A Literary Life Starting from the First Year of High School

October 22nd, Saturday.

When Lin Shubai pushed open the glass door of the "Half-Day Leisure" coffee shop, Chen Yuanshan was already sitting by the window.

A cup of Americano sat on the table, next to a black briefcase with a few pages of paper tucked inside an open folder. He was looking down at his phone when he heard the door open, looked up, and waved to Lin Shubai.

"You're here? Have a seat."

Lin Shubai walked over and sat down. A waiter came over, and he ordered a latte. Chen Yuanshan put his phone away, leaned back in his chair, and glanced at him.

Did you bring the manuscript?

Lin Shubai took out a thick stack of graph paper from his bag, secured with paperclips. He placed the paper on the table and pushed it over.

"Twelve thousand words, titled 'Life is Like a String on a Qin'."

Chen Yuanshan didn't pick it up immediately. Instead, he glanced at the title and read it aloud: "Life is like a zither string." He nodded. "That's an interesting name."

Then he picked up the manuscript, turned to the first page, and began to read.

Lin Shubai sat opposite, picked up the latte the waiter brought, took a sip, and said nothing. The coffee shop was quiet, with a piano piece playing in the background, the volume low, like the sound of flowing water in the distance. Two young people sat at the next table, laptops in front of them, occasionally exchanging a few words in hushed tones.

Chen Yuanshan's reading habits were the same as last time—very slow, reading word by word. When he came across a good passage, he would stop, push his glasses up a bit, and then continue. When he read the part where the old blind man was telling stories to the young blind man, the corner of his mouth twitched slightly. When he read the part where the old blind man broke the first string, he tapped his fingers lightly twice on the edge of the manuscript.

Lin Shubai sat opposite Chen Yuanshan, watching his changing expressions. He wasn't nervous—he was confident in the quality of the manuscript. But he was curious how someone who had been a literary editor for thirty years would view Shi Tiesheng's writing.

About twenty minutes later, Chen Yuanshan turned to the second page and read the core setting—

"His master told him: 'If you break a thousand strings, you can retrieve a prescription from the instrument case and cure your eyes.'"

Chen Yuanshan paused, took off his glasses, wiped the lenses, put them back on, and continued reading. His expression changed from focused to something more serious; his brows furrowed slightly, and his lips pressed into a line.

Lin Shubai knew that he had absorbed the information.

When Chen Yuanshan read the part where the old blind man finally played a thousand strings, opened the instrument case, and found a blank sheet of paper inside, he was completely stunned.

He stared at the page for several seconds, then put it down, picked up his coffee, and took a sip. The coffee was cold; he frowned slightly, but didn't seem to care, putting down the cup and picking up the paper again to continue reading.

The old blind man sat on the cliff all day. The wind blew, and although he couldn't see, he could hear. Down below, people were singing, crying, and arguing. He couldn't see anything, but he heard everything.

Then he went back to the blind boy and said, "I remembered wrong, it's not a thousand, it's twelve hundred."

Chen Yuanshan turned to the last page, read the last paragraph, closed the manuscript, and placed it on the table. He didn't speak immediately, but leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, and remained silent for a long time.

"You wrote a fable about lies. The old blind man's master told him that he could see by breaking a thousand strings. This was a lie. But it was this lie that sustained him throughout his life, allowing him to play the strings his whole life. When he discovered the truth, he didn't tell the young blind man the truth. Instead, he increased the lie—not a thousand strings, but twelve hundred. He knew the young blind man needed this lie."

He paused, then tapped his finger lightly on the table: "The core of this story isn't 'hope,' but 'why lies are more important than the truth.'"

Lin Shubai nodded: "A person needs something to look forward to in life. Whether that something is real or not is not important; what matters is that you have it."

Chen Yuanshan looked at him, his eyes revealing something—perhaps surprise, or perhaps a reassessment.

"You're only sixteen." He said this not as a question, but as a sigh.

"Age and experience are not necessarily proportional," Lin Shubai said. "Some people live to sixty and still don't understand this question, while others understand it in their teens."

Chen Yuanshan paused for a moment, then laughed: "The way you're talking sounds like an old man."

Chen Yuanshan picked up the manuscript again, turned to the section where the old blind man told the young blind man "one thousand two hundred sticks," and read it again. Then he raised his head, his expression becoming solemn.

"I'll take this manuscript. I'll schedule it for you in the next issue of 'October' or the one after that."

"Thank you, Teacher Chen."

"Don't thank me." Chen Yuanshan waved his hand. "I'm an editor, it would be my dereliction of duty not to use a good manuscript. This is top-tier material for any literary journal. Twelve thousand words, not too long, not too short, just right."

He carefully placed the manuscript paper into the folder, then leaned back in his chair, picked up his now-cold coffee, took a sip, frowned, and put it down.

"Let's get down to business. I've accepted your 'Life on a String,' and the payment will be based on the 'October' magazine's standard, five to eight hundred per thousand words. This time, we'll start at five hundred. After it's published, we'll see how it's received, and we can adjust the payment at the end of the year when it's reviewed."

"OK."

"There's one more thing." Chen Yuanshan took out a brown paper envelope from his briefcase and handed it over. "We didn't make it clear on the phone. I showed the manuscript of 'Charlotte's Web' to Lao Zhou, the editor-in-chief of the Children's Publishing House, last week."

Lin Shubai took the envelope, which contained several sheets of paper. He pulled one out and saw that it was the publisher's review comments form.

"After Lao Zhou finished reading it, he called me for forty minutes." Chen Yuanshan's tone carried a suppressed sense of pride. "He said that in his more than 20 years as a children's literature editor, he had rarely seen such a complete and mature long fairy tale. The story structure, character development, and emotional tension were all excellent. Especially the part about Charlotte's death, he said he read it twice and his eyes welled up with tears both times."

Lin Shubai turned to the last page of the feedback form, where a few lines of writing, though illegible, were displayed: "Publication recommended. Market risks are manageable. A face-to-face meeting with the author is necessary."

Chen Yuanshan continued, "Old Zhou is a very direct person. He probably wants to confirm two things with you: first, whether you actually wrote this manuscript; and second, whether you have the ability to continue writing. Long-form children's stories aren't a one-off deal. When a publisher signs a new author, they're looking at the possibility of long-term cooperation. If you can produce one or two more works of the same caliber, Old Zhou will have more confidence."

"No problem, when do we go?"

"I arranged to meet Lao Zhou this afternoon. This place isn't far from our magazine office. I'll show you around first, and we can grab some lunch while we're at it. We'll go there this afternoon."