between heartstrings

Wei Sizhe guessed right, the "you" in Shen Youqing's text message refers to him and Chu Jiahe.

No longer in a hurry to make supper, Chu Jiahe relaxed in Wei Sizhe's embrace, smelling the scent that made him feel at ease.He didn't intend to hide it at first, let alone act in a sneaky manner. Now that the other party asked, he will truthfully explain it.

"I think Mr. He asked for the address of Shen Youqing's home."

Shen Youqing's hometown is in the southernmost suburban county of Beichen City, where there is a village called "Xihe".Xihe Village is more than 90 kilometers away from the city center, and it takes about three hours to drive. Wei Sizhe couldn't imagine that Chu Jiahe would have to travel so far by himself.

"I've been to his house." Wei Sizhe said with a sigh, "It's too far away, how did you get there?"

"Take the bus and take the subway, and then take an electric tricycle." Chu Jiahe said with a smile, "It's faster than driving."

The turmoil in his heart still hasn't calmed down, and the frowning eyebrows can't be relaxed for a long time. Wei Sizhe doesn't want to let Chu Jiahe suffer even a bit, especially because of himself.

Wei Sizhe said: "Shen Youqing asked us to visit his house."

"Okay." Chu Jiahe patted Wei Sizhe's back twice, "What kind of clothes should I wear tomorrow?"

"It doesn't need to be too formal." Wei Sizhe said, "Ordinary casual clothes are fine."

Early on Saturday morning, the highway out of the city was unimpeded. The Porsche drove towards the southern suburbs of the city. When passing the toll booth, Wei Sizhe turned his head and looked at Chu Jiahe who was sleeping lightly in the co-pilot. He couldn't hold back, and reached out to touch him s face.

Sensing the movement, Chu Jiahe grabbed Wei Sizhe's wrist in a daze, closed his eyes and said, "Concentrate on driving."

At [-]:[-] in the morning, Wei Sizhe arrived at Xihe Village. Wei Sizhe followed the navigation around, ran over a gravel road, and parked the car beside the soil slope between two rows of bungalows.Pushing the door and stepping down, Wei Sizhe took out the milk and fruit basket from the trunk. Wei Sizhe looked at the uneven houses and courtyards. The changes here are not small, and it has been renovated a lot compared with a few years ago.

After walking two steps in the direction of Shen Youqing's house, Wei Sizhe suddenly stopped, tilted his head and asked, "Jiahe, should I prepare a red envelope for Shen Youqing's daughter?"

"Put your heart firmly in your stomach, I will help you remember." Chu Jiahe raised his hand to cover Wei Sizhe's back, pushing him to continue walking, "I will never forget this kind of thing."

Wei Sizhe said again: "Let's just take this little gift to visit, is it okay?"

"Don't be anxious, the key point is not the gift." Chu Jiahe exposed him with a smile, and softly told him, "I haven't seen you in so many years, wait a while, don't be restrained, calm down, and have a good chat with Shen Youqing."

Turn right at the intersection, looking far away, the courtyard door of a family is wide open, and children's laughter is scattered in the courtyard.Before Wei Sizhe stepped up the steps, he saw Shen Youqing leaning against the doorpost of the bungalow with a plush toy in his hand.

Medium height, slim build, and wheat complexion, this person has not changed from the appearance in memory. Wei Sizhe looked at Shen Youqing across the courtyard. After a few seconds, Shen Youqing raised his eyes, nodded slightly, and gave the toy to his daughter. Walk towards the door.

He had undergone surgery on his left leg, but it was recovering well, and he was actually a little limping if you didn't look carefully.The first thing Wei Sizhe paid attention to was Shen Youqing's legs. After confirming that there was no major problem, he took the lead and said, "Long time no see."

"Yes." Shen Youqing took the item from Wei Sizhe's hand, smiled at him, "It's really been a long time."

Turning to face Chu Jiahe, Shen Youqing showed a friendly and modest expression, and asked, "Are you Chu Jiahe?"

"Huh?" Wei Sizhe asked in a daze when he heard it, "Haven't you guys seen it before?"

Shen Youqing nodded: "Yes, today is the first time we meet."

