AVRL 38

After the grandmaster finished saying these words, he left the pavilion. Meng Chi sat dazedly in place, eyes lowered and expression restrained, not knowing what he was thinking. Yu Tingzhi did not leave; he quietly sat to the side accompanying him.

Only after the tea in the fairness pitcher had been drunk dry by him did Meng Chi seem to wake as if from a dream and open his mouth to remind: “Don’t drink any more. You didn’t eat much at noon. This tea is strong—it’s easy to get tea-drunk.”

Yu Tingzhi raised a brow: “You can get drunk from drinking tea?”

“Yes,” Meng Chi said. “There’s caffeine in tea. If you drink too much on an empty stomach your blood sugar will drop, and then you’ll feel dizzy and weak.”

Yu Tingzhi nodded, set down the teacup in his hand, and asked: “Have you ever been tea-drunk?”

Meng Chi nodded: “Once. Back when I first started learning the craft I didn’t understand much. One time I drank too much, felt dizzy and nauseous. Fortunately Master discovered it in time, otherwise I’d have been done for.”

Tea drunkenness was different from alcohol drunkenness. The “intoxicating” substance in tea was the caffeine in the leaves. Excessive intake of caffeine could produce adverse reactions—insomnia, dizziness, and nausea were the mild ones; in severe cases there could be muscle tremors, cardiac arrhythmias, even convulsions and seizures. These were dangerous signals of over-excitation of the central nervous system and required prompt medical attention. Long-term excessive intake of the fluorides in tea leaves could also cause chronic poisoning.

“That serious?” Yu Tingzhi’s brows furrowed slightly.

Meng Chi smiled: “That’s only for some special constitutions. Actually, as long as you don’t drink too much at once, overall tea has more benefits for the human body.”

For example, the catechins in tea leaves could fight cancer—green tea had the highest catechin content among teas. Polyphenols including catechins, as well as lipopolysaccharides and other substances, could protect against radiation. Tea polyphenols could also help lower the risk of cardiovascular disease. In addition, tea leaves could sterilize and disinfect.

“Let’s go. The tea leaves should be about finished airing,” Meng Chi glanced at the time and said to Yu Tingzhi. “Let me show you the wisdom of our predecessors.”

Yu Tingzhi smiled and followed him together toward the rear hall.

The layout of this small Zen courtyard was a bit like a siheyuan courtyard house, facing east with its back to the west. The tea room and main hall were in the center, the side rooms to the south, the kitchen to the north. On both the north and south sides there was a transparent long corridor—one side connected to the garden, the other to the vegetable plot.

The boiler for making tea was in the long corridor on the south side. As Yu Tingzhi approached he saw two large iron woks resting on a rough stove built of stacked bricks, the whole thing about half a meter high. Beside it was a low stool for the tea-making master to sit on, and on the other side of the stove was a dark blue stone table with vertical grooves, its entire body a dark color that proclaimed the traces of years.

Meng Chi told Yu Tingzhi to go fetch the aired tea leaves with a bamboo dustpan, while he himself went to clean the large wok thoroughly.

By the time Yu Tingzhi brought the tea leaves over, Meng Chi had already washed the wok and lit the fire. The grandmaster had also rolled up his sleeves and sat on the low stool, ready to get to work in earnest.

The key to fixing (killing the green) lay in the control of the heat—keeping it at a temperature that would neither scald the hands nor fail to cook the tea leaves thoroughly.

In the past, without high-tech products to maintain a constant temperature, masters acquired experience and mastered the technique through repeated operations.

Yu Tingzhi sat to the side watching, watching those emerald-green tea leaves being continuously turned by the grandmaster’s palms inside the iron wok.

His technique was skilled. With nearly every movement he lifted all the leaves in the wok in one handful, flipped and stirred them rapidly, shook them out evenly—all in one continuous flow, like raining a shower of tea leaves into the wok, stir-frying every single leaf thoroughly and evenly.

The grandmaster truly lived up to being an old master who had made tea for many years. His hands never stopped turning while his mouth could still chat with Yu Tingzhi, telling him that one had to wait until the leaves in the wok softened, the leaf surfaces lost their luster and took on a dark green color, and felt slightly sticky to the touch before the fixing was complete and one could proceed to the next step—rolling.

Only then did Yu Tingzhi understand what that blue stone slab was for.

The grandmaster evenly spread the fixed tea leaves on that blue stone table with vertical grooves and gently began to roll them.

