Valentine’s Day was a sensitive calendar spirit, a sensitivity specifically manifested when the scene of the old man with dementia giving flowers to the old lady occurred—he cried noticeably more heartbreakingly than the young girls nearby. Since this was practically the first time in his life witnessing a grown man cry like this, Xiao Nanzhu felt speechless while also generously offering his shoulder and sleeve to Valentine’s Day, who was wailing “I believe in love again” and needed something to wipe his tears and lean on. Although this seemed exaggerated and superfluous to Xiao Nanzhu, when Valentine’s Day dragged him forcibly to speak with the elderly couple who had just been in the square, he, typically lacking in human warmth, made the rare choice to compromise.

“Hey, what are you trying to do? Explain clearly, or I’m not going with you.”

Being firmly pulled by the arm, Xiao Nanzhu appeared uncooperative while striving to suppress his impatience. The two elderly people ahead were walking slowly, clearly unaware that two people were secretly following them. Seeing this, Valentine’s Day quickly looked to the side, then blinked his reddened eyes and moved close to Xiao Nanzhu’s ear to whisper:

“Just help me with this favor. I want to give them a gift. Although… although it’s nothing valuable, I just hope they can be happy today…”

After hearing this, Xiao Nanzhu instinctively narrowed his eyes. He seemed to have guessed what this fellow was planning to do, so he didn’t appear surprised. After all, Twenty-fourth had mentioned this to him before. According to him, it wasn’t difficult to do, but if he approached the elderly couple now, he might be mistaken for a scammer. Plus, there was no money to be made from this job, so he really couldn’t get motivated. Seeing his demeanor, Valentine’s Day immediately huffed angrily:

“Hmph, forget it if you don’t want to help. I just helped you earlier, hmph. Some people nowadays really make one’s heart cold, hmph hmph hmph… o(￣ヘ￣o＃)”

“Alright, alright, just shut up already…”

Frowning, he directly pinched Valentine’s Day’s incessantly complaining mouth. Unable to speak, Valentine’s Day glared at him dissatisfied, but his eyes were still very red. Seeing this, Xiao Nanzhu sighed heavily with a headache, again inwardly praying for this ancestor to get off work soon. After thinking for a moment, he still stubbed out the cigarette between his fingers and threw it in the trash.

Having achieved his goal, Valentine’s Day’s lips curved into a smile, instantly transforming into a beam of light attached to Xiao Nanzhu. Xiao Nanzhu frowned, snatched a whole stack of flyers from a young man distributing them outside a shopping mall, not forgetting to turn his head and wave at the suddenly dumbfounded fellow, saying thanks. When he quickly caught up with the elderly couple who were about to turn the corner, he extended his hand to block the small elderly woman, who, upon seeing Xiao Nanzhu standing in front of her with a stack of flyers, cautiously stepped back.

“You… you… what do you want?”

Tightly holding her husband’s hand, the old lady clearly had long-standing experience fighting against those who forced her to take promotional materials, immediately lowering her head and trying to escape quickly. Seeing this, Xiao Nanzhu immediately smiled at her, looking meaningful as he blocked her path:

“Auntie, don’t be afraid! I’m not forcing you to buy anything. It’s free! We have gifts! Gifts, do you want them? Free!”

The word “free” immediately struck the elderly person’s psychology. The white-haired old lady, who was initially in a hurry to leave, quickly stopped. Her husband beside her didn’t understand what was happening, just staring blankly at his wife. After pondering for a moment, the old lady still looked suspiciously at Xiao Nanzhu and seriously said:

“What thing is free? You’re not trying to get my home landline number, are you? Let me tell you, young man, I’ve seen this kind of scam several times on CCTV-1’s ‘Legal Online.’ Don’t think…”

The old lady’s words made Xiao Nanzhu’s mouth twitch involuntarily. He was quite pleased with the growth of safety awareness among the elderly today. However, he still needed to persuade her; otherwise, Valentine’s Day would give him trouble later. So, after waving his hand to indicate he wasn’t a scammer, Xiao Nanzhu earnestly said:

“Rest assured! I don’t need your number! Just tell me your and your husband’s names and birthdays, okay? We just need to register consumer information at the mall. You help me, and we can give you free gifts…”

Xiao Nanzhu’s words tempted the old lady who loved small freebies. Although she still felt something was strange, she eventually hesitantly told Xiao Nanzhu her and her husband’s names and birthdays. After noting everything down, Xiao Nanzhu couldn’t help but smile, then looked up and asked:

“Oh, I see. So you’re called Liu Yuexian, and the old man is Wang Rushan. You were both born in ’57, the old man in March and you in August, right?”

“Yes, yes, yes. What’s the gift? Is it soap or laundry detergent?”

The old lady nodded repeatedly, quite looking forward to the gift she was about to receive. Seeing this, Xiao Nanzhu smiled, slowly covering the old lady’s line of sight with his distinctly jointed hand, then lowered his voice:

“Please wait, I’ll get it for you…”

A crisp snap of fingers accompanied by a dazzling light startled the old lady standing by the roadside, making her exclaim “oh my” and instinctively step back. When she confusedly opened her eyes again, she found everything around her unchanged, except the young man who said he would give her gifts was gone. Just as she was angrily widening her eyes, ready to curse this shameless scammer, she suddenly felt her hand being gently pulled by the person beside her, followed by a young man’s confused voice behind her:

“Hey, Yuexian? Are we… are we here?”

