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Rebirth of the Great Painter 81

Aesthetic Disaster (Part 1)

 

In the cozy little house, everything was in its place.

 

Hua’s mother stuffed some coal into the stove, steaming the buns to have them ready for her daughter when she came back from evening self-study, to be eaten as a late-night snack.

 

Hua’s father watched TV on the sofa for a while. The plot of the TV drama was disjointed, significantly reducing its appeal.

 

After sitting for a bit, he took a sip of hot water and wandered into the kitchen to chat with his wife at the doorway:

 

“This month, Dashun’s father passed away, so we need to contribute 100 yuan for the condolence money. Wang Jie’s son got into college, and that’s another 100.”

 

“Back when your father died, Dashun specially had a hospital truck haul the coffin up the mountain, which was a big help to us. Maybe we should give 150 instead?” Hua’s mother sat at the table and discussed.

 

“No need, back when he moved, I went to his place every day to help him assemble furniture, and my shoulders ached for half a month. Giving and taking are all part of life; 100 yuan is quite appropriate,” Hua’s father said, rubbing his arms.

 

“Last month was quite good, we saved some money. Your salary is coming on the 10th, right? After buying these things for our daughter today, we still have quite a bit left from last month.”

 

“That furniture set sold for 400 and really came in handy.” Hua’s father said as he walked over and sat down at the table, fiddling with a backpack on it and frowning:

 

“I think the light yellow one looked better.”

 

“Your daughter got a new pink down jacket, and now with a yellow backpack, people who don’t know might think we run a dye workshop,” Hua’s mother scoffed.

 

“Did our daughter get a new down jacket?” Hua’s father was puzzled, as he wasn’t aware of it.

 

“Yes, she bought Shen Mo an ear warmer, and Shen Mo returned the favor by giving her a down jacket,” Hua’s mother said, propping her chin and seeming hesitant to continue.

 

Hua’s father stared into his wife’s eyes for a while, smacked his lips, wanting to comment on the matter, but felt that saying it out loud might break some kind of peace, so he swallowed his words.

 

The couple sat in silence for a moment until Hua’s mother suddenly pointed to the backpack on the table, unsure:

 

“Isn’t the one with the celebrity print more popular?”

 

“Give me a break, a backpack with a big face printed on it? From behind at night, it looks like you’re carrying a human head. Isn’t that creepy?”

 

After saying that, Hua’s mother burst into laughter, and the two chatted for a few more minutes by the warm stove before heading to the living room to watch TV.

 

With Hua’s mother now vying for the remote control, watching TV dramas became even more enjoyable for him.

 

 

 

In the cold northern winter, the night sky was ink-blue, sprinkled with stars.

 

Such a nightscape would be impossible to appreciate in the big cities, even a decade later.

 

Pushing the cart to the courtyard gate, Hua Jie looked up at the sky, where the twinkling stars were truly beautiful, some large and some small, each group forming interesting patterns.

 

She squinted slightly, connecting the dots to draw various shapes in her mind.

 

“What are you looking at?” Bian Hong stood beside her, also looking up.

 

“Watching the stars, observing the sky. It’s so clear, it’s like with a bit more effort, you could see the entire Milky Way. It’s truly beautiful,” Hua Jie exclaimed.

 

“It’s always like this, isn’t it?” Bian Hong didn’t find anything particularly unusual.

 

“The big cities don’t have such clear skies, nor can you often see the stars and the moon,” Hua Jie said.

 

“Have you been to a big city?” Bian Hong asked.

 

“…” Hua Jie turned to look at the boy and smiled slightly: “Never been.”

 

She did not leave this small town until she got into university.

 

Her family couldn’t afford to travel except for one trip to Harbin when she was very young, during which her parents fought the whole way. They stayed in a poor guesthouse where she ended up covered in flea bites; it was not a fond memory.

 

However, before starting work, she never craved travel. From her childhood, whenever there was a chance, her father would take her up mountains and down rivers on his motorcycle, playing in grasslands, wetlands, and pine forests, never feeling that traveling was such a rare form of relaxation.

 

It was only after she started working that she realized how precious it was to be able to leave the city that bore the brunt of her work pressure and wander around unfamiliar places, to cleanse her lungs in nature.

 

“We can go out together during the winter break,” Bian Hong suggested.

 

Because the winters in Jinsong City were so cold, the winter break was nearly two months long, which was plenty of time to find a place to explore.

 

“Sure,” Hua Jie smiled and raised her eyebrows.

 

But she felt she would mostly stay at home to paint, following Teacher Shen’s guidance.

 

“Bye, see you tomorrow morning.” Bian Hong spoke, but did not enter the courtyard, instead standing there looking at her.

 

“Goodnight, Brother Bian Hong,” Hua Jie waved, opened the courtyard gate to push her bicycle inside, and turned her head to lock the gate. Peering out, she saw Bian Hong still there.

 

She waved again, and the boy finally smiled and went to open his own courtyard gate. His face was shaded from the light, but his gentle demeanor was unmistakable.

 

It was only after Hua Jie closed the courtyard door, and the sound of her opening the house door echoed, that Bian Hong pushed his bike into his courtyard and locked his own gate.

 

 

As soon as she opened the door, Huan Huan rushed towards her, and Hua Jie was genuinely worried about stepping on it as she walked inside.

 

“I’m back!” The moment she heard this, Hua’s mother immediately stood up and ran from the living room to greet her daughter, first taking her backpack and then reaching for her down jacket.

 

However, Hua Jie held onto the jacket tightly, chuckling mischievously.

 

“What’s the matter?” her mother asked, puzzled by her daughter’s unusual behavior.

