Chapter 15

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Duan Qingshen smoked a cigarette outside the hotel.

He had come out to wait for the food delivery.

It arrived soon enough. Two of the orders were brought by the same courier. There was still a third order on its way; according to the delivery app, he would have to wait a little longer.

With two bags in his hands, he was beginning to wonder what exactly he was doing. Was his attempt at avoidance a little too obvious? He really had wanted to leave Liang Yuanxing some space to get undressed, but perhaps his motives were not quite so innocent. That explanation seemed to fool no one but himself.

After finishing his cigarette, Duan Qingshen stood where he was and stared into space for a while. He was doing nothing but staring blankly. His mind would not turn, and he had no idea how to make it turn.

There were many charcoal-grilled meat restaurants near the hotel, along with places serving northwestern cuisine and Mongolian food. Duan Qingshen regretted not checking their closing times in advance. It was nearly eleven at night, yet a few of the charcoal-grilled lamb restaurants were still lit up.

He regretted it because they had already eaten at the service area. Otherwise, he should have brought Liang Yuanxing here for dinner.

This was grassland lamb from Inner Mongolia. It ought to have made quite an impression on a boy from the south.

It had certainly made a strong impression on him the first time he tasted lamb from this region.

That was why the first thing he asked after entering the room was, “Xingxing, can you still eat?”

Liang Yuanxing had already showered and half-dried his hair. Sitting cross-legged at the corner of the bed, he was looking at his phone. He raised his head when he saw Duan Qingshen carrying the delivery bags.

“A little.”

“I’m not talking about fruit. The grilled-lamb places outside are still open.”

Liang Yuanxing looked puzzled. “Weren’t you the one who told me recently not to eat until I was stuffed? Why are you asking me to eat grilled lamb in the middle of the night?”

…Yes. But Duan Qingshen himself did not know why. It was strange. His thoughts were a mess, contradicting one another as he wrestled with himself.

“Did driving all day scramble your brain?” Liang Yuanxing asked. “Has it turned to mush?”

“Probably.” Duan Qingshen set down the bags, took out a bottle of snow pear juice, and handed it to him. “Drink some. You need to rehydrate.”

The juice was clear and sweet, the sort of drink that made one consume it greedily without realizing it—especially with a dry mouth. Liang Yuanxing tipped back his head and drank nearly half the bottle.

“Did you see the stars while you were smoking? There are so many outside.”

Duan Qingshen pressed his lips together and shook his head. “I didn’t notice.”

He had not looked up at all.

“Look at the ones I took.” Liang Yuanxing set down the juice and handed him the camera. “You were out there so long that I just looked up some settings for photographing the night sky.”

Duan Qingshen had been half leaning against the water counter by the entrance. He straightened and walked over, taking the camera from Liang Yuanxing.

“I’ll show you on the laptop.” Liang Yuanxing got off the bed and went to the desk, flipping open the computer as he muttered, “Why were you downstairs for so long? I thought someone had abducted you.”

Duan Qingshen removed the memory card and handed it to him. “No one can be abducted twice.”

“I didn’t abduct you.” Liang Yuanxing plugged the card reader into the laptop. “At most, I took advantage of some psychological longing of yours and embellished the distant places in your memories.”

“…”

Duan Qingshen looked at him.

“…”

Liang Yuanxing did not dare meet his eyes. What did he mean, abduct? How audacious. It had been guidance.

There was one thing Liang Yuanxing had never told him. A person absolutely could not lose their convictions; otherwise, the world would gradually corrupt and consume them. And the first time he had truly looked at Duan Qingshen—at dusk on the evening before Zeng Xiaoyang’s wedding—he had said, “No one here understands you. Come away with me.”

Because he had seen convictions slowly rotting away. He had also seen the same thing happening within himself.

He shifted the laptop a little, and Duan Qingshen bent down to look. The city’s night sky was affected by the light on the ground. Camera settings could rescue it to some extent, but settings were rather like customizing a video-game character’s face: more or less the same data could produce a fairly attractive face, yet people would usually make further adjustments to better suit their own tastes.

“Where was the camera positioned?” Duan Qingshen asked.

Liang Yuanxing pointed toward the balcony.

The hotel room’s balcony was partially enclosed. Duan Qingshen opened the door and stepped outside, but saw no tripod.

