Winter Time Rendering

Zhang Shutong walked into the private room right on time to wake Gu Qiuyan.

She still looked a little groggy and didn’t want to get up from the lounge chair. Zhang Shutong waited patiently beside her.

After a short while, Gu Qiuyan was finally back to full strength. She stretched lazily, and the first thing she did was, of all things, check her phone to see if her makeup was smudged.

"It’s not smudged," Zhang Shutong pointed out.

"What do you mean it’s not? Look, isn’t the corner of my mouth a little red?"

She dabbed at it gently with a tissue, preening.

Zhang Shutong couldn’t bring himself to say whether her makeup was actually smudged or if it was just a mark from how she’d been sleeping, so he went outside to wait.

There weren’t many customers in the shop at this hour. Even the other employees had gone out to eat, leaving just the young employee from before to watch the store.

When Gu Qiuyan came out, the employee handed them two bottles of water at just the right moment. They were, surprisingly, taken from an insulated container.

"This handsome guy here bought them for you earlier," the employee said with a mischievous grin.

Zhang Shutong was stunned. He hadn’t bought any water. Since Gu Qiuyan had fallen asleep, the only thing he’d done was sit idly in the shop for over an hour. He had no idea what stunt the employee was pulling, but he saw that the young miss had already accepted the bottles. She seemed to be in a great mood and hummed:

"I didn’t know you were so thoughtful."

Zhang Shutong didn’t know what to say. The employee gave him a conspiratorial look, leaned in, and whispered, "You guys ordered the most expensive package. This is a complimentary service. It’d be a waste not to take the water."

She then pointed to the price list on the wall.

"See? It says ’includes beverages,’ doesn’t it?"

Zhang Shutong bit the inside of his cheek. ’First of all, mineral water doesn’t count as a ’beverage.’ Second, can you please not pin this on me? And third, Gu Qiuyan is gullible enough not to notice. If she just glanced at the price list, she’d see right through this lie.’

Too bad that when the young miss was out and about, she tended to only care about the price, not the details on the list.

When they pushed open the glass door, the sky had already darkened. Night falls early in the winter. The streetlights had come on, bathing the evening in a warm, yellow glow. Neither of them had decided where to go next, so they lingered at the entrance for a moment. A cold wind blew, and they both instinctively hunched their shoulders.

Zhang Shutong noticed once again that Gu Qiuyan wasn’t wearing her scarf today. It had been a gift from her mother, and while he didn’t know the exact sentiment she’d poured into it, he knew that in a way, it was like a protective talisman to her.

"It’s so cold..." Gu Qiuyan clutched the water bottle and told him they should just start walking and figure it out from there.

So Zhang Shutong glanced back at the nail salon one last time. The employee was sitting at the front desk and gave him an encouraging ’fighting!’ gesture.

Zhang Shutong nodded to show he’d gotten the message. The employee smiled, and he smiled back, thinking, ’You’ve got the wrong idea. We’re not talking about the same kind of ’fight’ at all.’

He asked Gu Qiuyan what she wanted to eat. She said, "Whatever."

He pointed out that she hated "whatever" more than anyone, but she just told him to pick a place and treat her.

"I’m treating?"

"Who else?" she said, taking a sip of water. "I already bought so many things this afternoon."

Zhang Shutong racked his brain for any nice restaurants on the island, but came up disappointingly empty.

"I can’t think of any nice places either."

"Who said anything about a fancy meal? Just take me somewhere you normally eat that you think is good."

"How about a rice bowl?" Their current location was very close to the school.

Gu Qiuyan nodded and said, "Sure. I’m going to make you spend a fortune on me."

But the most expensive item at that shop was the potato and beef rice bowl, which cost a whopping 15 yuan per serving—hardly what one would call "spending a fortune."

Still, he couldn’t think of anywhere better to eat, so the two of them set off for the rice bowl shop under the dim streetlights. They marched with such a grand air, you’d think they were headed for a three-star Michelin restaurant.

Along the way, Zhang Shutong pulled out his phone to check it again. The poor little guy had almost reached the end of its life—

Only three percent of its battery was left.