Luan Nian drove the two drunk women home.
On the way to drop Sun Yu off, the two of them mumbled at each other in slurred voices, and though he couldn't make out a word, they seemed to understand each other just fine.
That was strange.
A little booze and they'd ended up like this. Real impressive.
He kept a stony face as he took Sun Yu upstairs. She'd bought a place near the Third Ring Road not long ago and lived there alone. Luan Nian pressed her hand to the fingerprint lock, got her onto her bed, poured her a glass of water, then called lumi. "Your good friend Sun Yu is drunk."
lumi swore into the phone, and Luan Nian, hearing the rustle of her pulling on a down jacket, hung up.
lumi got there twenty minutes later. By then Shang Zhitao had her face pressed against the car window, too drunk and too hot to sit up.
lumi opened the door, looked her over, and clicked her tongue. "Look at you." She glanced at Luan Nian's dark expression and thought Shang Zhitao was in for it tonight, then turned and ran upstairs.
Luan Nian drove Shang Zhitao home. She wouldn't sit still in the passenger seat, and he finally lost his patience, reaching over to press her back into her seat. "Keep this up and I'll toss you out."
Shang Zhitao froze, then burst into tears. "You're so mean. Why are you being so mean? Can't you talk to me nicely?"
...
Damn it.
"Stop crying." After a moment his voice softened. "Was I mean because you were being difficult?" He tried to reason with a drunk person, but a drunk person doesn't reason.
"No! You just don't know how to talk to people!"
Shang Zhitao cried the whole way to his place, tears and snot running together.
Luan Nian had never imagined he'd spend part of his life coaxing a drunk out of a car like this. She sat inside crying while he stood at the open door and bent down to lift her out. "Don't. Why are you hugging me? We barely know each other."
"Can't I walk myself? Why would I need you to carry me?"
"You owe me an apology."
"Apologize for what?"
"You just yelled at me."
"I didn't yell at you."
Shang Zhitao wailed again and slumped back in her seat, tears streaming, her nose running. Luan Nian genuinely wanted to strangle her. "Don't push it, Shang Zhitao. Push it any further and you can sleep in the car."
"This is what men are like. You get drunk and he won't even take care of you, gets impatient, and yells at you..." She kept on sniffling.
Her crying gave him a headache. After a long standoff he finally crouched down. "Fine. I shouldn't have raised my voice. I'm sorry."
"Then compliment me."
Luan Nian thought grimly that if he ever let her drink so much as a drop again, he'd be damned. "Compliment you on what?"
"Say I'm pretty."
He couldn't help it and let out a short laugh. "Fine. You're gorgeous."
"And smart," she added.
"Right, and smart."
"And very talented."
"Mm, very talented."
It took real effort to get her out of the car. He carried her upstairs, and within a few steps she was asleep. He laid her on the bed, undressed her, wrung out a towel to wipe her face, and got her to drink some water. By the time he finished it was already deep into the night. Luke, fresh from his bath and clean as ever, sat at the head of the bed watching them, looking puzzled. "What's wrong with Mommy? Why does Mommy look strange?"
"Your mom lost it today."
Luan Nian lay back down and picked up the book on his nightstand, flipping to where he'd left off. He pulled out the wish list tucked inside, the one he used as a bookmark, a reminder of which page he was on and also of the hopes a certain girl had once held for her life. He set the list gently on the table and read a few pages. Shang Zhitao rolled over and threw a leg across his, and before she could kick him he pinned her leg down with his own. "Even drunk you can't keep still."
Later in the night she rolled over again, took his hand, and mumbled, "We all missed you so much," a trace of sadness in her voice.
Luan Nian narrowed his eyes at her in the dark, but couldn't make her out clearly. He touched his fingertips to the corner of her eye and found it wet. She'd had a dream that made her sad.
People like to say that time changes things. The phrase that usually follows is that everything stays the same except the people.
Luan Nian knew who Shang Zhitao meant by "we," and he knew who she meant by "you." Since they'd found each other again, they had never spoken of it. But he had once opened a book on the shelves in her home and seen notes written in the margins, and he knew whose hand they belonged to.
After a night like that, Luan Nian woke up the next day in a foul mood. Shang Zhitao came downstairs looking for him, saw him on the treadmill, and walked over with a smile.
"Sleep well?" she asked.
He glanced at her without a word and kept running.
"Are you in a bad mood?" she asked again.
He ignored her, and only after he finished did he say, "Do you even know how much you can drink these days?"
"My tolerance is pretty good."
"How much did you drink last night?"
