and called Secretary Li: “Book me the nearest flight to City X. If there’s none within half an hour, go to the aviation administration to file a report, connect with City X Airport.”

It was dark outside. On the plane, he suddenly smelled the strange scent of the ICU, his only memory associated with the acronym lying on a hospital bed was Yu Wei.

Back then, he didn’t understand why Yu Wei wanted to jump off a building, but he guessed Yu Wei was in a lot of pain. He had seen Yu Wei in the middle of the night, the woman sitting in the living room, lighting a lighter, burning one photo after another.

She noticed him and then waved at him. Strangely, Yu Wei at that time didn’t show any desire for revenge, but Shen Yuanting dared not approach her, perhaps because the fire burning in the photos was too scorching, as if the flames of hell were also burning in Yu Wei’s eyes.

After the plane landed, he immediately rushed to the hospital. City X was really too remote, the more backward the place, the less modern technology could do, not to mention a place where wifi wasn’t even widespread.

He didn’t forget to call Yan Zhao, but the response was still that unfeeling female voice.

The sky had completely darkened, and the weather forecast was never accurate. The promised half-hour of rain had continued without stopping until now.

The road was very dark, the street lights were all broken, and outside the hospital was a brick wall painted white, covered with small advertisements or children’s graffiti.

With a splash, mud splashed up, and he stepped on another broken tile.

At the end of his sight, a lone lamp light appeared, illuminating the only entrance.

Like a moth plunging into a spider’s web, he dived into this narrow, dim light with a solitary courage.

The dim light, moistened by the rain, became blurred, and shadows were cut into countless pieces by the rain. In a daze, he saw a familiar figure. The young man was holding an umbrella, wearing the denim jacket he had forcefully packed into his luggage, his face illuminated by the light, exceptionally gentle, like the wind in late spring.

Yan Zhao: “…”

Yan Zhao: “???”

Am I hallucinating?

Other than that, there seemed to be no other reason to explain the figure in front of him. Once their relationship was confirmed, Shen Yuanting rarely made surprise visits because appearing suddenly would only cause trouble for Yan Zhao’s work—though he was also willing to deal with it.

Yan Zhao couldn’t help but wonder if he was hallucinating because he occasionally came to the city, filled with food and warmth, and desired.

However, the umbrella that fell on the ground, and the wet, real hug told him that all this was not some bullshit hallucination.

He hugged Shen Yuanting back, resting his chin on his shoulder. The man’s hand was holding him very tightly, almost breaking his waist.

Yan Zhao comforted him by stroking his back, like petting a cat, along the spine.

When the other’s heartbeat, like a drumbeat, gradually calmed down, he asked, “Why did you come here without telling me?”

Shen Yuanting said, “I couldn’t get through to your phone.”

“Ah?” Yan Zhao took out his phone and indeed found it was turned off. He held the power button, and the screen lit up for a few seconds, then turned off on its own after warning it was out of battery.

Yan Zhao was first embarrassed, then helpless, and then, a deep bitterness seized his heart.

Yan Zhao held his hand: “Don’t be afraid, I’m right here.”

He’s not stupid, he had already guessed why Shen Yuanting was so anxious.

Seeing the relief on his face as if he had survived a calamity, Yan Zhao felt a deep heartache. He led him out of the hospital and explained, “I’m going to buy instant noodles now, Director Xie and I haven’t had dinner yet.”

Shen Yuanting asked, “Why are you in the hospital?”

Yan Zhao: “You think I wouldn’t visit if your colleague had an accident?”

On the mountain road, the reason for his restlessness was finally came to mind—it seemed Ying Hongyu had fallen off a cliff during this period.

At that time, the rain on the other side of the town had almost stopped, only dark clouds still lingered over City X. He wanted to call Ying Hongyu, so he turned back.

After persuading Ying Hongyu to go back to the dorm to rest, another message came about a certain star’s accident.

Everyone was in this small town, what else could they do but visit the sick? Thankfully, the person wasn’t in life-threatening danger, even saying before anesthesia, “I want to eat pig’s trotters tomorrow”…

Thinking of this, Yan Zhao asked, “Have you eaten? What did you eat?”

Shen Yuanting: “Vegetables with noodles.”

“No meat?”

“Um.”

Yan Zhao nodded, picked up three bags of Kangshifu beef noodles, and then asked, “What about Wang Zai and Snowball?”

“They’re at home. Secretary Li is taking care of them.”

“And my flower?”

“…The flower pot was blown over by the wind, and the flower was rained on; it probably won’t survive.”

Seeing his rare guilt, Yan Zhao laughed: “If it can’t survive, then it can’t. When we go back, let’s visit the flower market together.”