My IQ has been increasing year by year.

Chapter 273 Two Young People

On a weekend afternoon, sunlight streamed through the kitchen window, casting a slanted dappled pattern of light on the floor.

The study door was wide open.

Pierre sat down on his sofa, holding a freshly brewed cup of black tea.

In the kitchen, Matilda pulled open the overhead cabinet and took out a jar.

That's a jar we use at home specifically for storing coffee beans.

Matilda glanced into the jar.

Then, she turned the jar upside down, placed it in her palm, and tapped it gently twice.

Only a few scattered coffee beans fell out.

Matilda stopped what she was doing and sighed softly.

She put the jar back on the cabinet, picked up a towel draped over her shoulder, and wiped her hands.

Chen Zhuo sat in the living room reading the latest issue of "Office".

Hearing the noise from the kitchen, Chen Zhuo turned his head.

"Xiao Zhuo."

Matilda draped the towel back over her shoulder, turned around, and looked at him from halfway across the kitchen.

"There are no coffee beans left."

She pointed to the jar.

Chen Zhuo looked at the jar without saying anything, waiting for her to continue.

"I was planning to sunbathe and read in the backyard this afternoon. The sun is shining brightly. Pierre is in his study reading a manuscript. His black tea has just been brewed. I guess he won't be coming out all afternoon."

Matilda sighed softly.

"But I'm out of coffee."

She walked over and sat down next to Chen Zhuo.

"Without coffee, my afternoon plans feel incomplete. When I'm reading, I always feel like something's missing. Could you please go buy some for me?"

Chen Zhuo took a sip of water from his glass.

"Okay, I'll just take a walk while I'm at it."

Chen Zhuo smiled and said.

"Still that old shop on the corner of Nassau Street?"

Chen Zhuo looked at Matilda and asked.

"Yes, that's the one."

Matilda then stood up.

She walked to the shoe cabinet in the entryway and pulled open the top drawer.

There was a coin box in the drawer.

She opened the box, rummaged through it, and pulled out two twenty-dollar bills.

Matilda took the money and walked back to the sofa, handing the banknotes to Chen Zhuo.

"One pound of Mandheling."

She explained it very clearly.

"If you want a dark roast, tell the barista that you only want the whole beans, not that they grind them into powder."

Chen Zhuo reached out, took the two banknotes, and put them in his pocket.

"His family just received a new batch of beans last week."

Matilda watched him pack up the money and continued.

"I like to grind my own powder using the old-fashioned hand-cranked grinder at home. The powder I grind myself has different particle sizes, and the taste is different when I brew it."

"Okay, one pound of Mandheling, dark roast, whole beans."

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Chen Zhuo repeated the key information and nodded.

Matilda came up from behind.

She walked to the door, reached out and took an umbrella from the hook on the wall, glanced at the sky outside, and then hung the umbrella back up.

"No need to bring an umbrella," she said.

Chen Zhuo's hand was already on the doorknob.

"It's getting windy outside."

Matilda reached out and helped Chen Zhuo pull up the collar of his sweatshirt to straighten it.

"The oak leaves along the roadside are falling heavily, and the wind is a bit strong."

Her hand paused for a moment, then she patted Chen Zhuo on the shoulder.

"Take your time on the road. No need to rush back. Nassau Street gets crowded on weekends. Watch out for cars when you cross the street. Thank you."

"Okay, I'm heading out."

Chen Zhuo nodded to Matilda.

"Be careful on the road."

Matilda waved her hand.

Chen Zhuo walked along the street.

He didn't deliberately avoid the fallen leaves on the ground; stepping on those dry leaves produced a series of crisp cracking sounds.

It was very quiet around, with only the occasional passing old-fashioned car and the chirping of unknown birds.

As he passed by the park, he saw Mr. Miller from the next block sweeping fallen leaves in his yard.

The old man was wearing a gray plaid shirt and holding a long-handled plastic rake, gathering the dead leaves on the lawn into a pile.

Good afternoon, Mr. Miller.

Chen Zhuo stopped and greeted them through the fence.

The old man stopped what he was doing, wiped the sweat from his forehead with the back of his hand, and looked over while leaning on his rake.

Good afternoon, Chen.

Mr. Miller smiled.

"Didn't Pierre go for a walk today?"

"He was reading manuscripts in his study," Chen Zhuo said.

"My teacher's wife asked me to go to town to buy some coffee beans."

"It's time for some hot coffee."

Mr. Miller looked up at the gray sky.

"The weather forecast says the temperature will drop again next week, and the leaves on these trees will probably all fall off in the next few days. I have to put them all in bags before it rains, otherwise the grass roots will rot if they are left on the lawn."

