After the breakup, I was taken in by a group of trendy young women.

Someone knocked on the door.

Lin Ye opened his eyes.

He leaned back on the old sofa, where the girls were sleeping haphazardly. Bai Xiaojing lay on top of him, her tattooed arms on the yoga mat, her tattooed legs curled up at the end of the sofa.

The air was filled with the lingering smell of spicy hot pot broth and the floral scent of the seven girls.

The knocking started again, this time two beats faster than before.

Bai Xiaojing mumbled something in her sleep, her lips brushing against Lin Ye's collarbone.

Lin Ye gently moved her off him. Her fingers were still clutching his underwear. He pried her fingers off, and she rolled over, burying her face in the sofa cushions to continue sleeping.

Lin Ye stood up, the elastic band of his athletic shorts was askew to one side, he pulled it up a bit, and walked to the door shirtless.

The door opened, and a draft rushed in, carrying the damp smell of cement and rust from the hallway.

Zhou Fang stood outside the door, holding a thermos of soup in her hand.

She was still wearing that floral nightgown, with a beige cardigan over it, her hair was pinned up with a bright pink plastic clip, and a few stray hairs clung to her neck.

Her gaze first fell on Lin Ye's face, then moved down half an inch to his chest and abdomen, pausing for a second.

Then her gaze passed over his shoulder and through the crack in the door she saw the scene in the living room: a tattooed man with one bare arm was lying on a yoga mat, two tattooed legs were sticking out from the end of the sofa, a green-haired and pink-haired man was huddled together, a man with bangs was using a cat backpack as a pillow, Shen Qing was wrapped in an old bed sheet, and a yellow-haired man was lying on the sofa with his nightgown rolled up to his thighs.

Zhou Fang's face burned from her neck to her forehead.

"Young man!"

Her voice was a whole tone higher than usual, as if someone had choked her; the thermos jar wobbled in her hand and almost fell to the ground.

"You, you really have no self-control!"

Lin Ye looked down at himself.

He was shirtless, the elastic band of his athletic shorts was askew, and he was wearing plastic slippers.

There was still a saliva mark on his right shoulder from where Bai Xiaojing had smeared it.

Looking up at Zhou Fang's expression again, the 42-year-old woman stood in the stairwell, holding a soup pot in one hand and covering her mouth with the other. She didn't know where to look, and finally chose to stare at the half-broken motion-activated light on the ceiling. Her expression seemed to say, "I knew this would happen, but I didn't expect it to be so soon."

"Sister Zhou, it's not what you think!"

"Here, have some to help you recover!"

Before he could finish speaking, Zhou Fang shoved the thermos into his hand.

The jar was the old-fashioned kind, with a stainless steel shell, heavy, and with a ring of water stains at the bottom, probably just taken off the stove.

Lin Ye caught the soup pot, but the pot was so hot that he had to switch hands to hold it steady.

"Sister Zhou, what's wrong?"

"We're just getting you a new sofa. The workers will be here in a bit. Don't worry, I just bought it; it only cost 12,000!"

When she said "only 12,000," her tone was as if she were saying "only spent 12 yuan." She slightly raised her chin, looked down from the ceiling at Lin Ye's face, and there was something indescribable in her gaze.

That kind of thing is called, "Aren't you moved?"

Lin Ye was stunned for a moment.

Twelve thousand.

He paid 1,680 yuan in rent for the whole year.

The landlord replaced the sofa in this run-down shared room with one that cost 12,000 yuan.

No matter how he calculates it, he can't make it even.

"Sister Zhou,"

He stood at the door with a soup pot in his hand, unusually at a loss for words. "The rent for a year is only a little over a thousand, why don't you get a sofa that costs twelve thousand!"

"Shh!"

Zhou Fang put her index finger to her lips, drawing out the "shh" sound, and quickly scanned both sides of the corridor to make sure no neighbors were eavesdropping.

Then she took half a step forward, the hem of her floral pajamas brushing against the doorframe, and said in a low voice:

"Young man, you can't tell anyone! Of all my dozen or so rental properties, which one has had its furniture replaced for more than 500 yuan? If the other tenants find out, how am I supposed to keep this business?"

She spoke in a hurried tone, as if she were explaining a secret deal.

Lin Ye looked at Zhou Fang.

She stood at the door, wearing a floral nightgown over a beige cardigan. The fuchsia plastic on her hair clip gleamed cheaply in the dim hallway light, and the folds around her neck were layered.

He's 42 years old and has been collecting rent in an urban village for over a decade. He can argue with his tenants for half an hour over a few dozen yuan in water and electricity bills.

This morning I spent ages mentally calculating how to save a few hundred yuan on a sofa.

She has now spent 12,000 yuan of her own money.

