The Eye of the Storm

It is a long way from Yancheng to Beijing. I set off early before nine o'clock in the morning, but I still haven't arrived at the destination at two o'clock in the afternoon.

The interior of the off-road vehicle is spacious, but with four men sitting in it, the space is still a bit cramped.

There were very few conversations along the way, and the driver sitting in the driver's seat focused on driving, so naturally he didn't talk much.Sitting in the co-pilot's seat was Cao Xiuyuan's assistant, Zheng Yin. Except for turning his head to chat with Cao Xiuyuan about work when he first got in the car, he had nothing to say for most of the rest of the time.

Liang Sizhe was sitting next to Cao Xiuyuan, at first he was a little uncomfortable, but when he saw that Cao Xiuyuan was just looking down at a pile of printed materials—probably scripts—and didn’t pay attention to himself, he quickly relaxed and leaned his head on the side. Leaning on the back of the chair, Wei Wei stared at the fast receding trees outside the car window.

Long-distance driving is especially suitable for sleeping, but Liang Sizhe did not feel sleepy. He felt that the situation and the scene had a sense of unreality, like a dream.

From the first time I met Cao Xiuyuan to getting on this off-road vehicle with him, the interval was less than 24 hours.

He closed his eyes, and the image of seeing Cao Xiuyuan for the first time yesterday could not help appearing in his mind.

The takeaway ordered for dinner last night was terrible, and he went downstairs with his slippers on, ready to dump the leftovers to the stray cats and dogs gathered downstairs.When he was about to reach the corner of the building, he saw two gangsters talking and laughing together. When he got closer, he saw that one of the gangsters was holding a thin willow stick and lashing hard at a pregnant female cat.

Liang Sizhe walked over, and with a wave of his hand, he put the lunch box in his hand on the bastard's head.Vegetable soup dripped down the bastard's forehead and bridge of nose, the bastard instantly uttered a rude swear word, held the thin willow stick in his hand, raised his hand and slapped Liang Sizhe viciously, Liang Sizhe turned his body to hide for a while, While turning sideways, his shoulder was hit, and when the bastard was about to hit him a second time, he raised his left hand to catch the thin willow stick, as if he felt no pain in his palm, he pulled it over with all his strength, Then he kicked the bastard's stomach hard.

Unsurprisingly, what followed was a fierce battle, the two gangsters didn't take advantage of it, and Liang Sizhe was bound to suffer.His shoulders were in hot pain from the slender wicker, and he kicked the slippers somewhere in the scuffle just now.

When the two sides fight, whoever wants to kill will win.Liang Sizhe is this kind of person, he has an air of recklessness in fights - he doesn't care about his own life, and he doesn't take the other party's life seriously.The two gangsters were frightened by him in a short while, and they backed up and said cruel words, saying that they would call their brothers to come over and take off his arm tomorrow.

Liang Sizhe didn't take this seriously, he ran away without chasing the gangster, looking around for his slippers.

The sky was completely dark during the scuffle just now, and the dim light of the street lamps spread on the concrete pavement in the community. He couldn't find any slippers, so he gave up quickly, with one foot in the slipper and the other bare. Then, with a normal expression, he returned the same way.

In the past year, he had made a lot of enemies nearby. For him, such fights were commonplace, and it was not worth remembering for a long time. He would forget about it after sleeping.

When I got on the elevator, the marble floor was a bit cold, my bare foot rested on the top of the other slipper, my left shoulder leaned against the side wall of the elevator, Liang Sizhe watched the numbers jumping on the electronic screen.

His hair hadn't been cut for several months, and it reached his shoulders. Before he went out, he tied his head with a rubber band indiscriminately. The shoulders of his denim jacket were pulled away by thin wicker, and the torn fabric hung down, revealing bruises. There was an obvious piece of flesh, one of the slippers was missing, and the vegetable soup was still stained on his hands.

Just walking to the door of the house in such a state of embarrassment, when he raised his eyes, he saw three people standing at the door.

One of them he knew was his professional teacher in the attached music high school a year ago, and there was a tall man about 40 years old, who was staring at him closely, making no effort to hide the scrutiny in his eyes at this moment.

While the man was looking at him from head to toe, Liang Sizhe also looked at the man without showing any timidity - he looked familiar, but couldn't tell where he had seen him for a while.Just as he was trying to search for the memory of this person in his mind, the music teacher standing next to him saw him, suddenly became energetic, and waved to him: "Liang Sizhe!"

Only then did Liang Sizhe look away, and looked at the female teacher with no expression on her face: "Why are you here?"

"Why didn't you even say hello? Didn't you recognize it?" The female teacher didn't answer his question, she came over and grabbed his arm to introduce him, her tone filled with excitement that couldn't be concealed, "Director Cao Xiuyuan! I know Right? The director of "Female Volt"!"

