The Room

After Li Lan and Zhu Qing exchanged a few simple pleasantries with them, Qi Yao’s group moved over to the camera in the living room to mingle. Li Lan reached out and stopped Zhu Qing, who was about to follow.

“Let’s go upstairs and take a look.”

Zhu Qing blinked in confusion. “Huh? Isn’t there insect repellent in the house?”

Li Lan quickly came up with another excuse. “Then let’s go outside and watch the fireflies.”

The word fireflies immediately caught Zhu Qing’s attention, and she followed Li Lan out the door in high spirits.

Yu Ling glanced over as they stepped outside. Zhu Qing noticed her expression and, before the follow PD could catch up, whispered, “Wouldn’t it be a little rude if we just leave like this?”

Li Lan walked ahead slowly, both hands resting over her stomach, and tilted her face up toward the moon. “What’s rude about it?”

“Staying in the living room to talk to them, greet them, welcome them, or whatever; and introducing the house while we’re at it. We got here early, after all, and already looked around; we could share our experience.”

Li Lan pressed a hand to Zhu Qing’s shoulder and turned her to look up. “Look.”

Above them hung a milky-white moon, smooth as jade, clear and pure.

“The moon is looking at us,” Li Lan said, stretching lazily. “Beautiful, isn’t it?”

Zhu Qing was completely captivated by the moon, her eyes wide. It was nothing like the murky yellow moon over the city.

Li Lan stood shoulder to shoulder with her. The mountain wind at night was cool, and the two of them looked up at the moon in the breeze; the scene was lovely.

“We only need to enjoy the view,” Li Lan said.

Zhu Qing stared up at it for a while, then turned to Li Lan and broke the moment.

“Let’s go back,” she said pitifully.

Li Lan asked, “What’s wrong?”

“I think I got bitten by mosquitoes,” Zhu Qing said, her face miserable. “I just saw a few fly off me.”

Li Lan froze. “Didn’t you have on long sleeves and long pants?”

“Useless. Clothes only block the scent so mosquitoes can’t find people, but once they’ve found you, they can bite right through your clothes,” Zhu Qing said. As she spoke, a wave of itching rose over her. She rubbed at her arms. “Hurry up and go. I’m so itchy.”

The camera had just followed them out when it saw Li Lan hurrying Zhu Qing back inside.

Li Lan pulled Zhu Qing back into the room. The smell of insect repellent hadn’t fully faded yet, which was actually a good thing; there were no mosquitoes. Li Lan told the staff, “Hurry in. I’m closing the door.”

The staff member, who had been lingering slowly at the doorway, immediately sped up.

Inside, Zhu Qing had already taken off her jacket and rolled up her pant legs. On the outer sides of both her upper and lower arms, and on her shins, several swollen welts had risen; each one was ringed in red. At a glance, they looked awful.

There was also the scrape on Zhu Qing’s leg from last time in the bathroom. Though it had almost healed thanks to Li Lan’s careful twice-daily dressing changes, it still stood out against Zhu Qing’s fair skin.

“Don’t scratch,” Li Lan said, catching Zhu Qing’s wrist. “I’ll get the medicine.”

Zhu Qing was miserable, whining softly. “I never want to look at the moon again.”

Li Lan came back with the ointment and crouched in front of Zhu Qing. In a low voice, she said, “I didn’t think it through. The bugs at night are vicious. You have to spray insect repellent before going out. No, better yet, we should just stop going out at night.”

The cream had been bought in advance by Qian Chu, and it worked well against the itch. Once it was applied, the prickling eased. Zhu Qing felt much better and perked right back up, even lifting one leg a little. “It’s not your fault. I’m just the kind of person mosquitoes love. Look at you—they didn’t bite you at all.”

Zhu Qing had always been a mosquito magnet. When she was a child, whenever she went out with other kids, she was always the one getting bitten.

She had once seriously suspected that the reason Qian Cancan was so close to her was because of that. When Qian Cancan was with other people, she was always the one getting bitten; but when she played with Zhu Qing, mosquitoes never touched her.

