Chapter 305: Talkative Yuan Zhou
Translator: Xiong Guoqi Editor: DesTheSloth
There were merely twenty minutes from the moment he finished calling until he got ready to go out.
“How long will my girlfriend need if she goes out in future?” Yuan Zhou was fairly curious.
He thought that while walking. He was dressed casually this time. Dressed in the clean beige casual pants and a white T-shirt, he stood at the crossing and waited for Jiang Changxi.
In a little while, a green taxi stopped in front of Yuan Zhou after a sound of “Zi”.
“Whoops! You look so handsome in the suit today. Are you going home for a blind date?” Seated in the back seat, Jiang Changxi directly opened the car door at the back row and teased Yuan Zhou when she saw him.
“No. I’m dressed like that every day.” Yuan Zhou said with a serious expression.
“Haw-haw. Boss Yuan is also a man of narcissism.” Jiang Changxi sat backward deeper into the seat to let Yuan Zhou in.
“No. I’m just telling the truth.” Yuan Zhou straightened his back upright when he got in the car.
“Ok. Take it easy. It’s only a joke.” Jiang Changxi looked Yuan Zhou with an amused manner.
“Humm, thank you. How much is the fare?” While the car was pulling away slowly, Yuan Zhou looked at the taximeter that was turned off and suddenly asked.
“300 RMB for a round trip. Waiting time will be charged separately.” Jiang Changxi answered cleanly.
“I will have to trouble you to wait for me, Master. I’m going back in the evening,” Yuan Zhou considered the places he needed to go for a while and then said that.
“No problem. Don’t worry. You are the friend of Jiang Changxi and I will definitely give you a good price.” While Master Bai was waiting for the green light, he turned the head and said to Yuan Zhou smilingly.
“Sorry to be a bother,” Yuan Zhou answered courteously.
“Not at all, young man.” With a smiling face, Master Bai should probably have thought of or misunderstood something.
“Ok.” Yuan Zhou then answered with a nod.
When the red light changed green, the car continued moving forward. However, it was quite quiet in the car.
There was slight tiredness on the face of Jiang Changxi. Looking closely, one could even see inconspicuous dark eye circles on her face. After she teased Yuan Zhou as a routine activity, she leaned back in the seat and closed her eyes for a rest.
Nevertheless, Yuan Zhou just sat in the back seat and stared somewhere blankly.
Actually, Chengdu wasn’t far from Meishan. It took only a little more than 1 hour to get there by bus and 40 minutes by car.
However, Yuan Zhou hadn’t been there for six years. After he graduated from the senior school there, he hadn’t been back anymore.
Meishan was the hometown of Yuan Zhou. At that time, however, Yuan Zhou was reluctant to go back even for the Chinese New Year. He had no house there and besides, his parents didn’t have other relatives there.
Even his parents went back to the hometown only on Tomb-Sweeping Day to burn joss sticks to their ancestors. Basically, Yuan Zhou was either studying in the school or believing it was all right to go back next time.
After his parents died, Yuan Zhou was more reluctant to go back as he would feel very depressed at that prospect.
However, there was actually not only sadness, but also more happiness over there.
Whether it was the cozy memory with his family members or with his friends and classmates, good memories were always more than the bad memories.
Therefore, Yuan Zhou decided to go back to his hometown in a hurry.
Yet, speaking of returning to the hometown, there wasn’t any matter of hurry.
“Young man, we are in Meishan now. Where do you guys want to go?” Master Bai’s words interrupted Yuan Zhou’s deep thought.
“So quickly. Where are you getting off, Boss Yuan?” Jiang Changxi sat straight and asked curiously.
“Drop me at Jinyi Road. How about you?” Yuan Zhou directly told them the main avenue of Meishan and then turned around to look at Jiang Changxi.
“I will go there with you first,” Jiang Changxi checked the time and then said that.
“Alright. We’ll be there right away.” After Master Bai said that, the car was pulled away steadily to the main avenue.
Although the avenues of Meishan weren’t asphalt roads, they were nevertheless flat cement floors. The stores at both sides of the avenues appeared to have been through many years.
“Doesn’t look bad.” It was the first time that Jiang Changxi came to Meishan. As soon as she got off the car, she said conveniently.
“Not bad, huh? Facilities in this place are quite complete.” Yuan Zhou answered and continued.
“Really?” Jiang Changxi nodded the head.
The simple answer of Jiang Changxi enabled Yuan Zhou to start a conversation.
The place might be much too familiar to Yuan Zhou. He didn’t even find any change in the stores. Suddenly, Yuan Zhou became interested in talking and thus directly started to introduce the place.
“Speaking of which, I often came here when I was in the senior school. This photo studio offered terrible service, but it’s surprisingly still open now.” When Yuan Zhou said that, he smiled once in a blue moon.