"Do you need any help?"

Chen Zhuo glanced at the large piles of fallen leaves that hadn't been bagged yet.

"No, no need."

C

Mr. Miller waved his hand.

"Go buy your things, I'll treat it as a form of exercise too."

Chen Zhuo nodded.

The closer you get to Nassau Street, the louder the noise becomes.

On weekend afternoons, most undergraduates at Princeton would rush out of their dormitories.

The roadside was filled with bicycles of various colors, some with their front wheels leaning crookedly over the curb.

The utility pole on the street corner was covered with a thick layer of posters, the outermost one being about the weekend's football game against Yale University, its edges curled up by the wind.

Chen Zhuo walked on the outside of the sidewalk.

The old coffee shop is located on the corner of Nassau Street in the middle.

The exterior walls were covered with withered ivy vines, and there was a heavy, dark wooden door with a slightly shiny doorknob.

Chen Zhuo reached out and pushed open the door.

The store was very warm, and a thin layer of condensation formed on the inside of the glass windows.

There were a lot of people inside.

The silver semi-automatic espresso machine behind the bar is running at full capacity.

Chen Zhuo walked straight to the bar.

There were three people in the line to order.

Ahead of him in line was a short-haired girl in a beige trench coat, who was looking down and rummaging through her wallet for change.

A twenty-five-cent coin slipped from her fingers, fell to the floor, and rolled to Chen Zhuo's feet.

Chen Zhuo lowered his head and bent down to pick up the coin.

The girl turned around and smiled apologetically.

"Sorry, my hand is a little unresponsive." The girl extended her hand.

"It's okay."

The line moved forward, and the girl ordered a hot latte, took the receipt, and went to the side to wait.

It was Chen Zhuo's turn.

The bartender behind the counter was a young man with a short beard, wearing a dark brown coarse cloth apron, with some coffee powder stuck to his chest.

"What would you like to order?"

The clerk picked up a pen and held it suspended above a paper cup in preparation.

"I won't buy any drinks," Chen Zhuo said.

"I want one pound of Mandheling coffee beans, dark roast."

The shop assistant put down his pen and looked up at him.

"Is this for Mrs. Matilda?" the shop assistant smiled. "She buys this batch of beans every month."

"right."

Chen Zhuo nodded.

"Matilda said, 'Don't grind it into powder, keep the whole bean.'"

"No problem, Madam likes to do things herself."

The shop assistant turned around and took a large paper bag from the shelf behind him.

"This batch was roasted last Tuesday. The beans have been properly aged and the flavor is just right now."

Chen Zhuo put his hands in his pockets and took out the two twenty-dollar bills.

Chen Zhuo stepped back half a step to the left of the counter, giving the front cashier position to the people queuing behind him.

He put his hands back in his pockets and stood there quietly waiting.

While waiting, his gaze swept past the crowd moving around the bar and landed on the best-lit area of ​​the café.

That was a row of round tables by the floor-to-ceiling windows.

The store was noisy, but the voices coming from that corner still carried clearly through the various sounds.

A young man sat at the second round table by the window.

He had his back to the window, and the light gray cashmere sweater he was wearing looked extremely soft, with the collar slightly open, revealing the white shirt collar underneath.

The man spoke very quickly and his English pronunciation was fluent, but he had a noticeable Russian accent when he enunciated words, especially when he encountered trilled 'r' sounds.

"What you're seeing is just the terminal bill, that's the most basic thing."

The man leaned back in his chair, his right hand drawing a large arc in the air.

"Before the natural gas pipeline is laid, all market pricing models are just empty talk. When winter comes and Berlin starts to cool down, if Urengoy slightly reduces the pressure, the figures on the London Stock Exchange will plummet."

He tapped the table with his knuckles.

"This is the leverage bar. The pipes aren't for transporting gas; the pipes are the leverage bar itself."

Three lattes were placed in the middle of the table.

The milk foam in the cup had collapsed due to being left for a long time, leaving an unsightly ring of milk stains on the cup wall, and no one touched the coffee.

Sitting opposite him were three students of similar age, dressed in the typical Ivy League sweaters and casual suits.

They listened intently, one of them holding a pen and unconsciously drawing meaningless lines on a napkin.

Men's body language is full of a natural expansiveness.

When he speaks, he swings his arms with a wide range of motion, and his body leans forward and backward at times, as if this round table, which is less than a meter in diameter, is his desk for issuing orders.

Chen Zhuo leaned against the edge of the bar, watching quietly.

