Chapter 94: Visiting My Wife’s Family
Shoutout to nyanmaru for the commission!
<Previous Chapter<Table of Contents>Next Chapter>
Outside the window, it was drizzling.
The rain reflected against the ancient and quaint small building, with two figures visible through the carved windows.
Several exquisite dishes filled the redwood table.
Not far away, there was a young woman sitting behind a screen, playing the guzheng. This was an antique-style small restaurant, with reasonable prices for the dishes and flavors that perfectly matched the classic style of H City.
“Taste this, it’s the signature dish here,” Chu Feng said.
X looked at the table full of dishes and said, “Isn’t it a bit too much?”
“It’s okay,” Chu Feng said. “We can pack up what we can’t finish.”
When he came here with Xie Shiyu before, they would only order a few dishes that they both liked. But this time, to test X, Chu Feng deliberately ordered everything in the restaurant, including the good, the bad, the classic, and the non-classic.
Some of them were especially favored by Xie Shiyu, and some were dishes that Xie Shiyu would never eat again after just one bite.
Chu Feng was like a student back in college doing a science experiment, preparing to observe X’s eating order and frequency, making a mental record.
The beer duck was the restaurant’s signature dish, but Xie Shiyu didn’t eat duck cooked with garlic. The first time they came to this restaurant, Xie Shiyu frowned after taking a bite of this signature dish.
Instead, he liked the stir-fried beef with scallions that nobody recommended.
X’s chopsticks wandered among the various dishes…
“Taste this one,” Chu Feng deliberately pushed the beer duck towards X a bit. “It’s recommended by a lot of people.”
He had a favorable impression of this dish himself. Every time he came here with Xie Shiyu, he would order it, while Xie Shiyu would eat his stir-fried beef with scallions and frown at the garlic in the beer duck.
“Okay,” X, not knowing why, followed Chu Feng’s recommendation and picked up a piece of beer duck with his chopsticks.
Chu Feng stared closely at X’s facial expression, without blinking…
The next second, X’s brow furrowed slightly.
The movement was very subtle, just before his brow furrowed, X adjusted his expression and didn’t show any disgust towards this recommended dish in a very polite manner.
Chu Feng noticed every tiny detail, and he deliberately asked:
“Is it delicious?”
X pursed his lips and smiled faintly. He didn’t like the taste of garlic in this beer duck, but since Chu Feng said it was a signature dish, X politely replied:
“It’s alright.”
Chu Feng’s lips curled slightly. Although X said it was alright, he observed that X didn’t touch the plate of beer duck again.
Instead, he reached for the stir-fried beef with scallions that Xie Shiyu used to love the most.
The scent of rain after the rain wafted in from outside the window, blending with the fresh aroma of flowers and earth, accompanied by the sound of the guzheng in the ancient-style small building.
Chu Feng pretended to casually taste the dishes while silently tallying in his mind the number of times X picked up each dish with his chopsticks and the “return rate” of the dishes.
The beer duck, which Xie Shiyu disliked the most, had a return rate of 0; he wouldn’t touch it after just one taste.
The return rate of the stir-fried beef with scallions was close to 100%; after tasting it once, he would go back for more whenever there was an opening.
The mushroom and egg stir-fry was a dish Chu Feng liked because of the mushrooms, while Xie Shiyu didn’t like mushrooms but enjoyed the eggs. Every time they ordered this dish, they would divide it accordingly.
Chu Feng observed as X took a spoonful of the mushroom and egg stir-fry. At first, he tried to avoid the mushrooms as much as possible, but later, perhaps noticing that there were more mushrooms left on the plate, he reluctantly scooped up some mushrooms to eat.
The rose fish milk soup was a dish that Xie Shiyu thought was good; he would always have an extra bowl after finishing his main course.
X had already had two bowls and was about to start on the third…
Up to this point, Chu Feng had noticed that X’s preferences for almost every dish were exactly the same as Xie Shiyu’s.
Chu Feng looked at the person in front of him, feeling like his heart was sinking in a cold ocean, while warm currents from the Pacific rushed over, making his heart flutter.
Either the person who didn’t come back with him from the airport two years ago was now sitting in front of him.
Or, in this world of billions of people, there really was someone so similar, who would appear in his future life.
If X didn’t look about the same age as Xie Shiyu, Chu Feng would almost believe in reincarnation.
“You…”
Chu Feng casually picked up some food and asked in a seemingly nonchalant manner:
“How does it feel to be back in the country?”
X: “It’s okay.”
Chu Feng: “Is there… anything you remember?”
X shook his head lightly. “But, it feels very familiar.”
Chu Feng: “You’ve been staying near the Pacific all this time? In… a country called Grinéa?”
X: “New Caledonia.”
Chu Feng: “The environment there must be nice.”
X: “Everywhere is the sea, seagulls… a bit annoying.”
Chu Feng: “Do they steal people’s food?”
X nodded. Once, he was eating a burger by the sea, and a seagull landed on his shoulder, pecked at his burger meat, and flew away with it when X let go. He couldn’t chase after it because he was in a wheelchair.
Chu Feng chuckled. He hadn’t been to this small island country before. When he used to go to the beach with Xie Shiyu for vacation, they went to places like the Maldives, Fiji, and the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. He had never heard of New Caledonia, this obscure place.
He wasn’t really asking X about New Caledonia’s customs and culture out of genuine interest; Chu Feng mainly wanted to transition to the next topic.
“You’ve been there since the shipwreck?”
X nodded. He could tell that Chu Feng wanted to ask about the shipwreck, so he added a few more details:
“Stayed for about two years.”
Two years.
The timing was right.
