Dinner that evening was at Chu Yifeng’s place. The location was never fixed. If Wang Cheng got off work early and Chu Yifeng had not returned yet, he cooked in his own apartment. If they came back together, they ate at Chu Yifeng’s for convenience. Little by little, their relationship as meal companions settled into a routine.
By now, Wang Cheng came and went from Chu Yifeng’s apartment as if it were his own. He even had a key Chu Yifeng had given him.
At first, he rarely used that key. Once, he got off work early and all the ingredients were in Chu Yifeng’s refrigerator. Since Chu Yifeng would not be home until later, Wang Cheng used the key, only to run into Aunt Liu, the housekeeper, who had come back to pick something up. She nearly mistook him for a thief.
When Aunt Liu heard that Wang Cheng cooked for Chu Yifeng, she looked both shocked and disbelieving.
Wang Cheng could not understand what there was to disbelieve. Men cooking was perfectly normal these days.
Clearly, the two of them were not thinking about the same thing at all.
After that, Wang Cheng began using the key more often. That evening, as usual, he was cooking at Chu Yifeng’s when his phone rang. Seeing the caller ID, Wang Cheng quickly turned and made a shushing gesture at Chu Yifeng, who was pouring hot water.
“Eldest Brother, what gave you time to call me? Are you doing okay in the capital? Have you eaten?” The moment Wang Cheng answered, he fired off a string of questions, trying to seize the initiative.
Wang Ning’an seemed to laugh on the other end of the line.
Wang Ning’an had only called to ask how Wang Cheng was doing living alone in the apartment, but somehow he ended up being the one receiving all the concern.
Only near the end did Wang Cheng tell him that he had started learning to drive.
Wang Ning’an warned him to be careful while learning and not to chase shortcuts or speed, because that was how accidents happened. At last reclaiming some of his authority as the elder brother, he did not hang up until more than ten minutes later. By then, Chu Yifeng was no longer in the kitchen.
The next day, in an unusual burst of generosity, Chu Yifeng drove Wang Cheng to the driving school and dropped him at the entrance. Wang Cheng watched him leave before going inside. Wang Cheng had arrived early, but Yuan Xia was even earlier. The instructor had not shown up yet, and Yuan Xia was already practicing on the training ground.
They were learning to reverse now. If someone had a decent sense of direction, reversing was relatively easy to pick up. Because Wang Cheng had access to a car at home, he had more or less mastered this part after only a few days. His reversing was not especially elegant yet, but at least he no longer crossed the lines.
Yuan Xia was the same. While chatting, he had mentioned that a friend of his owned a car, and whenever he did not come to the school, he practiced with his friend’s vehicle. He was now working on parallel parking, something that was almost easy once you identified the right reference points.
“Morning!” Yuan Xia got out of the car to switch with Wang Cheng.
“Not as early as you.” Wang Cheng climbed in. They could only use the time before everyone else arrived to practice. Once the others came, they would be stuck going back to reversing drills.
The two practiced for more than an hour. Close to ten, Assistant Instructor Liu finally arrived with the other six students crammed into one vehicle. Aside from Wang Cheng and Yuan Xia, all of them had to be picked up personally by Assistant Instructor Liu from where they lived, and the fuel cost had already been included in their tuition.
Once the others arrived, Wang Cheng and Yuan Xia could no longer practice parallel parking. Neither wanted to waste time accompanying the rest while they continued practicing reversing, so they raised the issue with Assistant Instructor Liu. Liu then spoke to Instructor He, and the two of them were reassigned to another assistant instructor surnamed Yang.
The arrival of two extra students clearly displeased some people in the new group. Their expressions were cool and they barely acknowledged Wang Cheng or Yuan Xia. Even when it should have been their turn, no one called them, and someone else would simply climb into the car. Once, when Wang Cheng tried to get in, another student announced that it was his turn and sat down before Wang Cheng could even respond. Wang Cheng was speechless, while Yuan Xia could only shrug helplessly. By the end of the day, neither had spent much time behind the wheel at all.
If they had all been hot-blooded youngsters, Wang Cheng might have understood, but one or two of them were already in their thirties or forties and still behaved the same way. Apparently, basic manners had been fed to the dogs.
“Childish,” Wang Cheng muttered under his breath.
Only Yuan Xia heard him. He shook his head with a smile. “Put up with it. Maybe it’ll get better in a couple of days.” At nearly thirty, Yuan Xia really could not bring himself to run to the instructor and complain like a child.
“I’m afraid putting up with it will only encourage them.” Wang Cheng had a point. Plenty of people could feel dissatisfied, but very few would openly act on it. The reason the whole group had become so exclusionary was mainly one man and one woman.
The man was willful and did whatever he pleased. Everyone else lined up properly, but whenever he felt like it, he cut in. If someone refused to let him, he got angry. He was a complete rogue, and the others naturally grew annoyed and started competing with him.
The woman was quite pretty, but also spoiled. Like the man, whenever she wanted a turn, she coaxed the other men into giving way, and unfortunately they all fell for it. With both of them doing this, the order became even more chaotic.
Wang Cheng had a feeling that if things continued this way, neither he nor Yuan Xia would get near the car. He finally made it to four-thirty when Chu Yifeng called. Chu Yifeng had gotten off work early and asked whether Wang Cheng needed him to come pick him up. Figuring he probably would not get another turn anyway, Wang Cheng told him to come.
“A friend?” Yuan Xia asked after overhearing him. He knew Wang Cheng’s eldest brother was no longer in Shanhai City because Wang Cheng had mentioned it before.
“No, my boss,” Wang Cheng answered truthfully.
Yuan Xia froze.