Going home for the Chinese New Year with a year-end bonus of 100 million

On Thursday morning, Lin Che woke up to a noise coming from the kitchen.

He sat up abruptly and glanced at his phone—7:20 AM. This was the deepest sleep he'd had in the past month. No waking up in the middle of the night, no endless pondering of lyrics, no lying awake in the dark waiting for dawn.

He put on his slippers and went out of the room, where he saw his mother standing in front of the stove, stirring the porridge in the pot with a ladle. Her movements were slow, and she held onto the edge of the stove with her left hand for balance, but her back was straighter than it had been a few days ago.

"Mom, why are you up?" Lin Che walked over. "I'll take care of it."

"You should sleep a little longer." The old lady didn't turn around. "I'm awake now. I'm just lying here anyway, so I might as well get up and move around. I can still cook some porridge."

Lin Che stood behind her, looking at his mother's gray hair and slightly hunched back. Morning light streamed in through the small kitchen window, falling on her shoulders, as if casting a soft glow on her old sweater. He wanted to say something, but his throat tightened, and in the end, he simply took two bowls from the cupboard and placed them on the stove.

The porridge was plain white porridge, served with a dish of pickled vegetables and a dish of fermented bean curd. It couldn't be simpler, but Lin Che drank two bowls.

"Mom, I don't have anything to do today, let me take you out for a walk."

The old lady, holding her bowl, hesitated, "Where are we going? It's windy outside."

"Let's just go sit in the park, it's not far. Just wear something warm."

The old lady thought for a moment and nodded: "Okay. Then I'll put on that gray sweater."

That morning, Shen Wei was looking at a list of volunteers in her office in the university town, feeling worried.

The "Autumn Harvest" market is almost twice the size of the first phase—the venue area has doubled, the number of stalls has increased from twenty to forty-five, and an agricultural innovation area and a public welfare area have been added. The management provided resources, but also pressure: this is an opportunity brought by the reputation of the first market, and they can't afford to mess it up.

She currently has 32 volunteers signed up, but with 45 stalls, at least 50 people are needed to keep things running.

She scrolled through her contacts, sent messages to several university clubs she had previously collaborated with, and posted recruitment notices in local volunteer groups. After doing all this, she leaned back in her chair and rubbed her temples.

The phone on the table vibrated.

Lin Che sent a photo. The photo showed a lake in a park, the autumn sun shining on the water, making it shimmer. There were several willow trees by the lake, their leaves mostly yellow, drooping over the water and reflecting faint images. In the corner of the photo, you could see the back of an old woman sitting on a bench, a plaid scarf draped over her knees.

The caption read: "I brought my mom out to sunbathe. She said thank you for the plum wine."

When Shen Wei saw the photo, a smile unconsciously crept onto her lips. She replied, "Tell Auntie for me that I'll bring another bottle over another day."

After sending the message, she turned off her phone and looked at the list of volunteers in front of her again.

I don't seem so tired anymore.

That same morning, Su Jing completed the final step in a custom order at her studio.

It's a women's quilted jacket made of dark gray cotton-linen fabric, with a very narrow indigo piping along the collar and cuffs. The fit is slightly loose, but the waistline is perfectly cinched, making it both comfortable and neat. The client is a university professor in her forties with a quiet personality. When she came to order, she said, "I want an outfit to wear to class, not too formal, but appropriate."

After Su Jing finished, she hung her coat on the mannequin and stepped back a few paces to take a look.

She remembered Lin Che's song "Sewing Machine". After returning to her studio last night, she found an old piece of clothing belonging to her grandmother - a dark blue cloth shirt with Chinese knot buttons, the cuffs were worn white, and there were several small patches on the collar, each stitch neatly sewn.

She folded the garment and placed it on the shelf next to the worktable.

Then she sent a message to the customer: "The coat is ready, you can come and try it on anytime."

After sending the message, she put down her phone, sat down at her worktable, picked up a leftover scrap of material, and examined it over and over in her hand.

The piece of cloth wasn't big, so she started measuring its size with her fingertips, and an idea gradually came to mind.

In the afternoon, Yang Fan received a call from Lin Che.

"Brother Yang, are you free tonight?"

"I'm free. What's up?"

"I'd like to invite you to dinner, just the two of us." Lin Che paused, "There's something I'd like to tell you."

Yang Fan agreed. After hanging up the phone, he sat in his office for ten minutes without doing any work.

He could sense Lin Che's changing state—from his breakdown that day, to his composure on Wednesday night, to his calm this morning; the process was faster than he had imagined. But it was also quite reasonable.

For some people, the cracks in their skin widen slowly in silence.

For some people, the cracks only begin to heal the moment they are exposed to light.

They met at a small noodle shop near the university town at six o'clock in the evening.

The noodle shop was small, with only five or six tables. The owners were a middle-aged couple who spoke with a genuine Sichuan accent. The menu on the wall was handwritten, with dishes like red oil wontons, dan dan noodles, braised pork intestine noodles, and pig's trotter soup... The handwriting was crooked, but each dish name was followed by a red "push" character.

Lin Che ordered a bowl of braised pork intestine noodles, Yang Fan ordered a bowl of pea and minced meat noodles, and also ordered a serving of wontons in chili oil and a plate of pickled vegetables.