“Since you have said its service is poor, it definitely is.” Jiang Changxi echoed.
“Of course. But the photographer of this studio is very interesting.” Yuan Zhou said that justly when he recalled the photographer’s glib tongue when he came to take photos at that time.
“See this store? This was a cybercafe. It looks that it has obtained its license now.” Yuan Zhou said in a low voice while pointing at a small store with its shop sigh of Heng Long Cybercafe.
“Formerly, there was a stall over here. The boss was an easy-going granny. She liked drinking liquor, but she cooked very delicious hot and sour rice noodles. At that time, I came for a bowl of that every day after the classes were over.”
“So much has changed. They have made several empty rooms into a small market. Speaking of which, the secret base of us boys was right here.”
“Haw-haw. The tree is still here. Look, its characteristic of being hit by thunders is still so impressive.”
“It’s the renting bookstore. With a deposit of 10 RMB, it charged 1 RMB per day. I once had a book confiscated by my teacher and the pledge of 10 RMB was then lost. I felt sorrowful for quite a while at that time.”
Then, Yuan Zhou introduced all the stores along the main avenue without ceasing.
It was the first time that Jiang Changxi saw Yuan Zhou behaving like that. He was simply too talkative. Unexpectedly, he appeared to be more humane now.
After they walked through the side streets, there appeared several white shabby buildings that were barely visible in front of them.
“Right in front of us is my school. Do you want to go there to look around?” Yuan Zhou stood at the end of the street and then said.
“Ok.” Without any hesitation, Jiang Changxi nodded the head.
“I once studied here, but now it’s surprisingly closed down now.” Yuan Zhou’s tone carried some reminiscence and unknown sentimental feeling.
“The quality of the buildings is very good.” Jiang Changxi suddenly heaved an unrelated sigh.
“Umm?” Yuan Zhou became dumbfounded instantly.
“It’s definitely in the 1980s when you studied here, right?” Jiang Changxi looked carefully at Yuan Zhou and then said.
“…” Yuan Zhou suddenly felt all the sentimental feelings vanishing.
Then he brought her and walked toward the school without speaking anything.
Jiang Changxi followed him behind quietly.
“They seem to have rotted out. There were formerly several wooden buildings here, gazebos actually.” Yuan Zhou pointed at some rotten wood and said.
“Humm,” Jiang Changxi nodded her head dumbly.
“This was the teaching building, but our school didn’t have a library.” Pointing at the main teaching building, Yuan Zhou introduced almost every place inside like a full-time tour guide.
“Wonderful.” Jiang Changxi was likewise a careful listener.
It was getting dark slowly. The two of them wandered about in the school for several hours.
During the period, Jiang Changxi listened to him constantly while Yuan Zhou talked excitedly. They appeared to be quite harmonious.
“Speaking of which, we were all students that lived here. The male dormitories were really not bad. Six people lived in one dormitory.” Yuan Zhou pointed at the building behind the main teaching building and told her.
“Coo.” Just when Jiang Changxi wanted to say something, her stomach suddenly sounded out of turn.
They fell silent for an instant.
The sound broke the excited mood of Yuan Zhou. Not until then did he react that he had surprisingly chattered without stop for several hours like that.
He looked at Jiang Changxi and found she still looked as usual without an expression of boredom. With that, Yuan Zhou felt rather embarrassed as it was anyway quite annoying to hear others babbling.
Not to mention he had gabbled on for several hours.
“Sorry. Let me treat you to dinner.” With a frown, Yuan Zhou said seriously and solemnly.
He wasn’t satisfied with his deeds and hence wanted to compensate Jiang Changxi.
“Haw-haw. Never mind. Aren’t you going to take me to your dormitory to have a look?” Jiang Changxi asked while pointing at an abandoned building at the side.
“No need. Nobody is in now, anyway.” Yuan Zhou took a look at the small shabby building and said with a frustrated tone.
“You have many classmates, right? You are supposedly the one who’s living the best among your fellow students. Don’t you want to hold a gathering and show off your well-being now?” Jiang Changxi suggested smilingly.
“It’s really a candid suggestion.” Yuan Zhou indicated that he didn’t even know how to respond.
“Of course. A person of great conscience and a piece of suggestion of great conscience.” Jiang Changxi answered mischievously.
“The atmosphere was totally ruined by you.” Yuan Zhou was rather speechless.
After quite a while, Yuan Zhou said lightly, “Thank you for your comfort.”
“You are welcome. This understanding elder sister is nice, isn’t it?” Jiang Changxi smiled and revealed two inconspicuous dimples.
“Absolutely.” Yuan Zhou nodded the head.
…