Chu Feng’s heartbeat gradually sped up. He lowered his head, not looking directly at X, and gave a friendly smile as if he didn’t care:
“That’s quite a long time. The shipwreck… happened around this time, too? I heard that May is windy at sea.”
Chu Feng casually made up.
He had seen Conan when he was a child with Xie Shiyu, and instead of directly asking, “When did the shipwreck happen?” it was better to casually suggest a time like “It was in May,” and wait for the other person to correct you or wonder how you knew.
Because most people wouldn’t voluntarily open up to another person, they would subconsciously deny the other person’s mistakes. It was said to be a questioning technique used by Sherlock Holmes.
Xie Shiyu’s plane crashed on June 26th, their wedding anniversary, still more than a month away. The year of X’s accident matched, and he wanted to verify the specific month of X’s shipwreck. If it was before Xie Shiyu’s plane crash, then… it was impossible.
Chu Feng waited for X’s reaction.
“It wasn’t in May.”
X looked at Chu Feng, his gaze unwavering, and gave a precise answer:
“It was at the end of June.”
In that instant after he finished speaking, X saw Chu Feng suddenly tighten his chopsticks, and the small mushroom that should have been picked up fell back onto the white porcelain plate.
——The month also matched perfectly.
“What’s wrong?”
X looked at Chu Feng’s reaction, feeling that the truth was getting closer step by step. Boldly, X picked up the mushroom that Chu Feng dropped into the dish with his own chopsticks and placed it in Chu Feng’s bowl:
“Do you like this a lot?”
Chu Feng lowered his head and softly replied, “Mm-hmm,” as he stared at the small white mushroom in the bowl, covered in a layer of golden egg.
If it were a stranger from the internet whom he had only known for a few hours, Chu Feng would never eat from a pair of chopsticks that had just been in their mouth.
But this person was X.
“Thank you.”
Chu Feng smiled faintly and naturally picked up the mushroom from the bowl, eating it one by one.
Like a silent, indirect kiss.
***
“Do you have time after dinner?”
Chu Feng put down his chopsticks, wiped his mouth with a wet tissue, and said:
“If you’re free, would you like to come to my place and see some old photos?”
X had also finished eating. He was somewhat surprised that Chu Feng would take the initiative to mention the photos.
Things were progressing much faster than he had imagined; they could go to Chu Feng’s house directly. He had thought that Chu Feng would be very opposed to letting a stranger into the home he had lived in with his deceased husband.
Buzz buzz buzz—
X’s phone suddenly vibrated in his pocket. He took it out and glanced at it:
There was a message from the headquarters of the gaming company in the work group chat, announcing that there would be a meeting at 14:00 in the hotel conference room to discuss the agenda for the fifth anniversary conference and the recent hacker attack response strategy.
Chu Feng: “Is… something up? It’s okay, if you’re busy, we can look at the photos whenever.”
X: “No. It’s just junk mail.”
X silently put his phone on silent mode—do not disturb, pretending not to have seen any notifications from the company.
With his abilities, the company couldn’t afford to dismiss him. Without him, there was no one who could replace his position. Whether he wanted to attend any meetings was entirely up to him. The headquarters was also very concerned that other competing companies might poach X.
The opportunity to go to Chu Feng’s house was rare; if he missed it, there might not be another chance. Compared to the company, the happiness of the latter half of life was certainly more important.
“Let’s go. Is your home far from here?” X sat in the wheelchair, waiting for Chu Feng to push him.
Chu Feng: “Not too far. About a fifteen-minute drive.”
***
They got back into the Lamborghini.
Chu Feng poured himself a mint-flavored Mentos candy and turned to pour X a lemon-flavored one that he liked. Then he started the engine. The car carried the two of them back home.
After dinner, it was nap time. Chu Feng used to be forced by Xie Shiyu to take a nap, living a very regular and healthy life. Two years after Xie Shiyu left, Chu Feng abandoned this habit.
He looked through the rearview mirror and saw X squinting slightly, seemingly taking a break.
This person must have had a very hard time these past two years.
If he really was Xie Shiyu…
Chu Feng just entertained this naive and fantastical hypothesis, and his heart began to ache.
Five minutes away from home, waiting at a traffic light intersection. Chu Feng observed that X had been resting with his eyes closed the whole time, showing no signs of waking up.
He quickly took out his phone and secretly sent a message to the restaurant staff he had already contacted:
“[Collect all the utensils used at table No. 5.]”
Confirming who a person really was, DNA was the simplest method.
Some traces could be extracted from the utensils X had used.
Now the problem was… he needed to go home and rummage through everything to see if there was anything that might have residual DNA from Xie Shiyu.
***
“We’re home.”
Chu Feng pushed X’s wheelchair, took the elevator back home, and ascended floor by floor.
X quietly observed everything here, every plant and every piece of furniture, even including the elevator buttons, made him feel… familiar.
Like he had seen it somewhere before.
Opening the door.
“You sit here for a while.”
Chu Feng pushed the wheelchair into the living room and brewed a pot of tea for X, one cup was Tieguanyin that Xie Shiyu loved, and the other cup was a slightly bitter Pu’er tea that he didn’t like.
“Try this tea. Someone gave me two kinds last time. You can have whichever you like. I’ll go get the photos for you.”
X nodded, taking a sip from each cup.
Chu Feng went to the storage cabinet to get something, keeping an eye on X. He saw that this guy didn’t hesitate to pour himself more tea into the cup of Tieguanyin.
——Two years ago, he couldn’t wait for the person he wanted to see the most.
Two years later, perhaps, he had finally waited.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. Chu Feng glanced at the message:
“[Chief Chu, the utensils have been handed over to the DNA identification center as instructed.]”
Want to show your support? Come donate at Paypal or Ko-fi to show your appreciation! :)
<Previous Chapter<Table of Contents>Next Chapter>