"My mom talked to me a lot today." Lin Che picked up a piece of pork intestine but didn't eat it immediately. "A lot of things she'd never said before."

Yang Fan didn't respond, waiting for him to continue.

"She said that when she was young, she actually wanted to learn tailoring and worked in a factory because there were no other choices in those days. She said that she herself hadn't received much education, so she especially hoped that I could study. But I later chose music, and although she didn't understand it, she never stopped me."

Lin Che put the fatty intestines into his mouth and chewed them slowly.

"She also said that she had a boyfriend when she was young, but it wasn't my dad." Lin Che smiled bitterly as she said this. "She said that person later went to the south and never came back. When she said these things, it was as if she was telling someone else's story."

"And what about you?" Yang Fan asked.

"Me?" Lin Che looked up, somewhat puzzled.

"What did you say to her?"

Lin Che was silent for a moment, then put down his chopsticks: "I told her about what happened in Beijing. The band broke up, the debts I owed, and how I drank myself into a stomach hemorrhage in my rented apartment. I've never told any of this to anyone before."

"Why did you say that today?"

"Because I felt she wanted to know," Lin Che said. "I used to be afraid she would worry, so I never said anything. But my mom is much stronger than I thought. She can endure much more than I realized."

Yang Fan looked at him without saying anything in response.

He simply picked up the teacup in front of him and said, "Come, let's drink tea instead of wine."

Lin Che also picked up his cup, and the two rough white porcelain cups clinked together under the dim light, making a crisp sound.

"Thank you, Brother Yang."

After finishing his noodles, Lin Che put down his chopsticks, as if he had made up his mind, and took out a folded piece of paper from his bag and handed it to Yang Fan.

"This is another song I wrote."

Yang Fan took the paper and unfolded it. The paper didn't contain the title "Sewing Machine," but rather a new song. The handwriting was still messy, but cleaner than the previous draft. The title read: "Autumn Light."

He read the lyrics over, and they were completely different from "Sewing Machine"—this song contained no mother, no guilt, no past. It described an evening when a person in a park saw a group of children running on the grass, chasing a soap bubble floating in the air. The soap bubble refracted colorful light under the setting sun, then burst, and the children let out a sigh of regret, but quickly ran off to chase another one.

The lyrics include this passage:

When the soap bubble bursts

The children let out soft sighs.

But they immediately turned around

Go after the next transparent hope.

The autumn sunlight shone on their faces

The light didn't explain anything.

It just landed, and that was it.

In their outstretched palms

After Yang Fan finished reading, he folded the paper and returned it to Lin Che.

When was this song written?

"Last night," Lin Che said, "I couldn't sleep after I got back, so I wrote this."

"Well written."

Lin Che took the paper, looked down at it for a while, and then looked up: "I want to produce both of these songs. Complete arrangements, recording, finding musicians, and making a song that can be uploaded to a platform."

"Then let's do it," Yang Fan said.

"It costs money," Lin Che said bluntly. "Arrangement, recording studio, mixing, mastering, plus the musicians' fees, I've calculated it, and it will cost around 15,000 yuan. I've saved some money, but it's not enough."

Yang Fan didn't hesitate: "How much short?"

Lin Che paused for a moment, then said, "Eight thousand."

"I'll contribute five thousand," Yang Fan said. "You can ask others if they're willing to contribute the remaining three thousand. But don't borrow it; consider it an investment. If the song generates revenue after it's released, we'll split it proportionally."

Lin Che opened his mouth, as if to say something, but didn't say anything.

In the end, he simply nodded emphatically: "Okay."

By the time they left the noodle shop, it was completely dark. The streetlights cast long shadows of the two of them. A gust of wind blew, carrying a few fallen leaves that swirled around their feet before settling back to the ground.

"Brother Yang," Lin Che suddenly spoke up.

"Um?"

"I changed one word in the last part of the song 'Sewing Machine'."

Yang Fan turned to look at him.

Lin Che said, "The original line was 'The stitches sewed up all the unspoken words for me,' and I changed 'for' to 'accompany'."

"The stitches accompanied me as I sewed up all the unspoken words."

He stood under the streetlight, his shadow spreading out behind him as a blurry dark mass, but his eyes shone brightly in the light.

"Because she never did anything for me. She just stayed with me and let me finish sewing by myself."

Yang Fan looked at him for a while.

Then he reached out and patted Lin Che on the shoulder.

"You've really finished writing this time."

That night, after Yang Fan returned home, he sent a message in the ecosystem group:

"Lin Che needs to record a song. He needs an investment of three thousand yuan. I'll contribute five thousand. Who wants to join in on the remaining three thousand?"

The group chat exploded within three minutes of the message being sent.

Shen Wei: "I'll go with 1,000."

Su Jing: "I'll go with 1000."

Chen Mo (Cultural and Creative): "I'm with 500. I'm a little short on cash lately, sorry."

Chen Mo (Security): "I'll make up the remaining five hundred."

Zhou Jin: "I'm a step too late. Then I'll take charge of monitoring support during the mixing stage. I have monitoring headphones and sound cards, which can help me listen for details."

Lin Che did not speak in the group.

But a minute later, Yang Fan received a private message.

"I don't know how to thank you."

Yang Fan looked at those four words, thought for a moment, and replied:

"Just make sure the song is good."