Chapter 3.2 - The Zhenjiang of Old (2)
The following morning, Zhousheng Chen came as promised.
The moment she opened the door, Shi Yi was once again stunned. The person before her was surprisingly wearing a pair of rimless glasses. Inside his black suit was a silver-gray dress shirt. Very serious and formal. This Western-style attire emphasized his tall build even more.
With her hand still against the door, Shi Yi forgot to move out of the way. The two of them stood there staring at one another.
Everyone else was being treated as if they were just decorations.
He smiled as he looked at her. "Is it an inconvenient time for me to come in?"
She made herself as much as possible act normally. Curious, she stretched out her hand and waved it in front of his eyes. "You're nearsighted?"
"I have slight farsightedness."
Laughing, she murmured, "Farsightedness? Isn't that just 'old eyes' [presbyopia]?"
Standing behind him was the same driver, who, as usual, had come along with him, as well as two men and two women.
When they heard Shi Yi mutter this, they all wanted to laugh but instead, they only politely bowed their heads to hide their expressions.
Zhousheng Chen did not seem to be bothered by this. He scrutinized her and remarked, "You did not sleep well?"
Puzzled, she answered, "No."
With his finger, he drew an arc under his own eye. "Right here on you seems to indicate that you did not sleep well."
Out of courtesy, he spoke in a very low voice.
Unfortunately, these words still managed to go straight into the ears of the people behind him. Shi Yi was slightly embarrassed that he had exposed the fact in front of these strangers that she had tossed and turned the whole night.
Very luckily for her, her parents had just walked out from the living room to where they were, and it gave her the opportunity to escape for a little while.
As the actual masters of the house, Shi Yi's Little Uncle and Aunt also came out to greet the guests. From the moment he entered the house to when he at last sat down and took the tea presented to him, everything Zhousheng Chen did was above reproach. Even her father, who had previously been somewhat displeased, started to display an approving smile. The whole time prior, Shi Yi had merely watched and observed, and only now was she able to set her heart at ease.
"The body, hair, and skin are all received from the parents.[1]" This was something that was etched deep into her heart, so she of course hoped that her parents would truly like him as well.
From the looks of it, besides finding the five people standing behind him rather peculiar, her older generation family members all seemed to have a very good impression of him.
"Because of health reasons, Mother is unable to journey outside, but she has asked me to express her regards." When Zhousheng Chen said this, the middle-aged man behind him had already placed a box, six or seven feet in length and made of yellow rosewood, on the table. "This is a gift for you, Uncle."
The box was opened, and inside were nine miniature, traditional-style screens standing side by side.
They were mainly made of green jade except for the bases, where the jade was a pale white color. Everyone was somewhat astonished by this gift. Shi Yi carefully looked them over several times and discovered that the most incredible part was the raised scene that had been carved into the screens: migrating geese of autumn filling the sky; pavilions, terraces, and towers; palace maids, each one distinct and unique, inside the tall buildings, some sitting, some lying down, their beautiful hair piled high on their heads.
"How many palace maids are on these?" Her little cousin-sister was unable to contain herself and asked quietly.
"There are exactly 999." Zhousheng Chen turned his head slightly so that, out of courtesy, he was looking directly at her cousin-sister. "It is said that if a person has no fated affinity with it, he or she will not be able to count all of them. Should you get the chance, you could try."
Mother wanted to decline the gift and repeatedly told him that he was being too kind.
Unfortunately, Zhousheng Chen had already laid out the circumstances in his favour, stating that it was an expression of his mother's regards. That very generous mother was not able to come, so how could they possibly tell him to bring the gift back with him again?
One after another, gifts were laid out in front of them.
Eventually, the entire room grew rather quiet. Only when Shi Yi's little cousin-sister was curious would he very simply state the name of these items, and unless he was asked, he would not at all describe their origins or history and instead, presented them as if they were normal gifts. From a set of six blue and white "qing hua" porcelain[2] goblets with designs of pines and plum blossoms on them, to a gilded turtle-shaped ornament made of silver, to the white, glazed meiping vase with an incised floral design against a pearl-like pattern background[3]. Each elder in the family had something, no one was forgotten.
Even her little cousin-sister was presented with a jade pendant, so brilliantly green it was scary, carved in the shape of a peach.
The astonishment Shi Yi felt was not the least bit less than her family members.
However, she had to pretend that she knew about all of this and understood Zhousheng Chen's background. Even when her mother threw frequent questioning gazes at her, she would only smile unperturbedly and nod her head, indicating to her mother that she should accept them.
These extremely cultured and shocking gifts caused every elder present to start speaking more formally and properly.
Later, her aunt took advantage of the opportunity when she went to pour some water to pull Shi Yi into the kitchen and very anxiously asked her where they should go to have lunch so that Shi Yi would not lose too much face. Shi Yi was unsure whether she should laugh or cry at this question and answered softly, "You don't need to worry about lunch. He said his mom wants to invite me to lunch, so I will be leaving with him in a little while."
"Oh, that's good." Her aunt breathed out in relief, but then quickly felt a little embarrassed and apologetic. "It's not that I don't want to be a host to your boyfriend. I really have never entertained someone like him. I honestly don't even know what he would normally eat."
What did he eat?
Shi Yi recalled their time together in Xi'an. Nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, they had even eaten at Mi Family Paomo.
But if she said that now, it was obvious her aunt would never believe her.
Zhousheng Chen repeatedly expressed his remorse over his need to leave with Shi Yi first and not stay for lunch. Even her parents started to feel flustered and over and over again told him that was the proper thing to do, that they had not prepared a gift for his mother for this occasion of their first meeting and they were truly apologetic about it.
As Shi Yi listened to them talk about being apologetic for this and sorry for that, she finally could not endure it any longer and lightly tugged at Zhousheng Chen's clothes. "Alright then, shall we go? Wait for me a few minutes. I'm going to go change into something a little more formal."
