ATLAS TRANSLATES

The next morning, Luo Jingyu arrived at class right on time again. The older women quietly chuckled as he pulled his homework out of his bag, his heart racing.

Sure enough, when Teacher Xu Qingyan received his single pressed cordyceps flower, she frowned and held out her hand: “Why is there only one? Where’s the other one?”

Luo Jingyu quickly returned the sample flower to her.

Xu Qingyan’s expression darkened further: “Student Luo Jingyu, I asked for your homework. You’ve only made one flower for two days in a row now. Everyone else makes two!”

Sister Shao looked at the flower and tried to mediate: “It looks really good though. Come on, Teacher Xu, let it go. Poor Little Fish has it rough – his girlfriend is visiting and he still managed to make one flower. That’s pretty good!”

Luo Jingyu was mortified, knowing this showed disrespect to Teacher Xu. Usually, even though he knew one flower would be enough to pass, he always diligently made two. But last night he was just too tired. He’d only slept three hours the night before, and even making this one flower took until 2 AM. He nearly fell asleep at his desk.

He couldn’t really explain this to Xu Qingyan, so he could only press his palms together apologetically, thinking he would make up all the missing homework once Huanhuan left.

Just then, Xu Qingyan couldn’t hold it in anymore and burst out laughing: “Little Ding, you lost! You’re treating us to afternoon tea today!”

Luo Jingyu: “??”

“Hahahahaha…” The women erupted in laughter, instantly dispelling the previous tense atmosphere.

Luo Jingyu watched them nervously, sweating.

Sister Zhu explained to him: “We made a bet earlier – the three of us said you’d only make one flower, but only Little Ding said you’d make two.”

Luo Jingyu felt like he couldn’t show his face anymore.

He wrote on a piece of paper and pushed it to Sister Ding: [Sister Ding, I’m sorry. Let me treat everyone instead.]

Sister Ding was nearly dying of laughter and quickly said: “No need, no need! Oh my goodness, you’re too funny. Teacher Xu, please start class – look how anxious the poor boy is, I think he might cry if this goes on!”

Luo Jingyu: “…”

Xu Qingyan suppressed her laughter and clapped her hands: “Alright, alright, let’s begin. Today we’re learning another wildflower, the Iris, which is also quite complex.”

That evening, Zhan Xi went with Luo Jingyu to have dinner with the three sisters. Xu Qingyan’s daughter had college entrance exams coming up, so she went home to cook for her daughter instead. She asked Sister Shao to tell everyone that this meal was her treat, as a congratulations to Little Fish for finding happiness.

This was Zhan Xi’s first time eating with Luo Jingyu’s friends. They chose hotpot.

She finally understood why Little Fish usually didn’t join the sisters for dinner. Setting aside the fact that he couldn’t hear, the sisters spent all day in flower-pressing class and still had homework to do at night. During dinner, they definitely didn’t want to discuss flower-pressing anymore. They all talked about their husbands and children – topics Luo Jingyu couldn’t participate in.

At this dinner, Zhan Xi discovered she had developed a new skill: being Luo Jingyu’s sign language interpreter. After he read others’ lip movements, he would respond with simple hand gestures, and Zhan Xi would speak for him.

Zhan Xi herself was surprised to realize she had unconsciously learned so many sign language phrases. While she might be clumsy trying to sign them herself, being able to understand was enough!

The sisters didn’t know sign language, so they chatted with Zhan Xi instead. What they cared about most wasn’t her family background or personal circumstances, but rather – how she and Luo Jingyu met.

“Tell us, tell us!” Sister Zhu said, “I’m so curious! Little Fish is such a shy boy – which one of you pursued the other?”

Who pursued whom?

Zhan Xi and Luo Jingyu exchanged glances, finding it difficult to answer this question. Zhan Xi hesitated: “I guess… it was me? But not exactly… ah, it’s hard to explain clearly.”

Sister Zhu was excited: “Tell us about it, don’t be shy! We were all guessing about it when we had dinner yesterday!”

So Zhan Xi briefly explained how things happened – initially, she contacted “Little Fish Fish Handmade Pressed Flowers” on Q Station.

Sister Ding asked: “We have accounts on Q Station too, did you see our videos?”