Walking into the room full of doubts, Shen Youqing's wife had already prepared tea, Wei Sizhe bowed and thanked him, and when he sat down at the wooden table, from the corner of his eye, there were Financial Daily and Financial Weekly spread out on the small bench next to the bed.

Chu Jiahe didn't follow Wei Sizhe in, he wanted to stay outside to play with Shen Youqing's daughter.

There was clear tea in hand, the fragrance of the tea was overflowing, and the steam was dense, and the two of them didn't touch it for a while.The wooden table faced the door, and the rectangular door frame circled a world in the field of vision, the blue sky, the lively courtyard, Wei Sizhe looked at Chu Jiahe who was laughing and playing with the girl on his back, feeling deeply moved.

The laughter outside the door stopped inside the house for a long time. After half a quarter of an hour, Wei Sizhe breathed a sigh of relief, turned his face and asked, "How are you doing?"

Hearing this, Shen Youqing picked up the teacup and invited Wei Sizhe to drink with him.There was a crisp sound from the rim of the cup, Shen Youqing sipped the tea lightly, and said, "Let's not start with such unreasonable words, shall we?"

No one expected to be able to sit at the same table and talk peacefully. Time should make everything right and wrong, but the broken friendship was slowly rebuilt in Shen Youqing's ordinary tone. Wei Sizhe had mixed feelings, Shen Youqing even more.

Wei Sizhe asked: "Still maintaining the old habits?"

Shen Youqing knew that Wei Sizhe was referring to the newspapers and magazines placed by the bed: "Although I am no longer a 'participant', I must read the financial news before going to bed, or I always feel that there is something wrong with this day .”

When the voice was interrupted, Wei Sizhe's eyes dropped to the ground, and many memory fragments of the four of them working together flashed before his eyes.He drank the tea in the cup, played with the small ceramic teacup, and said slowly: "Old He is married, and I am working with him in Shengrong now."

Rubbing the rim of the cup with her index finger, Shen Youqing listened silently without any response.Wei Sizhe paused for a moment, then continued: "Qi Qian opened a securities company and is still single."

"We don't get together very often, and the occasional recreational activities are still the same as before, such as fishing and golf. My level of golf has not changed at all. I still go my own way and do not follow the rules. I only compare distance, not score."

The bottom of the cup bumped against the corner of the table, Shen Youqing smiled and said, "No one is lazier than you."

Wei Sizhe racked his brains to think about the topic, worried that the performance would be too unfamiliar, and also worried that the scene would be embarrassing.Unexpectedly, in the next second, Shen Youqing turned his head to look over, and said, "Chu Jiahe has written everything you told me in the letter."

"A letter?" Wei Sizhe asked in surprise, "What letter?"

"I guess you definitely don't know." Shen Youqing said, "Otherwise you would never allow Chu Jiahe to run so far every day."

Wei Sizhe frowned: "Every day?"

"Yesterday was the tenth day. Chu Jiahe came to Xihe Village every day, please ask the village director to bring a bagful of things to my house." Shen Youqing pursed her lips and said, "I bought clothes and toys for my children, as well as skin care products for my wife. , Nutrients..."

Outside the house, Chu Jiahe picked up the four-year-old girl, slowly raised and lowered his arms in mid-air, carefully protecting her, and followed her instructions to play "flying the plane" with her.Inside the room, Wei Sizhe's gaze was fixed on Chu Jiahe, he raised his hand and stroked his forehead, and remained silent for a while.

"And, handwritten letters." Shen Youqing continued, "Although the content of each letter is the same, each of the five thick pages is handwritten."

The marks between Wei Sizhe's eyebrows became deeper.

"Delivering the letter personally from thousands of miles away, but not handing it to me in person, not only appears to be sincere, but also leaves room and leeway for me to face the past without any burden."

"He is taking care of my emotions." Shen Youqing said in a gentle voice, "He is using his way to help me build up the confidence to meet you."

"Words are the most decent communication, handwriting is sincerity, I have read this letter from Chu Jiahe no less than a hundred times..."

"Wei Sizhe, your lover is really not simple."

The girl used the red envelope as a fan, raised it to the side of her face and fanned it back and forth. She was tired from the "airplane", and she wanted to ride high again. Chu Jiahe then bent down and squatted down, lowering her back so that she could climb onto her shoulders, and supported her chubby body with her backhand body.