"Oh," Liang Sizhe turned his brain that was about to rust, without showing any surprise, he just opened his lips slowly and called out, "Director Cao."

The moment he called the exit, he remembered what the familiar name Cao Xiuyuan meant—a well-known film director in China, with numerous trophies, and several newcomers in the mainland—how could such a person appear at his door?

"Yeah, what's wrong here?" The vocal music teacher noticed the blood on his shoulder, "Did you fight with someone?"

"It's okay," Liang Sizhe didn't seem to care, "I had a fight with the dog downstairs."

"Sizhe, you..." The vocal music teacher looked at him, hesitated to speak, but finally changed the subject, and suggested kindly, "Please invite Director Cao to come in and sit down. Director Cao is here to see you."

Liang Sizhe was silent for two seconds: "My house is quite messy, why don't we just talk about it here."

"Open the door and have a look." The famous director Cao Xiuyuan looked at him and said, "Do you mind?"

"Just as long as you don't mind." Liang Sizhe looked up at him and said, then took out the key in his pocket with his unsoaked hand, and lowered his head to unlock the door.

Pushing open the door, Liang Sizhe raised his hand and turned on the ceiling light in the living room.

The room was indeed quite messy, with sofa cushions thrown all over the floor.The open piano case lay horizontally in the center of the living room, and next to it was a smashed violin, the broken neck of which was pulled by the strings.

A living room of tens of square meters should be open and bright, but right now it is so frustrating that people have nowhere to go.

Liang Sizhe didn't show any embarrassment. He took off the slipper and walked in front barefoot, stepping on the finely textured milky white tiles, stooping to pick them up all the way, putting the cushions back on the sofa, and packing up the violin and piano case Putting it against the wall, as if the breaking of the piano neck never happened: "Sit down." Then he went into the bathroom to wash his hands.

After washing his hands, he opened the door and walked out, and saw Cao Xiuyuan sitting on the single sofa facing the bathroom door in the living room, his eyes seemed to fall on the smashed violin in the corner.Seeing him come out, she began to look at him unabashedly again.That gaze seemed to have penetrating power, and Liang Sizhe felt a little terrified when he saw it.

He walked over and sat on the single sofa opposite Cao Xiuyuan. Although he felt uncomfortable, he still let him look at him.

"How is your finger recovering?" Cao Xiuyuan looked at him directly and asked, the question was as straightforward as his sharp eyes, "Can you still play the violin?"

This year, no one dared to raise this issue in front of Liang Sizhe. Everyone thought that this issue would irritate him, crush him, and make him collapse at any time.The female teacher squeezed sweat in her hands and looked at Liang Sizhe uneasily.

But Liang Sizhe looked surprisingly calm, even he himself did not expect that he would be so calm when facing this problem, as if all thoughts about the violin had died.Died completely, without any waves.

"I can't play anymore." He said frankly.

"Have the bones grown?"

"It's grown up."

"Did you think about your future plans during the year you left school?"

"Not yet." Liang Sizhe said.

It doesn't feel good to be interrogated by a stranger, not to mention that the content of the interrogation is something I don't want to mention, which makes Liang Sizhe feel a little annoyed.

Originally, I thought that if I answered "I can't play it anymore", the director in front of me should lose interest in me, but I didn't expect to ask endlessly--didn't he come to choose the kind of stuntman who can play the violin?

Cao Xiuyuan was silent for a moment, his eyes kept on his face, and after a while, he asked again: "Have you ever thought about acting in a movie?"

"I haven't thought about it." Liang Sizhe said truthfully.I thought about being a violinist.

"If you want, you can follow me to Beijing for a try, since you don't have any plans for the future." Cao Xiuyuan looked at the person sitting next to him, "Zheng Yin, shall we go back tomorrow?"

"Yes, at nine o'clock tomorrow morning." The man replied immediately.

Cao Xiuyuan got up from the sofa, stood up, looked down at Liang Sizhe and said, "Think about it for a night, if you want to try, follow us tomorrow."

Liang Sizhe suddenly raised his head and looked at him: "May I ask what your role is? It's related to the violin?"

Cao Xiuyuan didn't speak, Zheng Yin beside him spoke for him: "Yes, a boy learning violin."

"But I can't play the violin anymore." Liang Sizhe still looked at Cao Xiuyuan, waiting for his answer seriously.

Cao Xiuyuan measured him for a few more seconds before he said, "For an actor, it doesn't matter whether he can play the violin or not."

Hearing this, the person next to him immediately turned his head to look at Cao Xiuyuan, as if he wanted to say something, but Cao Xiuyuan obviously didn't intend to give him time to speak, so he raised his leg and walked towards the door.

In this way, Liang Sizhe followed them on the off-road vehicle bound for Beijing at nine o'clock in the morning the next day.

Cao Xiuyuan is right, since he has no plans for the future, let's try.