They all showed Zhan Xi their homepages, including their Weibo accounts. Each one was carefully managed.

After looking, Zhan Xi exclaimed: “Oh wow, I’ve seen all these accounts! I even inquired about prices!”

Sister Shao asked: “So why did you choose Little Fish in the end?”

Zhan Xi blushed and said: “Maybe because his shop had more views.”

Sister Ding teased her: “Do you know why his shop gets more views?”

Zhan Xi shook her head: “No.”

“Look at the comments,” Sister Ding pointed out. “Have you seen them? His videos get way more comments than ours!”

Really? Zhan Xi hadn’t noticed before. She opened the video comments to look, with Luo Jingyu curiously peering over too. He rarely checked Q Station comments, usually just sending the original videos to Fang Xu and being done with it.

Zhan Xi understood immediately when she saw the comments were all along similar lines:

[User 1]: Ahhh when will little brother show his face?! With such beautiful hands, his face must be handsome too!

[User 2]: Those hands are just too beautiful! The hairpins are gorgeous too, I want to buy but I’m broke…crying…

[User 3]: Whenever someone tells me which celebrity has nice hands, I just show them brother’s videos. These are truly the most beautiful hands in the world! I really want to see brother’s face too!

Zhan Xi: “…”

Luo Jingyu didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Sister Zhu still wouldn’t let go of their love story and asked eagerly: “So who confessed first?”

Zhan Xi helplessly pointed at Luo Jingyu: “Sister, does he look like someone who would confess?”

Luo Jingyu turned to look at her, reading her lips and freezing: “?”

Sister Shao understood immediately: “Oh! So Little Fish liked you but was too shy to say it, and finally you had no choice but to speak up yourself?”

“That’s… more or less what happened…” Zhan Xi leaned against Luo Jingyu and covered her face with her hand. “Oh, stop asking me! I’m getting embarrassed.”

The sisters burst out laughing. Sister Ding said: “Well, we have no choice! If we ask Little Fish, he won’t tell us either!”

Luo Jingyu just smiled as he watched them chat, while helping Zhan Xi cook and retrieve items from the hotpot. He knew exactly what Huanhuan liked to eat.

They had a split pot with both spicy and non-spicy broths. Both he and Zhan Xi could handle some spice. They retrieved various delicious morsels from the bubbling red soup, dipped them in sesame oil, and enjoyed the numbing spiciness, their faces flushing red.

He signed to Zhan Xi: [Is it too spicy?]

Zhan Xi smiled and shook her head, signing back: [Not spicy, I like it.]

The sisters all thought Zhan Xi was wonderful – she knew sign language and could communicate with Luo Jingyu without barriers. Whatever Little Fish signed, little Zhan could understand. No wonder they could date!

Luo Jingyu’s feelings were also quite complex. He had known these sisters for many years but never had any contact outside of Teacher Xu’s advanced classes where they would meet annually. They liked to tease him, always asking if he had a girlfriend, but he never answered, just smiled shyly.

The sisters were all married with children. Since Luo Jingyu couldn’t hear or speak, he never participated in their conversations. He always came and went alone, focusing on class and homework, never joining their dinners or even the field collection trips where he would always go by himself.

This time, because Huanhuan was here, he suddenly felt he could have dinner with the sisters too. He couldn’t speak, but Huanhuan could chat with them. They all seemed to like Huanhuan, which made him proud – Huanhuan was truly a wonderful girl that everyone liked.

There was something Luo Jingyu hadn’t noticed before but felt very clearly now – the frequency of his signing with Huanhuan seemed to be increasing. Even though they hadn’t seen each other for over ten days, when they met again, Huanhuan’s sign language skills hadn’t regressed at all, but had actually improved.

Being “understood” by someone he loved was truly a happy and heartwarming thing for Luo Jingyu. He didn’t need to constantly type on his phone or worry that when he raised his hands to “speak,” the other person wouldn’t understand.

Now, Zhan Xi could understand almost all everyday phrases and could even interpret for him to others. Only when it came to obscure words would she get stuck, needing Luo Jingyu to type them out for her to learn on the spot.

After dinner, everyone returned to the hotel together. The sisters knew Zhan Xi was heading back to Qiantang the next day, so they split the cost to buy her a bag of snacks and drinks for the journey.