"Sister Zhou, I'll return this money to you."

"What do you mean, 'repay'?!"

Zhou Fang waved her hand, the movement so large that the sleeve of her cardigan almost hit the door frame.

"I didn't buy it for you! I'm worried you'll break the sofa and I'll have to fix it! You're one man with seven women, and that old sofa has two broken springs; it'll fall apart in a couple more days!"

Her reasons sound plausible.

But she didn't dare look him in the eye when she said that.

She looked at the doorknob.

"Besides, I charge you a year's rent, so what's wrong with giving you a sofa? It's not like I can't afford to!"

Her voice suddenly dropped to a whisper, so soft that Lin Ye almost couldn't hear her.

Then she reached out and unscrewed the lid of the soup pot in Lin Ye's hand, her movements so quick it was as if she was afraid he would refuse.

As soon as the lid was opened, a rich aroma of Chinese medicine mixed with the fragrance of meat wafted out.

The soup was dark red, with goji berries, angelica slices, and a few pieces of meat and bones that were almost dissolved on top.

Oil swirls on the soup noodles, and steam rises up, covering Lin Ye's face.

"Drink it while it's hot, don't let my good intentions go to waste."

When Zhou Fang spoke, her voice regained the authoritative tone befitting a landlord, but the way she brushed a stray hair behind her ear betrayed her. Her hand was trembling slightly.

"What kind of soup is this?"

"A complete tonic soup. I simmered it for three hours."

Lin Ye looked down at the pot of soup.

Goji berries tumble on the soup noodles, angelica slices soak up the broth and unfold into whole pieces, and the meat on the bones is stewed until tender and falls off the bones with the slightest touch.

He didn't know what the "ten perfections" were, but just by smelling the aroma, he knew that this soup wasn't just some random herbs thrown in and boiled before being served.

"Sister Zhou, this is too..."

"Stop talking nonsense."

Zhou Fang interrupted him.

Then she stopped laughing, took out her phone from her cardigan pocket, and checked the time.

"The workers will be here soon. Hurry up and drink your soup and tidy up the house. Don't let the workers see this."

She gestured towards the living room through the crack in the door, but didn't say anything more; her expression said it all.

"Sister Zhou, you really don't need to..."

"Are you going to drink it or not?"

Zhou Fang put her hands on her hips, and the floral pajamas were stretched taut by the movement, revealing the rolls of fat around her waist.

Lin Ye picked up the soup pot, blew on it, and took a sip.

hot.

My tongue was tingling from the heat, but the rich aroma of meat and medicine flowed down my throat, warming me from my stomach to every part of my body.

The flavor of angelica root comes first, followed by the slight sweetness of goji berries, then the richness of bone broth, and finally, a faint, indescribable bitterness lingers on the back of the tongue.

Delicious.

It's not just polite talk, it really is delicious.

He took two more sips of soup from the pot.

As Zhou Fang watched him finish the soup, the corners of her mouth finally couldn't be contained and curled upwards so much that even her rose-red hair clip swayed.

She turned and walked downstairs, her slippers clattering on the concrete steps.

The voice-activated light came on, casting a dim yellow glow on her off-white cardigan, illuminating the fuzzy patches on it clearly.

She took a few steps and then stopped, without looking back.

"Don't tell anyone about the sofa."

"Don't tell anyone about the 12,000 yuan thing."

She paused.

"You'd better not mention that I made you soup."

Then the sound of her slippers continued down the stairs, turned a corner, and disappeared at the stairwell between the second and third floors.

The motion-activated lights went out, and the hallway returned to its dim state.

Lin Ye stood at the door with an empty soup pot in his hand, shirtless, the elastic band of his shorts was askew, and the drool stain from the blond hair on his right shoulder was still wet.

The smell of damp cement in the hallway mingled with the scent of floral water wafting from inside the house on both sides of his body.

He closed the door and turned to lean against it.

Someone knocked the water glass with seven toothbrushes stuck in it on the coffee table askew again, and the underwear on the clothesline swayed gently in the breeze.

Bai Xiaojing turned over in her sleep, her hand groping on the empty sofa cushions. She didn't find anyone, frowned slightly, and then continued to sleep.

A landlord who had been collecting rent for over a decade and could argue with his tenants for half an hour over a few dozen yuan in utility bills spent 12,000 yuan of his own money to replace the sofa.

I simmered this nourishing soup for three hours, and I'm not allowed to tell anyone.

Lin Ye looked down at the empty thermos in his hand.

The stainless steel casing had a line of small print: "Annual Meeting Souvenir of [Company Name] Appliances, 2012." That was something from twelve years ago.

There was another knock on the door.

A gruff male voice came from outside the door: "Hey, you're delivering the sofa! Open the door!"