"I don't remember."
He picked up his phone, pulled up a video, and handed it to her. "See for yourself."
Shang Zhitao watched a hopelessly drunk version of herself, tears and snot smeared across her face, refusing to let him touch her, accusing him of not being gentle enough and of not knowing how to talk nicely.
She burst out laughing at herself. "No more drinking, no more drinking." Then she explained, "I only get like that with Sun Yu."
"Not with Fu Dong?"
"Not with lumi?"
"Not with He Yun and Shang Zhishu?"
He fired the questions off one after another, his displeasure obvious. It wasn't only because she'd made a scene while drunk, but also because of what she'd said in her sleep.
"I had a bit too much yesterday. I've never been like that before." She gave him an apologetic smile. "Is it exhausting, taking care of someone who's drunk?"
"No."
"But you look tired."
He said nothing more and went upstairs to shower. She followed him. "Is it because I snored and kicked you and you couldn't sleep well?"
"No. You talked in your sleep."
He looked at her as he undressed. "The most annoying thing about you drunk is that you talk in your sleep."
"What did I say?"
"You said..." He paused. "You said you love me very much." He flashed a wicked grin and shut the door.
He got in the shower. Shang Zhitao stood outside listening, imagining what he looked like, and finally just cracked the door open and poked her head in.
Luan Nian stood under the showerhead, water running down his hair and over his face. A drop hung from the tip of his nose for a long moment before falling, then trailed down over his shoulders, his chest, the cut lines at his hips.
She stared, a little dazed, and swallowed hard, cursing herself inwardly for being such a pervert.
Under her blatant stare, Luan Nian felt his ego swell. Seeing she hadn't moved, he told her, "Either come in or get out."
Of course she wanted to go in, but she wasn't up for it right then. She smiled. "Sorry, that was forward of me." As she shut the door she heard him curse under his breath.
She was in a great mood. Sitting on the bed waiting for the handsome man fresh out of the shower, she even found herself thinking that among all the good-looking men on short video platforms, few had Luan Nian's particular style. So if she ever went broke again, could she film him and make money off it?
When he came out she asked him, "What are we doing today?"
"Catching up on sleep."
He said it flatly and lay down. When she didn't move he pulled her down beside him. "Sleep for a while first."
"And then?"
"Then I've got plans with some friends tonight. Want to come?"
"I already promised lumi I'd go shopping with her tonight."
"Okay."
She really had made plans with lumi. lumi rarely came to Beijing, and they'd arranged it before she even arrived. That evening Luan Nian dropped her off where she and lumi were meeting to shop, then went to his own gathering alone.
The dinner had been put together by Tan Mian that morning. When he heard Shang Zhitao was in Beijing, he specifically told Luan Nian to bring her along. By the time Luan Nian arrived, everyone else was already there. Lin Chun'er stood up and hurried to the door, and seeing no one behind him, asked, "Where is she?"
"She's busy."
"If I'd known Shang Zhitao wasn't coming with you, Xiao Mei and I wouldn't have bothered showing up either."
"She has plans with a friend," Luan Nian said.
Lin Chun'er and Xiao Mei didn't usually like coming to gatherings full of men, but Song Qiuhan and the others had told them today was different, that everyone's favorite Shang Zhitao was in Beijing for a conference and they'd finally get to meet her. That was the only reason they'd come.
Luan Nian said nothing.
He barely spoke through the whole meal. Shang Zhitao wasn't like other girlfriends who felt the need to share everything with their boyfriend. She was out shopping, and she hadn't said a word to him all evening.
Lin Chun'er secretly snapped a photo of Luan Nian and sent it to her. "Ms. Shang Zhitao, your boyfriend is looking gloomy."
Shang Zhitao, who was helping lumi try on clothes, laughed when she saw the message. "What's wrong with him?"
"Probably jealous, since everyone else here has a girlfriend or wife to talk to."
Lin Chun'er was sharp enough to read Luan Nian's expression and know exactly why he was unhappy. He'd wanted to bring his girlfriend to meet his friends, and she hadn't come. Men could be complicated sometimes, and other times very simple.
lumi came out of the fitting room, saw Shang Zhitao replying to the message, and asked, "What's going on?"
"Nothing."
Shang Zhitao told her about Luan Nian inviting her to dinner with his friends, without thinking much of it.
lumi went to pay and told her, "Shang Zhitao, you should go tonight."
"Why? I haven't seen you in ages."
lumi threw an arm over her shoulder. "Are you dumb? That stubborn mule wants to introduce you to his friends and you're not going?"