“You shot it handheld?”

“Yeah. I just leaned against the railing.”

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“There’s too much light.”

“Mm. I don’t know how to adjust for that.”

“Wait until it gets later. Once there are fewer lights on the ground, take another shot.” Duan Qingshen came back inside and glanced at the lens he was holding. “A wide-angle lens with a large aperture, thirty-five millimeters. Pretty clever, Xingxing.”

Xingxing smiled and scratched the back of his head. “Nothing special.”

“What about the shutter speed?”

“Ten seconds,” Liang Yuanxing said. “But it doesn’t feel quite right.”

“You used four hundred divided by the focal length. Most people use that for compositing video. For a single shot, three hundred is about right.” Duan Qingshen held the camera out to him again. “Put the card back in. I’m going to set up the tripod.”

Liang Yuanxing reached for the camera without bothering to stand. His arm stretched straight out, but he still fell just short. Helpless, Duan Qingshen could only take two steps over from the balcony door.

“Stay lazy, then.”

Liang Yuanxing had only taken the photographs for fun, so he had not brought out the tripod. He had simply leaned against the balcony railing. He had not expected Duan Qingshen to take it so seriously.

The cool night wind flowed in from the balcony. Liang Yuanxing sniffed at the scent carried on it, then immediately realized that he was acting like a puppy again, sniffing wherever he went.

Fortunately, Duan Qingshen had not seen him. After setting up the tripod, he stood on the balcony for a while, looking at his phone.

Liang Yuanxing put the card back into the camera. This time, he had no choice but to stand. He rose, stretched, and went out onto the balcony, taking a deep breath of the night air. Then he explained, “I wasn’t sniffing. I was just taking a deep breath.”

Duan Qingshen glanced at him.

“What are you doing?” Liang Yuanxing had not meant to look at his phone screen. “Are you telling fortunes with your phone?”

The display showed rows of lines, small star icons, and numbers.

Duan Qingshen laughed. “What is your brain made of? How do you come up with such things? I’m checking the cloud cover over Jungar Banner tonight. If the conditions are too poor, there’s no point taking pictures.”

“Oh, I see.” Liang Yuanxing secured the camera on the tripod. “But there are still quite a lot of lights on the ground. It’s already past eleven.”

“They seem to stay open until midnight.” Duan Qingshen put away his phone, returned to the room, and brought one of the three delivery bags out to the small round table on the balcony.

The two of them tilted their heads up at the same time. Even with the naked eye, the night sky was beautiful enough.

The little balcony was quiet. Neither of them spoke.

The tripod stood in front of a reclining chair. Duan Qingshen set the shutter speed to six seconds, but there was still too much city light. They would have to keep waiting.

“Xingxing.”

“Mm?” He turned his head.

“Go inside and get a blanket from the wardrobe. Your clothes are too thin.”

“Oh.”

Duan Qingshen took one photograph. The result was not ideal. He decided to keep waiting.

The hotel blanket was an especially thick woolen one. Liang Yuanxing draped it over himself. His phone lit up with another weather-app warning about a cold wave and strong winds in the area.

Duan Qingshen turned to look at him and smiled. He had meant for Liang Yuanxing to lean back in the reclining chair beneath the blanket, but Liang Yuanxing had wrapped it around himself instead. When he saw Duan Qingshen turn around, he opened one arm.

“It’s really warm in here. Want to come in?”

“Wrap yourself up properly,” Duan Qingshen said.

“Oh.”

Duan Qingshen was not wearing much either. After adjusting the ISO one last time, he went back into the room and put on his windbreaker.

Liang Yuanxing poked his head inside and called, “Boss Duan, could you bring my instrument out too?”

String instruments needed to be taken out and played regularly. Liang Yuanxing crossed his legs again. The ukulele was small, and Duan Qingshen reached over to pull the blanket farther across his shoulders.

Liang Yuanxing turned the tuning pegs. The pitch of a string instrument changed with variations in humidity and temperature.

“I’ll play something for you,” Liang Yuanxing said.

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“Sure.” Duan Qingshen sounded genuinely expectant. “What will you play?”

“Something appropriate to the occasion.” Liang Yuanxing said, “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star.”

“…”

It certainly was appropriate.