“I probably have some special constitution,” Zhu Qing said with a little pride. “See? You don’t get bitten when you go out with me. In a way, that’s my contribution.”

Li Lan was not pleased at all that she herself had escaped the mosquitoes. Instead, she said regretfully, “I still wanted to take you to see the fireflies. If we really went, I’d be the one hurting you.”

There were already mosquitoes this vicious in the courtyard; if they went out into the wild, wouldn’t the bugs just devour Zhu Qing?

Zhu Qing blinked, then let her sleeves and pant legs fall back down. A sweet smile spread across her face. “Actually, I’m pretty happy.”

Li Lan frowned, looking as if she were facing a formidable enemy. Her gaze was still fixed on Zhu Qing’s arms and legs. “Hmm?”

“You worry about me,” Zhu Qing said. “If I’d run out on my own and come back covered in bites, you’d definitely scold me. No, wait, you’ve never even really looked stern with me, so you’d probably feel bad... right?” Zhu Qing had only wanted to comfort Li Lan, but as soon as she said it, she realized she didn’t actually know how Li Lan would react.

After her memory loss, she’d only had two times when she’d behaved badly. The first was when she got drunk; she had no memory of Li Lan’s reaction, but Li Lan had prepared stomach-soothing food for her the next day, so she probably hadn’t made Li Lan angry. The second was when she wore the wrong clothes and embarrassed herself in front of Li Lan, then accidentally scraped her knee. Even though it had healed fairly quickly, Li Lan still hadn’t scolded her; she had only applied medicine and taken good care of her.

Li Lan looked at Zhu Qing speechlessly. “In your eyes, am I some kind of cruel and heartless person?”

Zhu Qing grinned. “Then smile for me.”

Li Lan really couldn’t manage it, but seeing Zhu Qing like that, she lifted a hand and stroked her hair, letting a very faint smile appear. “Mm.”

Even after smiling, Li Lan’s mood remained low.

She held herself to extremely high standards, so taking Zhu Qing out only to feed her a bunch of mosquitoes was the kind of thing that might seem laughable to outsiders, but it left her very unhappy.

At that moment, voices came from outside.

It was Qi Yao and Yu Ling’s turn to choose rooms. Li Lan and Zhu Qing’s room was next to the stairs, so they could hear the two of them going upstairs to inspect the rooms.

Not long after, Qi Yao came down in high spirits and said to Yu Ling, “I checked. The two rooms upstairs are both pretty good. One of them is an e-sports room; the decor is super cool. I like that one.”

Yu Ling didn’t reply. Shortly after, the two of them walked over to their room.

“Teacher Li, have you gone to sleep?” Yu Ling knocked lightly on the door.

A dozen seconds later, Li Lan opened it. “Not yet.”

Qi Yao had been talking with Yu Ling about the rooms, yet Yu Ling turned and knocked on Li Lan’s door instead. Qi Yao followed behind, rolling his eyes out of the camera’s view; his expression when he looked at them was a little impatient.

Yu Ling peered into the room and smiled. “We’re choosing rooms, but we still don’t know which one to pick. Teacher Li chose this room?”

Zhu Qing also stepped out and took the initiative. “I chose it. I like that terrace.”

Yu Ling glanced at her, then at Li Lan. Seeing that Li Lan had no intention of adding anything, she smiled. “I see. It does look pretty.”

Qi Yao said, “You like this room?”

Yu Ling’s expression stiffened. Then she forced out a smile. “They’ve already picked it.”

“Even if it’s picked, you can still change it,” Qi Yao said casually. Then he looked into the room again, seeming not to think much of it. “Let’s take the upstairs one. Didn’t you hear me? There’s an e-sports room upstairs.”

Yu Ling’s smile was almost impossible to keep in place. “...Fine. Let’s keep looking.”

Qi Yao frowned. “What else is there to look at? There are only three left. Otherwise, let’s draw lots. We still have to unpack, and it’s already so late.”

