Li Chuan's Past Chapter 4

Chapter 4

I thought that I would be able to see Li Chuan the next day, yet he did not show up. I didn’t have any expectations of him, let alone any presumptuous beliefs. From what I could tell, his kindness was the result of a certain type of upbringing. He really wasn’t just like that towards . Ever since the first ti I laid eyes on him, my main impression of him was that he was refined and courteous. However, the next ti I see him, I must treat him to a coffee in order to show my gratitude.

Gradually, a month passed by. No one on the night shift ever saw Li Chuan again. There were rumors that he had visited the café multiple during the morning shift. I’m never on the morning shift, so I couldn’t confirm any of this. Xiao Ye, on the other hand, constantly took morning shifts. But luck wasn’t with her and she never ran into him again. Even for the oldest custors, if they don’t frequently visit, they are forgotten. Besides, this street was commonly referred to as the financial street. Handso n and pretty girls were not rare at all. The wealthy were everywhere. Gradually, Xiao Tong’s conversations changed to the Porche sports car of a middle aged, bald gentleman. The parking lot by the door got more and more crowded each day, to the extent that the boss finally removed one of the two handicap parking spots. He was going to remove all of them, but Xiao Ye stood her ground saying that the handicap spot had to exist, it reflected the broad-mindedness and inner quality of the Starbucks managent. It was also a distinguishing feature of this café. Evidently, Xiao Ye did not understand the boss’ business nature. It was still Xiao Tong who ca up with the idea to save her. Xiao Tong suggested that the handicap spot could also be an elderly parking spot. Since there were still many elderly custors in the area who drove cars. Once spot could be used by the elderly and the handicap to park, thus settling the dispute.

Xiao Ye knew that if there wasn’t a handicap spot, that young man called Li Chuan would definitely never co to this café again. He always drove when he ca, which ant his work was far from here. His leg was an inconvenience, so he wouldn’t use so much effort to walk over for a cup of coffee. Plus, there were Starbucks everywhere in Beijing.

That night, Xiao Ye treated Xiao Tong to dinner. The next day, Xiao Tong told that Xiao Ye drank too much. She was drinking and crying at the sa ti.

Xiao Tong gave a summary of the night while sighing. He said that Xiao Ye could not extricate herself from the emotions she had sunk into. She had secretly been in love with him for half a year. It was foolish and crazy. In the end, she didn’t even know what his na was.

I originally wanted to tell Xiao Ye that Li Chuan had dropped off that other night. Or perhaps tell her his na was Wang Li Chuan. But I thought about it and didn’t open my mouth. I really sympathized with Xiao Ye, but Xiao Ye wasn’t my friend. Xiao Ye very rarely took the initiative to speak to . Once, she was in a bad mood and I made a mistake collecting money. I was ruthlessly reproached by her, making feel extrely distressed. In fact everyone here knows that she frequently makes mistakes when collecting money and are scared of having her even touch the cash register. There was no need to not forgive for just making a mistake once. The next day, she knew she had gone overboard and treated to coffee. In short, she was a very emotional person. Unlike . Since Mother passed away early, I was very rational and tomboy-like as a child. I wasn’t easily moved.

During this one month, I had to take the first three exams since the start of school. Despite putting in great effort to morize vocabulary, I was still spending not enough ti on studies in relation to the rest of the girls in my dorm room. My average was only sixty-five. My listening skills were only tolerable and I was unexpectedly failing intensive reading. Sixty-five was a grade that I had never co across during my whole career as a student. I felt ashad and humiliated. At one point I was extrely downcast, so much so that I didn’t even want to see the classmates in my dorm room because their scores were all higher than mine and didn’t really care about their grades. Only people like who tested in from a “regional high school” worried about every score.

None of them had to study every single day. Instead, they were always going to parties, watching movies, and wandering the malls. Feng Jing Er was the most relaxed. She spent all her ti dating and frequently skipped class. Yet, she had the highest marks in her whole departnt. She said that if she could continue being the best, by the end of the year, she would get four different scholarships. The largest scholarship was the “Hong Yu Fund.” That fund is given to the top ten students of the whole school. Since the competition was fierce, all the scholarships used grades as the baseline.

I needed money so badly, but I had no chance in competing for the scholarship.