"It's because I didn't have the courage to accept failure. I paid too much attention to gains and losses, and let myself get into a dead end." Shen Youqing said softly, "I didn't realize what I really lost before. The more I can see many things that I couldn’t see when I was young.”

Hearing his relieved tone, Wei Sizhe raised the corners of his lips: "Shen Youqing, we are not old yet."

"Yeah, I'm not old yet." Shen Youqing sighed with a smile, "Perhaps as Chu Jiahe wrote, I can still have the opportunity to 'do it all over again'."

Wei Sizhe turned his face to look at Shen Youqing, after several deliberations, he said word by word: "I'm sorry for what happened back then."

"What did you do wrong? Didn't you try your best? We all tried our best." Shen Youqing shook his head and said, "It's just that the world is impermanent, and fate likes to make things difficult for others."

"What you lost at that time was beyond our comprehension. It was almost all of you." Wei Sizhe said, "So none of us are qualified to ask you to cheer up and solve the problem rationally."

"I won't hide it from you. After the incident, I once hated my life, hated why I took this path, and complained about the injustice in the world every day and night." After many years, Shen Youqing finally chose to let go of her heart. He said frankly to Wei Sizhe, "Some things can only be seen clearly and figured out after calming down. What exactly should I grasp and what is left of me."

"When I really realized that I had lost my three most important friends, I thought it was too late. I thought that all I could do for you was to completely sever the relationship and stop disturbing your lives." Shen You Qing said, "Chu Jiahe told me that you also have the same idea. I know Lao He and Qi Qian, and they would not take the initiative to come to me, because they are the most clear about the importance, and people always want to go to a better and higher place. , and I am a cowardly person, a person left in the past by fate."

"You're not." Wei Sizhe said, picking up the teapot and filling the two cups, "We won't let you stay in the past either."

Shen Youqing turned his face away to ease his mood, Wei Sizhe said in a joking tone: "It's not easy to hear what's in your heart."

"I have wanted to see you since I received the first letter from Chu Jiahe, but I have never been ready. I don't know what kind of state and mentality I should face the past again." Shen Youqing and Wei Sizhe Clinking glasses, "After receiving so much kindness from Chu Jiahe, I was still asking myself last night, even if I, like He Yuan and Qi Qian, are your highly valued friends, Chu Jiahe doesn't have to do it for this sake. The energy, the time wasted, the money wasted, and others have long been impatient."

Wei Sizhe asked: "Then have you thought about why?"

"Because Chu Jiahe doesn't care about his contribution at all as I thought." Shen Youqing replied, "He's just doing his best to do something he thinks is worth doing."

Time passed quietly in the slow-down conversation between the two, and when the pot of tea was drained, Wei Sizhe finally said what had been buried in his heart for a long time: "I never thought that we could still drink tea like before. Chat, talk freely."

"In a person's life, there are a few friends who can go all the way to the end." Shen Youqing said, "My family is very harmonious, my wife is virtuous, and my children are cute, but Wei Sizhe, my truth is, I really miss and It's time for the three of you to 'advance and retreat' in business."

Wei Sizhe said, "We are all waiting for you."

Eye sockets suddenly turned red, Shen Youqing quickly pressed his eyes to control his emotions.After a while, he laughed out loud, then turned back and recalled: "I still remember seven years ago, at the beginning of the company's establishment, the four of us ordered a bunch of beer and barbecued, and sat in the short-term rented Loft apartment to eat and drink. , did everyone tell a wish?"

Wei Sizhe: "It's impossible to forget."

Shen Youqing reiterated: "Qi Qian said that he wanted to 'get rich overnight', Lao He said that he wanted to have 'wine and meat' in every meal, I said that I longed for 'career success', and what you said is... ..."

Wei Sizhe answered: "Even if you get nothing, you should be happy."

Shen Youqing stared at the sunlight outside the door, his relieved expression showed that he was saying goodbye to the past, and decided to look ahead and start again, reuniting with his friends with the mentality of going through a thousand sails: "Yes, be happy."

"Si Zhe." Shen Youqing sighed, and solemnly said to Wei Si Zhe, "Thank you for not giving up on me."

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