Yu Ling looked at Li Lan helplessly, then hesitated as if she wanted to say something.

Li Lan had already turned around and said softly to Zhu Qing, “Go inside. There are mosquitoes outside. You were just bitten, so don’t make it itch again.”

Zhu Qing waved it off. “It’s fine. I sprayed insect repellent.”

Yu Ling said in surprise, “There are mosquitoes too? Then what do we do? I didn’t bring any insect repellent.”

Zhu Qing was even more surprised than she was. “You didn’t bring insect repellent? Didn’t your assistant and manager help you plan ahead? There have to be a lot of mosquitoes in the mountains. Did the production team prepare any? I think the director and the others were just spraying something. Why don’t you go ask?”

Yu Ling fell silent for several seconds before smiling. “Then I’ll go ask the production team.”

Yu Ling said nothing more and turned to leave with Qi Yao.

In the end, the production team said they would still take the rooms downstairs.

Filming for the day ended. That night, after the door was shut, Li Lan covered all the cameras and turned off the earpieces before walking to the bed.

There was a large bed and a wooden daybed in the room. Zhu Qing had already washed up, changed into her pajamas, and was lying on the bed. Li Lan’s gaze passed over her silhouette, paused for two seconds, then moved to the daybed.

Zhu Qing rolled over. She hadn’t slept well on the plane, and the ride here had been bumpy, so she was already half-asleep. When she heard Li Lan’s voice, she was just about to tell her to sleep early when she saw Li Lan take the blanket and head to the daybed. She was actually going to sleep separately, and Zhu Qing’s sleepiness vanished at once.

“You’re sleeping there?” Zhu Qing sat up.

Li Lan told her to lie back down. “Mm.”

Zhu Qing didn’t really understand. The bed was so big that three people could sleep on it without any problem. Why was Li Lan going to the daybed? “You’re not sleeping with me?”

This time, Li Lan was silent for quite a while. Only after a long moment did her voice come from the other side of the room. “No.”

Zhu Qing lay back down, her chest feeling tight. She wanted to say something, but she really couldn’t.

She didn’t know how to describe this feeling. It was as if, only a moment ago, the two of them had still been getting along just fine, but no one knew when the surface of that peace would be broken.

Li Lan wanted to sleep separately from her.

Why would a normal person want to sleep separately from someone else?

There was only one possibility: they weren’t that close.

In this kind of harsh environment, even slightly close friends could sleep in the same bed, and no one would mind, especially not a bed this big.

Right. Li Lan minded.

Li Lan was deliberately keeping her distance; everything in front of the cameras was just acting.

Zhu Qing belatedly realized that she was on a dating show.

It was wrapped in the shell of a travel program, but at its core, it was still a romance variety show.

Li Lan needed a partner on screen, and Zhu Qing was the one cooperating in the performance. At night, in the parts the cameras wouldn’t film, Li Lan no longer had to pretend to be her partner.

Zhu Qing turned over irritably, her breathing a little uneven.

Maybe her movements were too loud, or maybe she’d been tossing around too long; after another half hour, Li Lan finally spoke. “Can’t sleep?”

Zhu Qing kicked her legs once and said unhappily, “Can’t sleep.”

Li Lan asked softly, “Because your skin itches?”

In the dark, Zhu Qing pouted and thought, Isn’t that obvious? Out loud, she said coolly, “No, I’m just annoyed.”

Li Lan said nothing, and Zhu Qing didn’t needle her again.

Zhu Qing wasn’t a child. Things like this wouldn’t really do anything to her, but her heart would still feel a little cold; she cared, but not enough to make a scene, so she could only swallow it down in silence.

Maybe Li Lan just liked the daybed?

Maybe Li Lan just wanted to be near the window?

Zhu Qing turned the idea over and over in her mind for a while, finally calming down. She took the initiative to ask, “What do you think of Qi Yao and Yu Ling?”

Since Zhu Qing was talking about serious matters, Li Lan thought it over carefully and answered in a low voice, “Young. In every sense of the word, young.”