Zhan Xi felt they treated Luo Jingyu like a little brother, and her like a little sister-in-law, also a child. She couldn’t refuse, so she thanked them and accepted. After saying goodbye to the sisters, she went back to the room with Luo Jingyu.

This was their third night sleeping together, and things seemed more natural between them.

After showering, Zhan Xi lay in bed buying her train ticket for the next day. She and Little Fish had discussed it – he said it would be better to take a daytime train. Although he could send her to the station at night, she would have to get home by herself after arriving, which might not be safe so late. Zhan Xi agreed, so she bought an 11 AM ticket.

After his shower, Luo Jingyu came out of the bathroom but didn’t start on his homework right away.

Huanhuan was leaving tomorrow, and he didn’t want to let her go. These past few days he had been busy with classes and homework, barely having time to accompany her. She never complained, spending her days exploring Shanghai’s streets alone, and quietly reading in bed at night, peaceful and well-behaved.

Luo Jingyu climbed into bed, boldly moving a bit closer to Zhan Xi. She felt his warm, slightly damp presence and naturally leaned into his embrace. Luo Jingyu wrapped his arms around her.

Zhan Xi showed him her ticket purchase page, and suddenly remembered the question from dinner. She turned to ask him: “Little Fish, when did you start liking me?”

Luo Jingyu: “…”

Seeing his blank expression, she asked again: “Was it after helping me with the shoe cabinet? Or Christmas Eve?”

Luo Jingyu thought for a moment. His left arm was still around Zhan Xi, and since what he wanted to say needed both hands to express, he chose a simpler way to let her understand – his right index finger simply pointed at her phone.

How concise! Zhan Xi understood immediately, but was also shocked: “When we were chatting on WeChat? Before meeting in person?”

Luo Jingyu’s lips curved into a small smile as he nodded.

“But at that time, you didn’t even know what I looked like!” Zhan Xi touched her face. “Was it like an online romance?”

Luo Jingyu nodded again, looking at her. With his right hand, he signed a simple message: pointing to himself, then touching his left heart, pointing to her, then placing his right index and middle fingers against his nose, slowly moving them down while closing them, and finally giving a thumbs up – meaning “beautiful.”

In his heart, she was beautiful no matter what.

Zhan Xi was deeply moved and hugged him tightly. So Little Fish had fallen for her even earlier than she had fallen for him – he hadn’t even seen her yet but already liked her.

No wonder! Was he afraid to deliver “Good Fortune” because he worried she would stop talking to him once she knew he was deaf?

At this point, Luo Jingyu signed another message with one hand: [I imagined you were thirty years old.]

Zhan Xi: “…”

After the shock wore off, she giggled: “So you were okay with dating an older woman?”

Luo Jingyu nodded and carefully examined her right hand. Huanhuan truly had small, plump hands. These hands had misled him, along with Fang Xu’s words as evidence – he had always thought she was a chubby little sister in her thirties.

So when they met and he saw how beautiful and radiant she was, he was completely shocked and felt even more like he was dreaming an impossible dream. The barrier between him and Teacher Egg wasn’t just a simple wall, but as thick as a city wall.

Zhan Xi said: “You’re different from how I imagined Little Fish too.”

Luo Jingyu looked at her with confusion, unable to guess how she had imagined him.

“I thought you were younger than me, just an ordinary boy working for Fang Xu.” Zhan Xi shyly squeezed his fingers. “I knew your hands were beautiful, but when I saw you at the night market, since you always wore a mask, I thought maybe there was something wrong with your face. I never expected you to be such a handsome guy.”

Luo Jingyu laughed with his characteristic “he-he” sound.

“Actually, even if there had been something wrong with your face, I still wanted to meet you.” Zhan Xi raised her hand to touch his face. “You know what? Maybe at that time, I already liked you too? Otherwise, why was I so insistent on meeting you?”

Luo Jingyu didn’t know, and didn’t dare to guess.

“Maybe… I was already somewhat attracted to you.” Zhan Xi said, “Little Fish, I think we were meant to be.”

Luo Jingyu felt the same way – one connection online had brought him Teacher Egg.