“I’m kidding.” Liang Yuanxing lowered his head and fingerpicked a short passage. “I only learned guitar in college. I rarely play the ukulele, but it’s convenient to take traveling.”

Duan Qingshen said nothing. He picked up a chair from beside the round table, carried it over to the tripod, and sat down opposite Liang Yuanxing.

During the first phrase Liang Yuanxing played, he asked, “Boss Duan, have you regretted quitting your job?”

“I have.” Duan Qingshen answered during the second phrase. “And I’ve been a little afraid too. I was worried I’d starve to death.”

Liang Yuanxing smiled faintly and continued playing.

“Were you afraid I’d become a prophet?”

“Yes.” Duan Qingshen’s tone remained fairly relaxed. “A landscape photographer heading off toward the northwest—well, that’s exactly what I’m doing, isn’t it?”

There was still a trace of laughter in his voice. Though he put it that way, he was far from despair.

In fact, there was still hope. After photographing Jiang Yu’s wedding dress portraits, Duan Qingshen had realized that his skills were still intact and that he and Liang Yuanxing worked extremely well together. Even if they eventually became content-library photographers, they would still be able to support both his assistant and himself.

Liang Yuanxing muted the strings with his palm and lifted his eyes to look at him.

People said that a photographer’s first pot of gold came from selling a camera, and the second from selling a lens. In this line of work, most people who made money relied on resources—or, more precisely, opportunity. Weddings, conferences, advertisements: many commercial photographers depended on referrals, just as Jiang Yu had referred Chi Shuanghai. As for opportunity, that truly came down to fate. It required the right time, the right place, and the right people.

Both of them had already sensed this opening. It might well prove to be an excellent beginning—for the as-yet nonexistent Green Mountain Awake Photography Studio.

“Do you want to hear a song?” Liang Yuanxing abruptly steered the conversation in another direction. “I’m in a good mood.”

“Hmm…” Duan Qingshen thought for a moment, then shook his head. “I don’t really listen to music. Sing whatever you like.”

The twenty-three-inch ukulele already had a pleasant resonance, and because its range ran somewhat high, it was most often used for lighthearted, cheerful music. Liang Yuanxing thought for a moment, strummed two chords, and then searched through the photos on his phone for some sheet music.

The balcony was small. Liang Yuanxing pointed at the little round table, and Duan Qingshen understood, dragging it closer.

Liang Yuanxing propped his phone upright on the table, resting it against one of the delivery bags Duan Qingshen had brought out.

The city slowly grew dark. The lights of shops and restaurants went out one after another, like a battery steadily running down from one end of the street to the other. Then, in Duan Qingshen’s eyes, there was nothing left between heaven and earth but the glow of the phone screen illuminating Liang Yuanxing’s face.

Liang Yuanxing sang “Master of Dust” in his clear, cool voice. In the first line, he sang to him, “Starting tomorrow, things will be this way.” At three minutes and twenty seconds, he sang, “It’ll be okay, nothing’s wrong. With a willing heart, it’s never too late; turn a thousand pounds of weight into something thinner than paper.”

When the wind blew across the balcony, the blanket slipped a little from his left shoulder. Liang Yuanxing looked at the sheet music on his phone. Duan Qingshen looked at Liang Yuanxing.

He listened, absorbed, without moving an inch.

It’ll be okay, Duan Qingshen thought. Nothing will happen.

After the song ended, they remained silent for a while. Then they chatted a little, mostly about the weather. Zhejiang had been drenched in endless rain lately; at last, autumn had arrived. Duan Qingshen lifted the fallen blanket and pulled it back over Liang Yuanxing’s shoulder.

Before they knew it, midnight had arrived. Duan Qingshen glanced at his phone. The date changed from October 22 to October 23. He took a small cake box from one of the delivery bags on the table.

“Happy birthday.” He handed the box to Liang Yuanxing. “Sorry, I didn’t have time to prepare a gift. And… thank you.”

Duan Qingshen did not say exactly what he was thanking him for. He could not have explained it himself.

Just as Liang Yuanxing had said, people were often unable to express their feelings with complete accuracy.

October 23 was Frost’s Descent, the final solar term of autumn. Once today had passed, autumn would truly be reduced to no more than a tiny tuft at the very tip of its tail.