“Why are you at my little aunt’s house? Where is she?”
Chen Li avoided the first question and answered the second. “She went to work. She might not be back for a few days.”
Xie Huaixia frowned. “Then I’m going to starve for days.”
“Aren’t there any restaurants nearby?”
The girl’s bright eyes flew wide open. “There are! I’ll take you there. You can buy me dinner!”
“Deal.”
Chen Li’s first meal in Dongxie Village was at a container-style food court by the river.
It was all deep-fried, high-calorie food.
She ate there once. She wouldn’t go back if you paid her.
So the next day at lunchtime, when Xie Huaixia invited her again, she politely declined. Instead, she rummaged around Xie Anqing’s kitchen and made the simplest dish she could think of: egg fried rice.
How could she describe the taste of her kitchen debut?
“Even a dog wouldn’t eat it,” Chen Li reported to her manager in a voice message. Behind her, Xie Huaixia bounced along, having just led Chen Li to the convenience store and earned herself a bag of spicy snacks.
Xie Huaixia might or might not have heard the message. Chen Li put her phone away and headed into the backyard. When she pushed open the door, she froze.
After working day and night, Xie Anqing had finally managed to steal a few minutes’ rest. Worried that Chen Li might not be settling in, she’d hurried home. Now she sat beneath the banyan tree at the stone table, a spoon in her hand and Chen Li’s leftover fried rice in front of her.
The plate had been full when Chen Li left. Now, only one bite remained.
Chen Li stared at the plate. How had Xie Anqing managed to swallow any of it?
Xie Anqing glanced at Chen Li, then ate the last bite.
It wasn’t that she had no standards. She was simply starving. From yesterday until now, a full twenty-four hours, she’d eaten only a hurried bowl of noodles. Her stomach had been empty for ages. At this point, she could probably swallow bran with a drink of water—never mind fried rice even a kitchen novice would struggle to make this badly.
Xie Anqing set the spoon down and stood. Xie Huaixia was coming in behind Chen Li. “Wash your bowl after you finish your snacks.”
The girl had just spotted the aunt she’d been missing so badly. She froze for a moment, then rushed over and hugged Xie Anqing. “Okay, Auntie! But are you going out again?”
“Yes. The road to Xie Xiaomei’s house is still blocked. If we don’t clear it, you won’t be able to go play with her.”
“Oh.” Xie Huaixia reluctantly let go. “Take care of yourself, okay? Don’t work too hard.”
“I know.”
Xie Anqing tightened Huaixia’s loose ponytail, then looked up at Chen Li. “Miss Chen, I’m sorry. I’ll need at least two more days.”
Chen Li was still stunned that Xie Anqing had actually eaten the whole plate of fried rice. She gave a small smile. “You already said ‘sorry’ when you left yesterday. I said I understood.”
“Thank you.”
Xie Anqing gave Xie Huaixia’s cheek a quick pinch and started to leave.
At the door, she paused. “Starting tonight, I’ll have someone bring you food for every meal.”
Was that a polite way of saying her cooking was terrible?
Chen Li smiled. “Thank you, Secretary Xie.”
Xie Anqing didn’t say anything else. Her footsteps soon faded away.
Chen Li took a shower, then sat idly on the bay window in her room, admiring the vase of apricot-pink roses.
They had bloomed that morning.
When she’d woken up, the shadows of the trees had swayed across the window, and every flower on the sill had opened.
Chen Li still couldn’t put into words the visual surprise of that moment, or the ease and comfort that slowly followed. She’d poured water into a cup, leaned against the window to watch, and accidentally fallen asleep.
At six that evening, a woman in her forties brought Chen Li dinner.
The next few meals arrived right on time.
Chen Li spent her days either sitting by the window waiting for food or sleeping when she got tired.
By the third evening, she couldn’t sit still anymore. She went downstairs, found her camera in the car, and prepared to take some pictures.
The camera wouldn’t turn on.
Chen Li immediately remembered the day Guoqing had attacked her. She’d instinctively grabbed whatever was within reach and thrown it like a weapon.
That had been an expensive throw.
She set the camera down and listened to footsteps crossing the front courtyard, drawing closer.
They didn’t sound like the woman who brought her food.
And they weren’t Xie Huaixia’s.
Chen Li turned her head. The footsteps passed the car, and the visitor came into view.
It was Xie Anqing, whom she hadn’t seen for three days.
She must have just showered. Her hair hung loose and was still damp, and when she looked up at Chen Li, her face was full of exhaustion.
“Miss Chen, you’re still up,” Xie Anqing said.
Chen Li gave a brief reply, then asked, “Are you finished?”
“I am.”