"Shang Zhitao, listen to me. Don't go wobbling around while you're in a relationship. You've never been that kind of person, so don't make things awkward for yourself. This one's on you, you should ditch me, dress up nice, and go meet his friends. Why wouldn't you? Are you not fit to be seen? If you don't go stake your claim, someone else will be happy to. Look at him, all high and mighty. He might be in his forties, but there's no shortage of people who'd want to sleep with him. You need to get in there, understand? Work your way into every corner of his life."
"Then what?"
"Then make sure he thinks about you every waking second."
"Like what?"
"Like getting on good terms with his friends, so they keep bringing you up later. Like leaving your things around his place, so he thinks of you whether he's eating or taking a shit. Like giving him underwear, so he thinks of you every time he takes his pants off..." lumi rattled off one line after another, and Shang Zhitao laughed so hard she nearly doubled over.
"Did you take a class on dating?" she asked lumi.
"Did that stubborn mule teach you to talk trash?" lumi shot back, then gave her a shove. "Go on, Shang Zhitao. Be sure of yourself, like you used to be."
lumi was sharp too. She could see the real problem between Shang Zhitao and Luan Nian, that Shang Zhitao wasn't as certain of herself as she used to be. Or maybe her certainty no longer showed on her face the way it had in her twenties, plain and unmistakable.
Shang Zhitao quietly asked Lin Chun'er, "Chun'er, where are you all?"
Lin Chun'er sent her a location pin.
She caught a cab there.
By the time she arrived it was nearly nine. She texted Luan Nian: "Hello, can I join your gathering now?"
"?"
"Can you come out and get me?"
Luan Nian felt the gloom that had hung over him for hours suddenly break into light, and he laughed without meaning to. The others stared at him. "?"
He got up and walked out of the restaurant, and there she was. "Weren't you shopping?"
"I was shopping. But I also wanted to have dinner with my boyfriend's friends."
"It's all cold leftovers by now."
"Doesn't matter."
"What does matter, then?"
"Being with you matters."
Shang Zhitao wasn't the type to pour out sweet talk all the time, but the few times she did, she meant every word. Luan Nian wasn't someone who fell for sweet talk from just anyone either, but hers worked on him.
"Let's go." He turned to head inside, and just before the door he suddenly took her hand.
Her heart skipped, and her face flushed red.
"Why are you blushing? Can't hold hands?" he asked, knowing full well why, and tightened his grip on her hand as he led her in.
Lin Chun'er, who loved stirring things up, led the whooping and hollering.
Everyone in the restaurant turned to look at them, and a fine sweat broke out on Shang Zhitao's palm. Over the years she'd managed a few feats of her own: traveling alone, hosting a press conference in three languages, running projects worth hundreds of millions. She'd met all kinds of people too, from provincial officials to street vendors. But she'd never been this nervous.
Her fingertips had even gone a little cold.
Luan Nian pulled her over to the table. The man who'd sat silent through half the meal suddenly lit up. "Let me formally introduce everyone. This is my girlfriend, Shang Zhitao."
"Hi, everyone." Her face was still red, and for a moment she felt like she was back in her early twenties, innocent and unworn by the world.
Lin Chun'er stood up and hugged her. "Hey there, internet friend."
"Hi, charity director." Shang Zhitao said it with real solemnity.
Xiao Mei hugged her too. "Hi, trilingual genius."
"Hi, archaeology expert."
Tan Mian shook her hand. "I feel like I've seen you somewhere before."
"That year you and Luan Nian sang 'I Hate Myself for Loving You' at our company anniversary. I was in the crowd keeping order. The female staff went a little wild."
Lin Chun'er pointed at their joined hands. "So can Luan Nian let go of her hand now?"
"No."
He refused, pulled out a chair for her, and sat down right beside her.
For a long stretch of time, Luan Nian hadn't liked gatherings where people brought their partners. Song Qiuhan and Lin Chun'er were always clinging to each other, him giving her a flower or telling her not to show her waist. Chen Kuannian was always teasing around with Xiao Mei. At times like that he often felt a hollow sense of loss, thinking of the girl who, every time he'd answered her call, had made him want to get away.
Love needed to seep in.
Like sunlight slipping through a gap in the curtains, slowly filling an entire room.
That was how it worked its way into each other's lives, sharing friends, worries, interests, walking through mountains and rivers together, and building a good life together in the small everyday things too.
Luan Nian hadn't understood that before, hadn't cared to. But time had taught him.
He thought he could do better now.
Starting today.