SG 12

On a weekend night full of customers, things didn’t feel so hard to bear because Chu Baiyan was there. Even with someone helping him, Yan Anqing didn’t just sit back. When customers asked professional questions, he still answered. But for any question outside that, his gaze would move toward Chu Baiyan.

Every time that happened, Chu Baiyan felt like a satellite receiver. He could always sense the signal for help coming from Yan Anqing. He would see that small pointed chin turn his way, and that expectant look in his eyes waited for him to take over.

Chu Baiyan also didn’t like dealing with people, but something like this, simple customer contact without much talk, was easy enough. He actually liked store owners like Yan Anqing, calm and self-service type. If you wanted something, you bought it. If you didn’t, you could leave without feeling awkward.

What he really hated were overly eager shop owners. From the moment he stepped inside, they would follow right next to him. If his eyes stopped on a product for more than two seconds, an explanation came right after. If he wasn’t interested, they’d rush to recommend another. That kind of thing killed any mood to buy.

Yes, a calm customer needed a calm shop owner.

After nine o’clock, customers began to thin out. Chu Baiyan walked to the counter. Yan Anqing handed him a bottle of water.

“Drink.”

He unscrewed the cap, took a long gulp, and put the bottle down. He picked up a ceramic starfish from the box next to him, stood before the tank, and compared it to the real starfish inside. Each one had its own charm.

“Why don’t you keep some fish too?” Chu Baiyan asked. There weren’t many people who kept only starfish in their tank.

“I like starfish.” Fast-moving creatures made him feel pressured. Starfish didn’t. Whenever he saw them, they were always slow, never hurried.

“What else do you like?” Chu Baiyan asked again, remembering he still hadn’t decided on a gift.

“The sea.”

“The sea?” Chu Baiyan raised his eyebrows. That was a wide category.

“The ‘son of the sea’ lives there. There’s no sea in Jindu, so I can only go to the aquarium.” Yan Anqing liked the sea, but he couldn’t live near it.

Even though that answer explained nothing, Chu Baiyan could roughly guess that watching the aquarium every day was the same as seeing the sea for him.

He placed the ceramic starfish back in the box. His eyes went to the “merman” plate again. It felt completely different now. He had watched the whole process of making it. The amount of work was beyond what he had imagined. From shaping, carving, to coloring, every step was precise and careful.

The shop also had other plates that could be used as decorations, but none had a human figure. That one was the only one, and it wasn’t for sale, which showed how important it was to Yan Anqing.

After finishing the inventory and recording everything in his notes, Yan Anqing took out special packaging boxes and packed the items Chu Baiyan bought.

“Why did you hold hands with the red ‘merman’?” he suddenly asked.

“Huh?” Chu Baiyan’s mind could never keep up with his sudden jumps in thought.

“I didn’t like it.” Now that there were no customers, his brain was back to normal. He remembered that besides the weekend crowd, that was the other reason he’d felt unhappy earlier.

“The morning show?”

“Yeah.”

Chu Baiyan understood and explained, “We didn’t hold hands. That was the curtain call. When our hands were open, it just looked like that from outside, but we didn’t touch.”

When he was in kindergarten, every time they had games that required holding hands, he was always the one left alone. The teacher would say, everyone find your best friend and hold hands, but Yan Anqing never had a best friend. No one wanted to play with him, and no one wanted to hold his hand.

He never doubted Chu Baiyan’s words. He nodded, but then added softly, “Don’t hold hands with him anymore.” He could accept that Chu Baiyan wasn’t his best friend, but he didn’t want him to have another one either.

Chu Baiyan couldn’t help but laugh. Of course he wouldn’t hold hands with a male coworker. Outside of performance time, they barely talked.

“I’m closing now.” Yan Anqing’s mood brightened again before bedtime. When Chu Baiyan picked up the shopping bags to leave, he called out to him.

Tonight, Yan Anqing remembered to tell him good night.

It was already ten when Chu Baiyan walked out of “Starfish Pottery.” The residential paths were quiet, almost no one was out walking. The dim and soft streetlights shone through thick branches.

In fairy tales, magic always vanished at midnight. But Yan Anqing seemed to have a kind that didn’t fade, one that could live on inside the story. Walking down the tree-lined path home, Chu Baiyan thought that wasn’t so bad. His life was simple and pure. That alone was more than most people had.

The next day, Yan Anqing got his tofu pudding, fried dough, and rice cakes as he wished. When he came back from the aquarium and stepped into the shop, his phone rang.

“Baby, are you at the store?”

“I just walked in.”

“I figured by now you’d be back from the aquarium.” The sound of his voice made the wrinkles at the corners of Grandma’s eyes soften.

“I’ll visit you tomorrow. Grandpa Zhang and Grandpa Liu are coming to see your grandpa. With them there, I’d only get in the way if I stayed home.”

His grandfather had Alzheimer’s. At first, he only forgot small things, but in the last two years it had gotten worse. He remembered the distant past clearly but had no impression of anything recent. He could still take care of himself, but they didn’t dare let him go out or stay home alone. With his old war buddies coming, Grandma finally had a chance to leave the house.

“Grandma, you can see the ‘merman’ tomorrow.” Yan Anqing was cheerful. He had planned to call her later anyway.

“You come early. He leaves at 9:45.”

“The one from the aquarium? He swam to your place?” Conversations like this had happened many times. She was used to it now, just following his words naturally. Most of the time, those scenes only existed in his imagination.

Since reading The Little Mermaid as a child, Yan Anqing had always believed there was also a “son of the sea” in the world. He often described to his grandma what his imagined “merman” looked like, even reenacted conversations with him, and told her what they talked about.

They had consulted doctors before. The doctor said as long as it didn’t affect his daily life, there was no need to interfere. No matter how normal he seemed, he was still a patient. So Grandma stopped correcting him. She just went along with it. If her baby said there was a “merman,” then there was one.

Two months ago, when Yan Anqing saw the mermaid show at the aquarium, he decided that one of them was the “son of the sea” he had been looking for, and he even dragged Grandma to see it with him.

Grandma, of course, knew those “mermen” were just performers. But Yan Anqing was different. He had high-functioning autism. Since he’d been treated early, he could live and study like an ordinary person. But there were still parts of his perception locked inside his own world, where no explanation from others could reach him.