Actually, Zhan Xi’s idea of “meant to be” was different from Luo Jingyu’s, but she didn’t plan to tell him about the strawberry hairpin from years ago.

How mysterious that her fate with Little Fish had begun so early.

After their nighttime chat, Luo Jingyu dutifully went to do his homework. Zhan Xi read for a while until sleepiness overtook her, then lay down to sleep.

At 2 AM, Luo Jingyu finished making two flowers and carefully climbed into bed, gently lifting the covers to lie down.

Zhan Xi slept very properly, not sprawling her limbs about. The previous two nights they had each kept to their own sides, with no physical contact. But this night, as Luo Jingyu looked at Zhan Xi’s sleeping face, his heart stirred. He slowly moved closer to her, boldly draping his arm over her waist in a light embrace.

In her sleep, Zhan Xi seemed to sense something and moved closer to him too, her left hand unconsciously resting on his body. They lay facing each other on their sides, and Luo Jingyu didn’t even want to turn off the lights, wanting to look at her face a little longer.

Once the lights were off, the room would be dark. In the dark, he wouldn’t be able to see anything.

He also couldn’t hear her breathing. Unable to see, unable to hear, and unable to touch her – the previous two nights had been like this, causing him inexplicable anxiety.

This night would be different, right?

Luo Jingyu finally turned off the lights and closed his eyes, pulling Zhan Xi’s body closer, letting her head rest against his solid chest. He could touch her, could smell the milk scent from her body, and felt extremely content. He felt less lonely – in this dark and quiet world, he was no longer alone.

After four days and three nights, Zhan Xi took the high-speed train back to Qiantang alone.

She went to the pet shop to pick up her gift and brought it back to apartment 1504. The kitten was a bit depressed, but Zhan Xi fed it some canned food and it perked up.

Zhan Xi did some basic cleaning of both apartments and followed the plant care guide to water and fertilize Luo Jingyu’s plants.

In the evening, Gift stayed alone in 1504, and before going home to sleep, Zhan Xi took Luo Jingyu’s large whale plushie with her, thinking about what happened that morning.

She had woken up in Luo Jingyu’s arms – not only was he holding her, but she was holding him too.

He wasn’t wearing long pants, and she was only in her nightgown. Their bare legs were tangled together under the covers, but surprisingly, neither of them felt shy. When they opened their eyes and saw each other, Zhan Xi said, “Good morning.”

He expressed his feelings with a kiss on her forehead.

Zhan Xi missed his embrace, so she brought the big whale home to sleep with.

Monday morning, she got up early, put on a proper outfit, applied light makeup, and went to the company with a calm expression.

Yuan Sichen and others knew about the transfer results and tried to comfort Zhan Xi. She thanked them and said she was fine.

When work hours began, she walked into Wen Qin’s office and directly submitted her resignation letter.

Wen Qin didn’t try to keep her. Zhan Xi even felt that Manager Wen seemed relieved.

Zhan Xi thought Wen Qin must have been very conflicted. She wanted to train someone, but that person might go take the civil service exam at any moment and had asked for a transfer. If she transferred and then passed the civil service exam, Wen Qin would have trouble explaining to the Planning Department manager. Without being able to guarantee Zhan Xi would stay with the company, whatever Wen Qin did would put her in a difficult position.

So, Zhan Xi’s resignation might be the best outcome.

Resignation required one month’s notice, so Zhan Xi and Wen Qin agreed her last working day would be June 30th.

After submitting her resignation, Zhan Xi went to the stairwell again. True to her word, she called Chi Guilan.

When the call connected, Chi Guilan spoke in an accusatory tone: “So you know to call home now? Your brother said you went traveling – where did you go? By yourself or with others? A girl going far away without telling family, what if something happened? Not even sending a WeChat message daily! I even told your brother to report to the police! Do you know how worried your mother was?!”

Zhan Xi waited for her to finish, then said softly: “Mom, I resigned.”

Chi Guilan: “…”

She shouted: “Zhan Xi! What’s wrong with you? You’re fighting with mom over such a small thing? How can you resign now? Even if you want to resign, you should wait until you pass the civil…”

“I’ve said before, I won’t take the civil service exam anymore.” Zhan Xi said coldly. “Don’t you understand? I want to find my own job. Don’t interfere with my work anymore.”