Xie Anqing came over to get a drink of water. She’d meant to stand while she drank, but she was so tired she could barely lift her arm. In the end, she leaned against the table like Chen Li.
Chen Li’s camera sat on the table.
Xie Anqing turned her head without thinking and noticed the crack in its casing.
She stopped drinking.
At the level crossing, she’d been so focused on Chen Li’s injury that she’d forgotten the camera had disappeared from her hands.
An expensive camera like that would cost more than Xie Anqing could afford, even if she saved every cent of her salary for two years without eating or drinking.
Chen Li caught the change in Xie Anqing’s expression at once.
A shadow passed quietly through her light-colored eyes. She tapped her fingers on the camera. “Secretary Xie, your dog scared me, and I dropped my camera. What do you think we should do about it?”
Xie Anqing’s hand shifted against the edge of the table. She put her cup down. “I can’t afford to pay you back right away.”
“I won’t be here much longer.”
She wouldn’t be able to wait for Xie Anqing to save enough to pay her back.
Xie Anqing understood. “What would you like to do?”
“Well…”
The main room was quiet and dark. There were no lights on; only the moonlight outside was rising like a tide.
Chen Li looked at Xie Anqing from only a short distance away, taking in those deep eyes like sunset behind distant mountains. Now that they’d caught the moonlight, their beauty was impossible to hide.
Chen Li’s eyes were another camera. They wouldn’t break or wear out. They would always follow beauty—drawn in, yet seeking it out of their own accord—as they moved closer to Xie Anqing, inch by inch.
“I’ll have to think about it.”
Chen Li’s voice wasn’t especially soft, but Xie Anqing heard it as if through a fog. She could feel Chen Li drawing near, bringing the sticky heat that came before a storm, sweeping through the summer night. Xie Anqing wanted to move away, but couldn’t make herself budge.
The moonlight rising like a tide slowly washed over her neck, her mouth and nose, then her eyes.
“I don’t think you have to pay me for the camera,” Chen Li said. “Maybe you could just keep me company instead.”
As soon as she finished speaking, the woman beside her suddenly leaned against her, resting her head on Chen Li’s shoulder. Her breath brushed Chen Li’s neck. A strand of long hair had slipped inside the strap of her sundress, giving off the warmth and dampness of the moonlit room.
It happened so suddenly that Chen Li went completely still for a moment. Time stopped; her breath caught. Only when the strand of hair began to tickle her skin and the woman’s weight started to sink did Chen Li seem to return to herself. She instinctively put an arm around Xie Anqing’s waist and lifted her up.
Xie Anqing was heavy in her arms. Chen Li tightened her hold, and the other woman slumped against her neck.
The banyan tree spread its shadow across the ground, full and alive, swaying in the wind.
When Xie Anqing’s head drooped helplessly, Chen Li’s hand tightened around her waist to keep her from falling. Then she called out, “Secretary Xie.”
“…”
“Secretary Xie?”
“…”
Uneven shadows from the leaves brushed over the bluish pinpricks on the back of Xie Anqing’s hand.
Chen Li’s expression shifted. She finally realized something was wrong and quickly raised her hand to pat Xie Anqing’s cheek.
The skin beneath her fingers was hot enough to burn.
“Xie Anqing.”
Chen Li’s voice dropped at the same moment hurried footsteps sounded at the entrance. She turned quickly. A woman with features almost identical to Xie Huaixia’s strode into the room and helped Xie Anqing out of Chen Li’s arms.
The woman turned to Xie Huaixia, who had followed her in. “Xiaxia, call Aunt Xie Xiumei and tell her to come over right away!”
Xiaxia had just grabbed Xie Anqing’s hand. At her mother Xie Yun’s command, she swallowed back the tears that had started to fall and tapped the screen of the Xiaotiancai smartwatch on her wrist to call Xie Xiumei.
At the same time, Xie Yun bent quickly and slipped her left arm beneath Xie Anqing’s knees, trying to carry her upstairs.
But she’d forgotten that her right arm had just been injured. She couldn’t put any weight on it.
Xie Yun was the village party secretary. She and Xie Anqing had worked together for nearly six years without ever falling out. When Chen Li came to Dongxie Village, Xie Yun had been studying at the municipal Party school. The day before yesterday, she’d returned from the city and thrown herself into evacuating residents and clearing the roads. She hadn’t been home since.
The falling rocks had injured her arm while she was clearing the road.
It didn’t hurt when she kept still, but the moment she moved, her whole right shoulder throbbed.
Chen Li caught Xie Anqing in time. “Give her to me,” she said to Xie Yun, whose forehead was already beaded with cold sweat.