This was an extremely delicate job: one could neither crush the tea leaves nor fail to preserve the white down on the backs of the buds.

After rolling, the first drying could be carried out. After that, a round bamboo tray was covered over them and they were dried a second time before the production was considered complete.

“Come smell,” the grandmaster held the just-finished dry tea and very showily called Yu Tingzhi over to appreciate the tea fragrance.

The newly made Maofeng was covered in white down, the bud tips like awns, the color like ivory. Every single leaf was uniform and sturdy. Before even drawing close, Yu Tingzhi’s nose was already filled with the tea fragrance—rich and penetrating to the heart.

“Good tea,” he said.

Perhaps because he had personally witnessed the production of this tea, these simple two words were the most earnest Yu Tingzhi had ever spoken them. From the bottom of his heart he was conquered by this tea fragrance.

Meng Chi walked over beside Yu Tingzhi and bumped his shoulder: “Isn’t my grandmaster amazing?”

“Mm, very amazing,” Yu Tingzhi nodded. After a pause he added, “Aren’t you going to show off your skills?”

Meng Chi arched a brow: “You want to watch me make tea?”

“Mm,” Yu Tingzhi nodded.

Meng Chi smiled, turned, and walked toward the long corridor: “Come on.”

After all, he had followed the grandmaster and learned for several years. Meng Chi’s technique was in no way inferior to the grandmaster’s; instead it added a few degrees of efficiency and competence. Yu Tingzhi quietly watched from the side, watching his two hands turning back and forth inside the iron wok. Because his skin was sensitive, before long his fingertips, knuckles, and palms were covered with a layer of crimson. That bit of scarlet flickered in and out of sight amid a stretch of ink-green. Yu Tingzhi felt a bit of an itch in his heart and suddenly very much wanted to paint.

“How about it—want to try?” Seeing him watching entranced, the grandmaster opened his mouth to ask.

“Can I try?” Yu Tingzhi asked.

“Forget it,” Meng Chi suddenly interjected. “Don’t scald your hands.”

The grandmaster laughed once: “He’s not even afraid of scalding his own hands, yet you’ve already started feeling the pain for him ahead of time.”

Meng Chi: “…Who’s feeling the pain.”

Meng Chi lifted his eyes and glanced at Yu Tingzhi. Meeting the smile in his eyes, he opened his mouth and said: “Teacher Yu still has to teach students how to paint. If he really gets scalded, wouldn’t that be misleading the younger generation?”

The grandmaster uttered an “mm”: “That’s true too. Then you’d better just watch.”

Yu Tingzhi wasn’t particularly insistent on trying either. Just watching Meng Chi make tea like this was quite interesting.

By the time all the fresh leaves picked that morning had been processed, it was already near evening. Meng Chi, mindful that Yu Tingzhi still had to teach the next day, specially contacted the master from the temple who went down the mountain to buy supplies, asking him to take Yu Tingzhi along on the way.

Originally Meng Chi had still wanted to stay on the mountain a couple more days, but Jiang Hong called him, saying the factory had produced a batch of decent-quality dry tea and asking if he wanted to come take a look.

“The factory just switched to a new master. The tea he makes is much better than before. I shot a video for you—take a look. If you want it, come over and see. I’ve still got clients waiting for my reply.”

Jiang Hong hung up after speaking. Meng Chi opened WeChat and saw the live-shot video Jiang Hong had sent him. The strip shape of the dry tea in the video looked acceptable, only the color was a bit dark. But phone photography definitely had a certain color discrepancy. In the end Meng Chi still decided to go down the mountain together with Yu Tingzhi.

The grandmaster divided the tea they had made that afternoon between the two of them, packing it separately into tin canisters, and also took out some dry tea he had made earlier for Meng Chi to take back to Yang Zhengfeng. Meng Chi accepted them one by one, reminded the grandmaster to take care of his health, then turned and got into the vehicle.

Meng Chi sat down beside Yu Tingzhi, their shoulders pressing against each other. First he stuffed his own tea canister into his backpack, then wanted to put the one in Yu Tingzhi’s hands in as well, but didn’t succeed.

“It’s just this little bit of tea—why split it into two canisters?” Meng Chi complained.

“The tea you made—I want to keep it private,” Yu Tingzhi picked up one of the tea canisters.

Meng Chi arched a brow and pointed at the tin canister holding the tea the grandmaster had made: “Then what about this one?”

