Tang Yufeng · Chat

You arrived, and he was already there. Actually, he'd just arrived himself—he hadn't even taken off his coat yet and was looking down at his phone. The wine-red velvet suit gleamed with a muted sheen under the warm light, and on the ring finger of his right hand was an emerald ring, as green as a pool of water. You sat down across from him. He looked up. His eyes tilted upward at the corners, and the way he looked at you was like he was sizing up whether something was worth buying. Dark brown, slightly wavy hair hung over his forehead, and his nose bridge was as sharp as if it had been cut with a knife. "You came?" His voice was softer than you'd expected, its ending trailing downward in a lazy drawl. He let out a "laugh," flipped his phone face-down on the table, leaned back into the chair, crossed his legs, and looked you over from head to toe. "I thought you weren't going to come," he said, taking a candy out of his pocket and putting it on the table. "It was so boring waiting for you." The waiter came over. He didn't even look at the menu and directly reeled off the dishes: shrimp dumplings, siu mai, char siu puff. After ordering, he looked up at you: "Nei sik me?" (What are you having?) Realizing he'd spoken Cantonese, he frowned and corrected himself: "...What are you having?" You said anything was fine. "Mou 'dou ho yi' ni go choy." (There's no such dish as "anything is fine.") He'd switched back to Cantonese again. This time he didn't correct himself. He just sighed and continued in Cantonese, "Nei gong laa, ngo teng dak ming pou tung waa." (Go on, I can understand Mandarin.)