Mud beads

Liang Xia answered the phone on the third ring.

"Feed?"

Her voice was fast, with the sound of rushing water and plastic bags being turned over in the background, as if she hadn't finished get off work yet.

Yu Zhu gripped her phone, her lips moving slightly, raindrops dripping from her hair onto the screen. She wanted to speak, but only a breath of cold air escaped her throat; as she inhaled, her chest tightened.

"What's wrong, Yu Zhu?" Liang Xia paused for two seconds, then suddenly raised her voice, "Get to the point!"

Yu Zhu then spoke: "Liang Xia."

His voice was a little choked up.

Liang Xia immediately fell silent.

"The rain is so loud, where are you?"

Yu Zhu looked up and around. Rain streaked across the streetlights, the distant walls were high, and the house numbers were hidden in the shadows of the trees, too dark to see clearly.

"Yueyuan in the southern suburbs," she said, "I can't get a taxi."

Liang Xia took a breath, as if she was amused by her own anger: "Yueyuan? You're really something, going to a rich neighborhood to pick up trash? Send me your location, don't wander off."

"Okay." Yu Zhu lowered her head, wiped the water off her face, unable to tell if it was rain or tears.

"You're like a father to me," Liang Xia said. "Stand on the curb, not under the tree. I'm coming over now."

After hanging up the phone, Yu Zhu sent out the location.

The screen lit up for a moment, then quickly went dark again. She put her phone in her inner pocket and moved to the side of the road.

She was out of her mind just now, forgetting that there was still lightning in the sky, and standing under the tree really seemed a bit reckless. Yu Zhu buried her face in her knees, and smelled the damp cotton clothes, mixed with the smell of earth and a trace of lingering alcohol.

The smell of alcohol wasn't hers.

Thinking of Echizen Toru and the woman's rose-red coat, her stomach churned inexplicably.

After waiting for an unknown amount of time, a beam of headlights slowly approached from afar.

An old electric scooter sped out of the rain, its headlights yellowish, a faded sticker on its front fender. Liang Xia wore a black helmet and a blue raincoat, billowing in the wind like a tattered sail. As the scooter braked in front of Yu Zhu, its tires slipped in the puddle, nearly causing it to tip over.

"Fuck." Liang Xia braced himself with one foot, took off his helmet, and upon seeing Yu Zhu's appearance, his cursing voice softened. "Are you human or a water ghost?"

"I am your living father." Yu Zhu walked towards Liang Xia, her tears turning into a smile.

Liang Xia's face was soaked by the rain, her hair stuck to her face, and her brows were furrowed.

She got off the bike, pulled a disposable raincoat from the basket, and roughly unfolded it.

"Put them on."

Yu Zhu raised her hand, her fingers frozen and unresponsive.

Liang Xia couldn't wait any longer, so she simply put the raincoat over her head, the plastic film sticking to her wet hair and making a rustling sound.

"Are you out of your mind? What are you doing in the middle of the night, without an umbrella? Do you know how far this place is from the main road? I was so tired on my electric scooter that I almost burned paper money for myself halfway there."

Yu Zhu whispered, "I'm sorry."

"Shut up." Liang Xia wiped the back seat twice, but it was no use; it was still wet. "Get in. Hold on tight. This car is secondhand, and the brakes aren't very good. If we really fall tonight, tomorrow's headline will be 'Two milk tea shop employees sneak into a rich neighborhood at night, suspected of being mentally unstable.'"

Yu Zhu sat in the back seat and hugged Liang Xia's waist through the raincoat.

Liang Xia smelled sweetly of a milk tea shop, mixed with the smell of rain, a plastic raincoat, and the heat of an electric scooter battery. She had a slender waist, her bones were bony, but she was steady. The scooter twisted the accelerator and sped into the rain. Yu Zhu leaned back, and Liang Xia scolded her again, "Hold on tight!"

Raindrops pattered against the disposable raincoat.

The old electric scooter wasn't fast and shook when it encountered puddles. Liang Xia kept cursing the whole way, cursing the road, the rain, the municipal government working on the road in the middle of the night, and Yu Zhu for being so troublesome. Her voice grew hoarse as she cursed, and she suddenly asked, "Did Ji Yong dump you?"