I wasn’t a good student, but I was a good daughter. I could finally send money ho and help pay for my younger brother’s tuition. With the remaining money, outside the cost of living, I bought a walkman and a tube of lipstick. The Starbucks boss required female employees to put on makeup, so I had been using Lin Qing’s lipstick. When I was going to give it back to her, she said she’ll give it to as a present. Embarrassed, she also said that it was actually expired. “All makeup have expiration dates. You must finish using it before it expires.” She also advised not to buy poor quality makeup. At the very least, I should use Olay. I bought a brand that she scoffed at. It was ten yuan and I had already thought it was really expensive. However, she said that the color was fairly alright, it matched with my skin. It looked like my sense of aesthetics wasn’t bad. I said I had learned watercoloring from Father. She looked disbelievingly at and laughed. I had to tell her that my father was from Shanghai, was sent to the small town to teach, and then never returned to the city.

“Does that an you still have relatives in Shanghai?”

“My paternal grandfather is still in Shanghai.”

“Are you close to your grandfather?”

“In order to marry my mom, my dad had a huge falling out with him. He never went back again, nor kept in touch.”

“What did your grandfather do?”

“I don’t know.”

The night after I finished taking the third exam, I took a day off and didn’t go to the café. All of a sudden, a huge group of guys ca to the dorm room. I only recognized one of them, Lu Jie. It turns out Lu Jie’s dorm room and our dorm room were “friend dorms.” I had missed a lot of the activities of the friend dorms. From Ning An An’s introductions, it seed like the main interactions between the friend dorms were for the guys to take the girls out to the movies or for the girls to teach the guys how to dance. The secondary goal was also to provide a chance to develop “friendships.” After socializing several tis, only one Math Departnt male student — called “Xiao Gao” — obtained Wei Hai Xia’s affections. Most guys pursued Xiao Rui, and not all of them were within the friend dorms. As a result, Xiao Rui had it easy for many things. For example, I had to carry water at least twice a day from the hot water room by the dining hall to use for washing up during in the morning and at night. Xiao Rui never had to carry hot water. Soone always carried it to the dorm room for her. Moreover, she always had chocolate in her bag. They were all gifts.

That night, I went to the school dance hall on East Campus for the first ti. The dance floor was about as big as the auditorium. There was a disco ball hanging above, and a band in front with a singer who would sotis sing romance songs and other tis rock to rock n’ roll. With the music on, one by one, everyone joined in, holding hands, and dancing like monkeys. The guy who asked to dance was called Xiu Yue, a Philosophy Departnt third year. He said that in his departnt, you had to beco a Ph.D. in order to find a job, so his goal was to get a Ph.D. If I tried dancing as a sport, I felt that I had a natural gift for it. I like to swim and like to play volleyball. I also took classes in Taichi before. So after a night, I was able to learn the basic dance moves. Xiu Yue asked whether I wanted to review lessons at night with him because he had heard constantly complain about my exam grades.

“Playing is playing. Studying is studying. You can’t mix these two things together. Otherwise, you can’t play well and you can’t study well.” He earnestly suggested.

Xiu Yue was qualified to say this because he was the head of studying in his departnt. There were already professors who had their eyes on him. To get into graduate school was sothing that would happen sooner or latter.

“Oh.”

“I heard that you often work part-ti outside? As long as you have enough to use, it should be good. Don’t sacrifice your studies for working.” He said.

“Oh.”

“Even though I’m not in the Foreign Languages Departnt, I have passed the eighth level in foreign languages. It’s up to par with a foreign languages major. Although, my speaking isn’t too good, especially when it cos to retroflex constants.”

“Really?” I said.

“Yes. Every morning, I put a pebble underneath my tongue to practice rolling it.” He said with a look of unswerving determination, “That’s right, will you go to the English speaking practice group on Friday night?”

“No. Where is it?”

“West Campus gardens.” He was amazed at how soone who studied foreign language didn’t go to the English speaking practice group.

“Are you free this Friday night? We can go together. After practicing English we can go watch a movie with Lu Jie and the others. We can watch through the entire night.”

“Mmm…next week is mid-term exams. I have to prepare really well. Next ti.”

“Don’t always be thinking about studying. You need a balance. Especially when it’s exam ti.”

“I have to work.”

“Then next ti.” He smiled faintly and didn’t insist any more.

After the dance, everyone headed to the video hall on the street to watch a movie while eating sunflower seeds and drinking soda. The friend dorm activity was finally over after hanging out until one in the morning.

The entire ti, my mind was loaded with worry about my grades.

After that, I got up at five every morning to morize vocabulary. Besides working and going to class, the rest of the ti I spent studying.

Under the street lamps of autumn, I watched as the weather turn cold. Employees of the café had a ten minute “coffee break” every four hours. The day before my exam, I got a cup of coffee and sat in a corner, next to the window. I watched as the whistling autumn wind swept the streets. The street lights shined upon a few pedestrians leisurely stolling down the street. As I slowly drank my coffee, soone, all of a sudden, walked towards .

I saw Li Chuan once again.