 

“Where’s dad? Come here, quick!” Hua Jie called out, still clutching the down jacket and keeping her hand in its pocket, gripping some money but not taking it out.

 

She was clearly enjoying keeping everyone in suspense.

 

“What are you shouting for?” Hua’s father had been out with his wife earlier that day buying numerous gifts for their daughter, and had spent the whole evening wondering why Hua Jie hadn’t come home yet.

 

Now, he too was keen to see her excited, happy expression as she received her gifts.

 

There’s a great joy in raising a daughter, seeing her happy and content when she’s ‘fed.’

 

He had planned to sit for a while and then casually get up and stroll over.

 

But now that his daughter was calling, he might as well come out now, no need to wait.

 

“How do you like them?” Hua’s father asked as he came out, not even glancing at his daughter but going straight to the dining table, sitting down, and patting the backpack and other items on it.

 

He thought his daughter was calling him out because she had seen the gifts on the table and was excited to thank her wonderful dad.

 

“Huh?” It was only then that Hua Jie noticed the items on the table.

 

Oh?

 

“Your dad and I bought you a few things today,” her mother said as she pulled her baffled daughter to sit at the dining table, proudly presenting:

 

“A few days ago, the furniture set you designed and your dad made sold for 400 yuan.”

 

“Here, this is a new repeater, your old one was always jamming the tapes, but this new one is much better and has lots of features.”

 

“…” Hua Jie looked from her mother to her father, then reached for the brand-new, neatly packaged repeater1A repeater is a machine that can store sounds from media such as tapes and CDs in a built-in chip and play them repeatedly. It is commonly used for learning foreign languages through listening and speaking exercises.. After unpacking it, she found a small, pink device.

 

It was well-made, both vintage and beautiful.

 

Hua’s father watched as his daughter tenderly touched and admired the repeater, clearly very pleased with it.

 

He couldn’t help but smile proudly.

 

He had chosen this repeater himself, knowing his wife liked those flashy kinds, but none of those were as pretty as this simple pink one.

 

See! His daughter clearly loved it!

 

Hua Jie unconsciously let go of the down jacket, which her mother had neatly folded and hung over the back of a chair. She held the repeater in her arms, feeling a warm comfort inside.

 

Her mood was like warm tea infused with the scent of flowers in March, or like a gentle breeze by the lake in June.

 

In her previous life, she had also received a new repeater, but that was not until her second year of high school.

 

One year earlier, she had returned to change many things.

 

Looking up into her parents’ expectant eyes, she grinned broadly, looking quite silly.

 

This prompted her mother to playfully tousle her hair, messing up her braids.

 

“There’s more, your hair has grown too, and here are some hair ties,” Hua Jie’s mother said, handing her a small fabric pouch.

 

Inside were not only hair ties but also hair clips and headbands, all glitzy and glamorous, quite extravagant.

 

Her mother’s eyes sparkled, clearly proud of her purchases.

 

“They’re beautiful,” Hua Jie hurriedly gathered them in her arms, showing how much she liked them.

 

Her mother quickly tried a hair clip in her hair, “This looks beautiful… and this one too… My daughter is so pretty, everything looks good on her. Let your hair grow a little longer, and today I will braid it for you, tomorrow I will style it into bunches, and maybe even braids…”

 

It was as if she were a little girl longing to play with dolls.

 

When Hua Jie was younger, her mother was too busy working to style her hair and always took her to get it cut short.

 

Now that her mother worked as an accountant at the railway bathhouse, she was a bit less busy and had time to pay attention to her daughter’s hair.

 

Hua Jie looked down at the hair ties, imagining the star treatment of having her hair styled differently by her mother every day.

 

This… could drive Shen Mo, who had face blindness, insane.

 

“The latest style of backpack,” her father pointed out another pink item on the table.

 

Hua Jie took a closer look and realized that the eye-blindingly pink thing was actually a backpack!

 

The tender, heart-meltingly soft color was cute…

 

Too cute to be the kind of backpack she would wear out!

 

Moreover, it matched the color of the down jacket quite well.

 

Her father really did share the same aesthetic as Shen Mo; straight men, typical straight men!

 

Were they both treating her like a doll?

 

That was a bit too much.

 

Moreover, the backpack has two little bunny ears on top. When walking, they bounce around, and she can even flick the ears up.

 

As she reached out to flip the backpack over, sure enough, there was a little white pom-pom tail at the bottom… it made her shiver.

 

“You used to like such pretty backpacks, but we couldn’t afford them. Now that you’re in high school and we’re a bit more financially stable, you can finally wear one. Are you happy?” Her father said, nodding affirmatively with an air of grace.

 

Back then… According to the year she was reborn, it must have been over a decade ago.

 

“…” Ah, but she was twenty-eight years old mentally, “…Yes, I like it!”

 

Her mother, hearing her say she liked it, immediately smiled. Because of her big eyes, the first wrinkles that appeared as she aged were crow’s feet.

 

Even so, she was still a great beauty.

 

Her father also smiled modestly, looking at his daughter whose hair was slightly askew from being tousled by his wife, and he felt slightly moved. He sighed and asked:

 

“How did your midterm exams go?”

 

“They were okay, I performed normally,” Hua Jie said, surrounded by a table full of small gifts.

 

Her father glanced at her skeptically. Normal performance meant she was average in the class, perhaps around the thirtieth rank.

 

  • 1
    A repeater is a machine that can store sounds from media such as tapes and CDs in a built-in chip and play them repeatedly. It is commonly used for learning foreign languages through listening and speaking exercises.

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