One Life, One Incarnation, Beautiful Bones

46

Zhousheng Chen was very busy of late. Most of the time, she would eat by herself, and she was very used to him coming home late. That morning, after they visited Wenxing, he took her home and then left again.

She read through some scripts for a little while but then grew distracted and began to revise her own draft. Her editing ended up carrying on until past seven olock.

In her mind, she was deliberating over wording. Her hands gripped the stack of papers while she unconsciously drummed the table lightly with it. After a while, she turned her head and laid her cheek against the desktop. Her brows furrowed together, relaxed, then slowly furrowed again. Thoroughly absorbed in her own thoughts, she did not even notice that Zhousheng Chen had returned.

He hung up his coat that was still dripping droplets of water, and then, through the open door, he saw her in the study.

He stepped into the study. “What problems have you run into?”

Shi Yi instinctively closed her file folder and was about to stand, but he placed a hand on her shoulder.

He crouched down in front of her, motioning to her just to speak as she was.

After mulling for a moment, she had to admit to him, “Tangled in a trap of my own mind.”

“A trap of your own mind?”

“I’m writing something, and I want to write it in the best way possible so I’m overthinking the wording and sentences.” She exhaled lightly. “It’s a trap by my own mind.”

“Mm,” he said, indicating that he understood. “Let me think how I can help you get out of it.”

She laughingly scoffed, “I won’t trouble you, the great scientist, with this.”

“Shh… Let me think. I think I’ve come up with something.”

Amused, she nodded.

“Do you remember how I answered you in regards to what the second lunar month is known as?”

“Gan Xiang [Fragrant Violet].”

He nodded. “That was actually spoken out of my habit. If you delve into this more seriously, the second lunar month actually has many alternate names, and each of those names has a different origin. Wouldn’t it be very difficult, then, if you were forced to decide which is the better name?”

She admitted that what he was saying was true.

“Just like in the laboratory, I never require students to completely copy me. Everyone will have their own methods that are appropriate to them.” He contemplated briefly and then continued, “I am not very good at literary writing or essays, but I do know that the scholarly and literary persons of the past each had their own preferred or habitually used phrases and words. For both research and writing, the key lies in this.” With his finger, he lightly tapped his own temple and said, “Use the ways and styles you are used to using to write what you want to write.”

“Mm.”

“You haven’t had dinner?” He patted her stomach. “Hungry?”

She answered honestly, “Yes.”

“Let’s go.” He straightened. “We’ll go out to eat.”

“Now?” Simply from listening to the noise of the rain, she could imagine the weather outside.

“I looked at the weather forecast. The rain will stop in an hour. We will drive slowly and go to eat somewhere that takes a little longer to drive to.”

“The weather forecast?” Shi Yi had always had a bad impression about weather forecasts. “What if it’s not accurate?”

Shi Yi followed his foosteps, keeping along with his pace as she spoke to him.