This ti, he had on a western style outfit. A brown jacket, a black turtleneck sweater, and a pair of fading jeans. His clear-cut face was very white. For the sake of my heart and my breathing, I didn’t dare look at his face more than once. It seed as if he had just taken a shower, a faint steam was emitting from his entire body. With his wet and stiff hair, he could shoot an ad for n’s hair gel. I suddenly rember a vocabulary word I morized today: “dashing.” I don’t know why everyone here calls him the “young man in the suit.” People in suits could be found everywhere. A more suitable term would have been “fashionable male.” It should be male instead, because there were plenty of fashionable young man on the streets, but he had an additional scholarly. (I have been translating “西装青年” as “young man in the suit” so that it sounds a bit better. But the direct translation would have been “suited youth”. Hopefully, that makes more sense in the explanation of why “时尚男生” or “fashionable male/man” would be a better term to call Li Chuan. Man vs. youth. *starry-eyes* :))

“Hi.” He said, “How are you?”

“I am fine.”

“Do you mind sitting here?” He pointed to the seat next to .

“No, no. Please sit, I’ll bring the coffee to you. What would you like for today?” I didn’t wait for him to answer before quickly adding, “It’s my treat this ti. Thank you for dropping off that night.” I promptly switched to using Chinese because, even though my speech in regards to coffee was pretty good, I would probably make a fool of myself with anything else.

“Oh, don’t ntion it. You sit, I go get the coffee myself. What do you want?” He asked as he placed his computer bag on the chair.

“I don’t need anything. I’m on my coffee break and need to get back to work soon.”

He walked over to purchase coffee and I saw that he paid and ca back.

“Where’s your coffee?” I asked.

“Your co-worker insisted on bringing it over for .” Although he didn’t show anything on his face, his tone held a bit of embarrassnt. Xiao Ye was probably overly attentive, making him unhappy.

I turned around and, sure enough, saw Xiao Ye’s face completely red. This was probably the first ti she had seen Li Chuan in these few months.

Xiao Ye brought the coffee over to us and gave a aningful glance. Understanding, I said, “Look, my break ti is over. This is Xiao Ye, Ye Jing Wen. A high achieving student in the Chinese Departnt of M University. She can recite “” and her foreign language is especially good. She got a 2200 on her GRE.”

He smiled gently, “This café is concealing talent. Miss Ye, so sorry for inconveniencing you to bring my coffee to each ti.”

I relaxed, it was clear that he wasn’t an aloof person. He knew of Xiao Ye.

I stood up and promptly went to the cash register to take over Xiao Ye’s work. I saw Xiao Ye sit down and chat with him. She even laughed several tis. Her angelic smile was matchless. I felt gratitude for her.

She sat for half an hour and ca back to the counter with a rosy face.

Xiao Tong ca over to make fun of her, “Now you should finally know what his na is. Tell us. What big shot’s son is he? He’s so wealthy despite being so young.”

Xiao Ye said, “I don’t know. I didn’t ask.”

“You didn’t even ask for his surna?”

“I asked, he said it was Wang. That was it.”

“What does he do?”

“I don’t know. We’re just strangers, why would I ask in such detail?”

Xiao Tong wanted to continue asking for more, but Xiao Ye suddenly turned towards and asked, “Xiao Qiu, do you know him?”

“No.”

“Don’t lie. He took the initiative to seek you out. It’s obvious he knows you.”

“…Of course he knows . I once spilled coffee over him.”

“Do you know what his na is?”

“Don’t…don’t know.” Since he didn’t wish to say it himself, then why should I say it for him.

Xiao Ye looked at with suspicion, clearly not believing . She then turned her back to and thought for a bit before suddenly turning back again and coldly asking, “It can’t be that you have your eyes on him, right?”

“What do you an?” I didn’t bat an eye.

“I always thought that countryside girls were really sincere. It looks like it isn’t that way. You sure have skills to seduce n.”

Her voice was very low, very sweet, but said through gnashing teeth next to my ears. She then suddenly laughed. I raised my head and saw Li Chuan walk over to the counter in front of .

“Hi.” Xiao Ye said.

“Hi.”

He looked at us in confusion. Both Xiao Ye and I were standing behind the cash register and he didn’t know who he should be speaking to.

“Mr. Wang, do you want coffee?” Xiao Ye sweetly asked.

“Yes, without sugar, ok?” he said.

I suddenly said, “Mr. Wang, are you free tonight?”

He looked at . After awhile, he nodded.

“Can I ask you to go to the movies?” I went on.

He stared blankly for a bit, “Watch a movie? When?”

“Twelve o’clock.”

“Ok.” Surprisingly, he answered rapidly.