Before writing this story, I sat next to the pot of succulent on the balcony of my home and thought for a long time where to start. Later I thought, let's start with that bottle of water priced at 9 yuan. That bottle of water was from Nongfu Spring, eight bottles at a time, bought at a discount from the supermarket. When Zhou Ye appeared at the door of the fire escape carrying it, I was sitting on the steps in a daze. I just got laid off and I don't know where I will go tomorrow. I revised my resume three times and still don't think it works. He sat next to me, put one of the bottles at my feet, and said, "It's 9 yuan and 9, don't dislike it." I thought, this guy is really interesting. After living in Beijing for three years, no one ever handed me water worth 9 yuan. Everyone drank coffee worth more than 30 yuan and talked about projects valued at several hundred million. By the end of the conversation, no one could tell where their rent would come from next month. He handed me a bottle of water and said, "Don't dislike it." Later we started chatting about the bottle of water. Talk about being laid off, talking about interviews, and talking about "what's the point of living". He said that he studied philosophy and said that there is no ultimate meaning but temporary meaning. I thought he was talking nonsense. Later I found out that he was not talking nonsense - the soft-boiled eggs he cooked were my temporary meaning. Later, the egg turned into a bowl of noodles, the bowl of noodles became a studio, the studio became a home, and the home became three people's. Are the people and things written in the story true? Some are. Some are not. The fire escape is real, I sat there. Yellow hair is real, I have seen it. The water priced at 9 yuan and 9 is also real, I have drank it. But those conversations, those fights, those nights spent squatting on the floor crying—some of them were made up by me, some were experienced by others, and some were what I imagined would have happened if I had been braver.