He had only a superficial understanding of those macroeconomic concepts, having only heard some from the news, and the rest was money he had spent on tuition fees in the stock market in his previous life.

At the edge of the same window area, next to an empty table that had just been turned over, stood another young man.

This person is wearing a jacket.

The jacket had faded a bit from washing, and the zipper was zipped all the way up, covering the neck.

The young man held a recycling tray in his left hand and a damp rag in his right.

He was cleaning up the mess left by the previous table of guests.

His movements were extremely swift and quiet.

He first stacked two empty paper cups together and placed them on the edge of the tray, then picked up the dish with a little jam on it and placed it firmly in the center of the tray.

No collision sound was made between the porcelain and the plastic tray when these actions were performed.

Finally, he took the rag and wiped the table in a U-shape.

He didn't use a spray bottle, probably because he was afraid the cleaning agent mist would splash onto the guests next to him.

He finished wiping the table and turned to walk to the next empty table.

The young man noticeably slowed his pace as he passed the round table where the man in the cashmere sweater was.

It's not out of politeness to avoid it, but rather more like an instinct formed over many years, an extreme sensitivity to the sounds and spaces of the surrounding environment.

He tucked his shoulders in slightly, reducing the horizontal cross-sectional area of ​​his body, and slid along the edge of the walkway like a weightless shadow.

His eyes remained lowered, fixed on the tray and dishcloth in his hands.

Chen Zhuo remained leaning against the bar.

On the left and right, the physical states of the two young men existed simultaneously in his field of vision.

One is constantly radiating sound and movement, occupying space, while the other is constantly shrinking itself, erasing any trace of its existence.

"One pound of Mandheling, packed."

The bartender called out.

Chen Zhuo turned his head and looked at the numbers on the electronic scale.

454 grams, exactly one pound.

The shop assistant picked up the bag, folded it twice, and sealed the bag tightly.

"Here's your change, sixteen dollars."

The clerk pushed the paper bag and the change over together.

"Thanks."

Chen Zhuo reached out and took the paper bag, put the change into his pocket, held the paper bag in one hand, and turned to walk out the door.

The moment he turned around.

At the round table by the window, the man in the cashmere sweater was talking about a point that had gotten to him emotionally.

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"As long as we control those transit hubs, the bottom line is in our hands!"

The man spoke loudly, and his right hand, which was resting on the back of the chair, suddenly swung outward in a forceful sweeping motion.

His movements were too exaggerated.

The back of his hand slammed heavily against a glass of water on the corner of the table.

The cup was struck by his massive arm, instantly lost its balance, and fell to the ground.

The young man in the old jacket was carrying a tray and walked to the edge of the table, preparing to collect the old newspapers from the chair next to him.

A piercing cracking sound rang out in the corner of the coffee shop.

The glass shattered instantly upon hitting the hard floor.

Half a glass of ice water, mixed with a few half-melted ice cubes, was splashed on the ground, leaving a large water stain that landed directly on the young man in the jacket's left foot.

They were old leather shoes, with some peeling at the toe, and ice water immediately seeped into the cracks in the leather.

The buzzing conversation in the coffee shop paused briefly.

The students sitting nearby stopped talking and turned to look at them.

The man in the cashmere sweater stopped talking.

He frowned, glanced down at the broken glass on the ground, and then at the young man standing beside him carrying a tray.

There was no apology on the man's face, only annoyance at having his interest interrupted.

He instinctively reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a black leather wallet.

He pinched two two-thousand-dollar bills between his thumb and forefinger and slapped them on the edge of the round table.

Then, he gestured with his chin to the puddle of broken glass mixed with ice on the ground.

"Clean it up."

There was no command or discussion in the man's tone; it was simply a matter-of-fact statement.

It's as natural as putting coins into a vending machine and waiting for the drink to come out.

The young man in the jacket stopped in his tracks.

He still held the tray steadily in his left hand, and the empty cups on the tray remained perfectly still.

He didn't look down at his wet shoes.

He didn't even look at the two green banknotes on the corner of the table.

He slowly raised his head, his gaze passing over the water stains on the ground and landing directly on the face of the man in the cashmere sweater.

His eyes held no anger at being insulted, no servility, and no awkwardness in the face of the rich.

That was a kind of coldness and hardness that Chen Zhuo had captured while observing from the side.

A look like someone staring at a stone in ruins.

Neither of them spoke.

The air in this one or two square meter space seemed to have turned into some kind of high-density solid, and remained frozen.

The students at the next table exchanged glances, but neither of them spoke to break the awkward silence.

Chen Zhuo stood less than three meters away from them, holding the bag of warm coffee beans.

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