Yu Zhu held her, her eyes fixed on the road ahead, and said softly, "It has nothing to do with him."

Liang Xia waited for a while, and seeing that Yu Zhu didn't continue, she said, "Okay."

"We'll talk when you're ready," she laughed. "Let's get you back to life tonight."

Liang Xia stayed at Yu Zhu's rented apartment.

Yu Zhu was taking a shower in the bathroom. When the hot water poured down, her skin first went numb, and then she regained some sensation from the heat. She reached up to touch her cheek; the dull pain was gone, but she could still feel Yue Jianche's hand on it.

She changed into her pajamas and came out; Liang Xia had already put the electric kettle on to boil water.

On the table were two buckets of instant noodles, a packet of cold medicine, and some braised eggs that he had casually bought from the convenience store downstairs. Liang Xia sat boldly in the chair, his wet trousers draped over the back of the chair, wearing only his underwear and showing his bare, slender legs, drying his hair with a towel.

Yu Zhu looked at Liang Xia, who also had tattoos on her legs and several small round scars on the outside of her thighs.

"How did you get this scar?" Yu Zhu sat down and lifted the lid of the instant noodles. Steam rushed up, and the smell of cheap seasoning packets filled the small room.

"It's from the cigarette." Liang Xia handed her the fork and pushed the cold medicine over. "I was young and reckless once, you know."

She looked up, glanced at Yu Zhu, and said in a relaxed tone, "You're not the only one who's suffered with men."

Yu Zhu held the paper cup and blew on it.

The two finished their instant noodles, and it was quite late. There was only one bed in the rented room, and the two of them squeezed together, which Yu Zhu found a little uncomfortable.

She has never slept with anyone else.

"You sleep inside," Liang Xia said. "If you get a fever in the middle of the night, I'll kick you awake."

Yu Zhu lay against the wall, her body still a little cold. The cold air and rain seemed to seep into her bones, and she couldn't dry herself off no matter what she did.

Liang Xia turned off the lights.

The only sounds inside were the rain outside the window and the occasional hum of the refrigerator starting up.

After a long time, Liang Xia suddenly said, "I used to work in the south. When I was fifteen, I came here to work with my boyfriend at the time. He said his uncle was here and could arrange jobs for us."

Yu Zhu kept her eyes open and didn't move.

Liang Xia's voice was muffled in the darkness: "When I got there, I realized it wasn't a proper job. I didn't want to do it, and I ran away twice before I finally got out. It was a rainy day like this, and I spent the night squatting at the train station entrance. When I woke up in the morning, my shoes had been stolen. Later I learned that when you're traveling, you can't put all your money in one pocket, you can't take off your shoes, and trusting men will bring you bad luck for life."

After she finished speaking, she chuckled to herself.

Yu Zhu slowly turned around and looked at Liang Xia in the darkness, only able to see a blurry outline.

Liang Xia continued, "So don't feel ashamed. Even if you look embarrassed, it's still much better than what I did. Everyone has stood there like an idiot in the rain before."

Yu Zhu's eyes felt a little hot.

She buried her face in the blanket and said in a soft voice, "Liang Xia, I don't want to owe him anything anymore."

Liang Xia remained quiet for a while.

"Then I'll pay it back," she said. "If I can't pay it back, I'll pay it back slowly. At worst, I'll spend my whole life paying it back. A living person can't let themselves die from holding their pee, can they?"

That's not a nice way to put it, and it doesn't make much sense either.

But Yu Zhu listened to her.

The next morning, when Yu Zhu woke up, the rain outside the window had stopped.

Liang Xia had already left. There was a sticky note on the table with ugly handwriting: "The porridge is in the pot. If you dare not eat it, I'll kill you when I get back."

A crooked smiling face was drawn next to it.

Yu Zhu sat on the edge of the bed for a long time before getting up to wash up. She felt dizzy and lightheaded, and her throat felt like it was being rubbed with sandpaper. She had to lean against the wall to get to the kitchen.

The small pot contained white porridge, the rice cooked until very soft, with a little bit of mushy residue at the bottom. She ladled out a bowl, and just as she sat down, her phone vibrated.

Manager Chen from Jinyuan Mansion transferred 500 yuan to her.