Zhu Qing turned her head and looked at Li Lan’s outline in the darkness. “I’m young too.”

Li Lan seemed to give a quiet laugh. “That’s different. You have restraint. You wouldn’t want the upstairs room.”

Zhu Qing felt rather pleased, but still said modestly, “If that counts as restraint, then restraint is too easy to have. There are still two other groups of guests who haven’t arrived yet; one is a middle-aged acting duo, best actor and best actress, and the other is a group of elder nationally ranked first-class actors. There’s no rule that says whoever arrives first gets first pick. Each of them has real weight behind them; setting aside seniority and respect for the young, just their experience alone means they should choose first.”

Li Lan nodded, then suddenly said, “Yu Ling knows that too.”

Zhu Qing thought of Yu Ling and sighed. “I like her face. She really is beautiful; a pure, fresh white flower, and when she doesn’t smile, she has that cool, distant air. That kind of look is the most attractive.”

Li Lan said coolly, “A face doesn’t necessarily reflect the heart. Don’t decide what kind of person someone is before you know them.”

Zhu Qing said, “I know. Didn’t she also come ask about our room today? She should’ve figured out how we were choosing, but she really didn’t like the room with the rooster crowing. Luckily, the two of them still chose it in the end. I don’t know whether Yu Ling reminded Qi Yao or the production team said something.”

Li Lan thought about it and said softly, “Either is possible. Qi Yao and Yu Ling both have people backing them; they wouldn’t be allowed to make such a basic mistake, and that kind of footage wouldn’t be cut so easily either.”

Zhu Qing froze, then hurriedly said, “Then do you have someone backing you too? Will the clips of us being foolish get aired?”

A bad feeling rose in her chest.

Zhu Qing had long known that the middle-aged and elder guests were all heavyweight names, and the current online mood was pretty respectful toward seniors and the young. As long as they didn’t cause too much trouble, the production team would basically never use them as sacrificial lambs.

So that meant the younger pair had people backing them; the middle-aged and elder groups had their own established status for protection; and that left only her and Li Lan!

There was another silence on Li Lan’s side.

“I don’t,” she said. “I wasn’t being foolish.”

Zhu Qing said, “You’re still separating yourself from me at a time like this. The more I think about it, the more it feels like that’s exactly what it is. Otherwise, why did they only make you ride the ox cart? Are they not going to play tricks on us tomorrow?”

Li Lan’s tone was firm. “They won’t. Go to sleep.”

How could Zhu Qing possibly sleep? She whispered, “Tomorrow I’ll definitely watch my words and actions. No, unless absolutely necessary, I’ll put myself on mute.”

“Really, there’s no need,” Li Lan said in a deep voice. “The production team won’t do that.”

Zhu Qing wriggled twice, then burrowed half a meter under the blanket toward Li Lan’s side. “Why not? You don’t have anyone backing you either.”

Li Lan let out a faint sigh. “Qi Yao and Yu Ling are signed to a company; I’m with a personal studio. I don’t need anyone to push me. My work outside is handled through collaborations...”

Once she started explaining, there was too much to say. It was already very late, and they still had to get up early tomorrow to look for food, since the production team hadn’t provided any ingredients.

Li Lan stopped herself and said briefly, “In short, I have people.”

Only then did Zhu Qing finally relax, slowly wriggling back to her side.

Very soon, Zhu Qing was fast asleep. Because of her poor sleeping posture, her breathing was a little heavy, and it was clearly audible in the quiet night.

Li Lan, however, kept her eyes open, not feeling sleepy at all.

She thought of how Zhu Qing had described Yu Ling’s looks just now.

A little white flower, fresh as a lotus out of clear water.

A white flower: sweet like a blossom, yet with that cool, high-end air. Combined, the two qualities gave her a somewhat contradictory appeal.

The feeling was oddly familiar; it stirred up many dusty old memories in Li Lan.

————————

Zhu Qing: I’ve got someone backing me! (pulls Li Lan over)

Li Lan, cooperating as she’s pulled over: Mm, right. She’s got someone.