Yu Tingzhi: “To give my maternal grandfather a taste.”

Hearing this, Meng Chi gave a low laugh and joked: “You’re being so double-standard. If my grandmaster knew he’d be unhappy.”

Yu Tingzhi: “Then don’t tell him.”

Hearing these words, Meng Chi laughed even more openly. He looked at Yu Tingzhi’s face that flickered in and out of sight under the dim lights. Those beautiful eyes brightened and darkened; when he smiled and looked at him, it was as if stars were twinkling.

“Teacher Yu, you really are…” Meng Chi sighed lightly, yet couldn’t find a suitable adjective.

“Really are what?”

He had originally wanted to say a bit cute, but then felt that the word “cute” somehow didn’t match Yu Tingzhi. After thinking back and forth, he said: “Childish.”

Yu Tingzhi smiled lightly and offered no comment.

The master from the temple drove them in a small three-wheeled vehicle to the bus stop at the foot of the mountain. The timing was perfect; they caught the last bus back to Xichi.

They had gotten up early that day and hadn’t been able to nap at noon either. Not long after getting on the bus Meng Chi leaned against the seat and fell asleep. Only when they reached the terminal did he slowly wake.

Perhaps because it wasn’t the first time, when Meng Chi awoke clear-headed and discovered he was once again pillowing on Yu Tingzhi’s shoulder, he didn’t feel embarrassed and even politely said “thank you.”

By then it was already dark. The two walked through the night from the bus stop toward the homestay. Just as they reached the entrance Yu Tingzhi received a call from She Shan.

That morning after Yu Tingzhi had sent She Shan a WeChat message telling him to handle the comments, he hadn’t contacted him again. She Shan had sent him several messages and also sent Meng Chi several WeChat messages. The two of them seemed to have vanished from the face of the earth—not a single person replied to him.

In the end She Shan could only call to ask about the situation, mainly asking about Meng Chi. If Meng Chi felt troubled, he could delete the posts.

Meng Chi naturally said there was no need. She Shan didn’t say much more, only sullenly complained that Yu Tingzhi was “forgetting friends at the sight of beauty” before hanging up.

This phone call from She Shan reminded Meng Chi of the matter he hadn’t finished asking about that morning.

“You said it was you who had She Shan come looking for me to be a model—what’s that about?” Meng Chi asked. “When She Shan looked for Yang Zile I still didn’t know you.”

Yu Tingzhi said: “Not that time. After you refused, She Shan originally wanted to look for someone else.”

Meng Chi nodded: “Then he came to you for a painting, and you said you wanted to paint me?”

Yu Tingzhi nodded: “Mm.”

Hearing this affirmative answer, Meng Chi immediately recalled that time after the photos were taken and they were looking at the finished shots. He had said to She Shan that it didn’t necessarily have to be him—if they switched to someone else, Yu Tingzhi could still produce the same effect. Yu Tingzhi had suddenly appeared and given him an unassailable answer.

“It has to be you.”

It couldn’t be anyone else.

At the time, Meng Chi’s feeling toward that answer had been more one of being flattered and overwhelmed. Back then he and Yu Tingzhi couldn’t be considered familiar, and there hadn’t been any involvement between them.

At this moment, hearing Yu Tingzhi say once again that it had to be him and no one else, the emotion of surprise was already gone from Meng Chi’s heart. All that remained was ready joy, along with some subtle stirring.

Meng Chi was no fool. If at the beginning he had thought that feeling Yu Tingzhi treated him a bit specially was a self-important illusion, then the several coincidences afterward and the ambiguous teasing in their words were enough to prove that it had not been an illusion.

Meng Chi turned his eyes and looked at Yu Tingzhi for a few seconds. A bit of playful amusement appeared in his eyes as he suddenly asked: “Teacher Yu, did you have designs on me from the very beginning?”

Yu Tingzhi met his gaze and nodded frankly: “Yes.”

Meng Chi laughed lowly. The smile on his face was relaxed and pleased.

“Then if I don’t agree, wouldn’t that be failing to live up to your painstaking efforts?” After a moment Meng Chi said again with a smile.

Yu Tingzhi was stunned at the words. He stopped walking and asked: “Agree to what?”

Meng Chi’s footsteps never stopped. Only when he walked all the way to the door of his own room did he turn his head and slowly open his mouth to say: “Let you paint me.”