Then came a WeChat message.

Manager Chen: Thank you for your hard work yesterday. We have enough temporary concierge staff, so you don't need to come over for now.

Yu Zhu stared at the line of text, her finger hovering over the screen.

No need to ask why.

She replied with two words: Received.

He added, "Thank you, Manager Chen."

The message was sent, and the porridge was still steaming. She took a sip, which burned her tongue, but she swallowed it anyway.

My part-time job that paid 500 a day is gone.

Yu Zhu put down the bowl, turned on the computer, and brought up the account book.

She sat at the table, first noting down the money Liang Xia spent on medicine and instant noodles last night, and then entering the 500 yuan transferred by Manager Chen into the income column.

Then, she opened another form: the Yue family account.

The money to buy out her life, 100,000.

The card Yue Feng gave her contained 800,000 yuan.

During the time she lived in the Yue family's house, the meals she ate, the clothes she wore, and the things she used all added up to a total of 980,000.

She stared at the number for a while, then checked her bank card balance. The card Yuefeng had given her had its tuition halved for junior high school students on charity programs, deducting 130,000 yuan. There was no tuition for three years of public high school. In addition, she had transferred 100,000 yuan to Aunt Wang, leaving her with a little over 570,000 yuan.

Tuition fees, rent, medical expenses, emergencies. All the unpredictable futures were covered by this money. Many times she dared not touch it, only feeling a little at ease when she looked at the balance.

Now, looking at that string of numbers, she feels suffocated.

That's the Yue family's money.

Echizen gave her a little something back.

it is good.

Then return it.

Yu Zhu opened WeChat and found Ji Yong.

She typed: Could you give me Etsuya Toru's bank account number?

After sending the message, Ji Yong quickly replied with a question mark.

Ji Yong: What are you going to do?

Yu Zhu: Pay back the money.

Ji Yong called immediately.

Yu Zhu thought for a moment and then pressed the call button.

"Did he cause you trouble?" Ji Yong asked.

"No," Yu Zhu's voice was a little hoarse, "I want to cut ties with him as soon as possible, isn't that good?"

There was a few seconds of silence on the other end, then a laugh could be heard.

"Okay." Ji Yong hung up the phone and sent Yue Jianche's bank card number.

Ji Yong: This is his private card. Think it through.

Yu Zhu replied: Thank you.

She copied the card number into her mobile banking app.

A page popped up asking for a large transfer, requiring facial recognition, SMS verification, and reconfirmation of the recipient. She sat at the table and pressed each button one by one.

A prompt will pop up on the screen after each stroke.

Transaction successful.

Transaction successful.

Transaction successful.

Three very soft beeps, like three nails hitting the ground.

The balance dropped from over 570,000 to a little over 30,000.

Yu Zhu did not move immediately.

She turned on her computer, woke up Panpan, and asked it to create a repayment schedule for her. The schedule included: buyout payment, financial aid, temporary living expenses, amount already repaid, and remaining amount. The schedule was generated quickly. She checked the numbers cell by cell, saved it, took a screenshot, and sent it to Yuejian Che.

Another line of text appeared below.

I will pay back the remaining 430,000 yuan as soon as possible before graduating from university.

After sending the message, the dialog box remained silent.

Yu Zhu did not wait.

She placed her phone face down on the table, then picked it up again and glanced at her bank card balance.

Thirty thousand and a few hundred.

Although she had lost most of her escape routes, the weight that had been pressing on her chest all night eased a little. The rented room was quiet; a thin layer of rice porridge sat on the table, its surface covered with a thin layer of rice skin. The leaves outside the window, washed by last night's rain, were a grayish-green, glistening with water.

Yu Zhu put away her phone, thought about the 30,000 yuan in her card, and breathed a sigh of relief.

Moth

When Koshima Toru received the bank's notification, he was in his car.

The assistant sat in the passenger seat, quietly reporting tomorrow's schedule. He glanced down at the screen: one loan of 200,000, another of 200,000, and a third of 150,000. Immediately afterward, a repayment schedule arrived on WeChat.

The grant, provisional living expenses, amount already repaid, and remaining amount are all clearly listed.

Echizen Toru watched for a while, then turned off the screen and looked out the window. He smiled.