______

A strange scene appeared on the street in the city center: a young couple stood in front of a glass display window outside a shopping mall, looking at themselves repeatedly. They appeared to be only twenty-four or twenty-five years old by their faces, but their clothes were so old-fashioned, like what elderly people in the park would wear, making people want to laugh. The girl seemed to be angry with her boyfriend beside her, chattering incessantly. The young man had a good temper, just continuously saying comforting words. Onlookers initially thought they were a young couple playing around—after all, it was Valentine’s Day, who knew what these young people were up to? But if you moved closer, you would discover these young people were having rather strange conversations.

“Wang Rushan, what should we do now?! How did we both end up like this?! I haven’t bought groceries for dinner yet. Xiao Hua and his wife will have nothing to eat when they come back from work! I still need to pick up Dongdong after school. Oh my, look at me… what I look like now…”

Continuously muttering at the glass display window, the black-haired, big-eyed girl had a crisp voice, a petite figure, and apart from the strangely colored, old-fashioned cotton jacket and pants, she was actually a very pretty girl. The Wang Rushan she mentioned stood beside her, looking at his own reflection in the glass. Seeing his outfit of down vest plus old cotton jacket and pants, he also confusedly touched his head full of hair and puzzledly said:

“Yuexian, don’t worry, don’t worry. This… I don’t know what’s happening either. I still remember having Alzheimer’s and being bald, but now how has all my hair grown back… Hey, why don’t we sit down together and think of a solution?”

Saying this, he took the girl’s hand and found a roadside bench to sit on. Liu Yuexian, whose face had paled with anxiety, looked at her husband, who now appeared energetic and just over twenty years old, and didn’t know what to say. Since earlier, she and her husband had become like this—everything around them unchanged, only the two of them seemingly bewitched into their appearance from decades ago. This sounded absurd, but it was happening to these two elderly people, and most crucially, even they didn’t know how to return to normal.

“Sigh, if I go home like this, your son will probably be scared to death.”

Having finally suppressed her chaotic emotions, Liu Yuexian glanced at her husband and spoke somewhat helplessly. Hearing this, Wang Rushan was taken aback, thought for a moment, then smiled:

“You look even younger and prettier than my daughter-in-law now. My son will surely be jealous of me when he sees you…”

“Go away, you old rascal!”

Glaring at her husband without goodwill, her face showing anger, Liu Yuexian was actually quite pleased inside. After all, every woman has a heart for beauty. Although she was old and her mindset was behind the times, seeing herself and her husband return to how they looked many years ago, she looked at this face that seemed to exist in her distant memory yet was never forgotten, and suddenly lowered her head, saying softly:

“Wang Rushan, it’s so good that you can remember me.”

These words made the young man beside her pause. He stared at the young girl with red eyes before him, yet his memory was full of her with white hair, tirelessly caring for him in recent years. Although his mind wasn’t clear, he still remembered that he had troubled her, but she had never despised him—dressing him, feeding him, giving him medicine, massaging his legs. In his confused state, he couldn’t say a complete sentence before, but at this moment, he suddenly wanted to say a belated words of love to this woman who had spent a lifetime with him.

“Yuexian, thank you… being able to remember you again makes me very happy, truly very happy.”

Saying this, Wang Rushan leaned towards his wife’s young and pretty face and gently kissed her. This seemed somewhat strange given their actual age but was perfectly appropriate for their youthful appearance. Passersby wouldn’t notice this action, which seemed natural today. This elderly couple, who had regained their youth on this special day, sat together on the roadside for a while, then began wandering aimlessly hand in hand like young couples.

“No cooking today. Your son complained my food was too salty yesterday. Let him go hungry today.”

“Alright, let that picky boy go hungry. Anyway, we have money in our retirement pension cards. Let’s eat something good today!”

“Then I want beef noodles. Remember? The one behind the textile factory. Now his son runs it, and they’ve reduced the ingredients…”

“Of course I remember! After noodles, let’s walk around. You haven’t changed those clothes for years! You just won’t spend money on yourself…”

“Your son and daughter-in-law have to pay their mortgage. How could I burden them… Oh! Wang Rushan! Buy me a salt water popsicle! My front tooth is back! I want to eat that!”

The two elderly people, with youthful appearances, walked through street after street, talking and laughing. The boy bought the salt water popsicle that the girl hadn’t eaten since her tooth went bad, and also took her to buy a bright red, gaudy down jacket that only young girls would wear. While trying on clothes, the store owner kept saying how lucky the young man was to have such a beautiful girlfriend. Hearing this, Wang Rushan just smiled foolishly, looking at Liu Yuexian in the distance, then tilted his head proudly:

“You’re wrong. This is my wife.”

…

When night fell on the sky, they went to the cinema to watch a movie. In their memory, days like this—two people staring at a dark screen, secretly holding hands and blushing in the darkness—seemed to have happened in a previous life. Fortunately, at least now they knew they would be the ones accompanying each other through a life full of happiness and warmth. Just as the bucket of gritty yet unpalatable popcorn was about to be finished, Liu Yuexian heard a vague, slow call from the person beside her.

“Yuexian… Yuexian…”

When she turned her head, she saw an aged, bald face covered in wrinkles—no longer young and handsome, just like any foolish old man in this world, not good-looking at all. But in his eyes, Liu Yuexian saw herself, also fat and old. After smiling with red eyes, she tightly held her husband’s hand in the darkness, then said softly with a crying voice:

“Silly old fool, never peaceful.”

…

“I believe in love again, wuwu… It’s so touching, wuwu!”

Clutching Xiao Nanzhu’s sleeve and continuously sniffling, Valentine’s Day, the instigator, walked home with Xiao Nanzhu, still not emotionally released from what had just happened.

“You’re so noisy…”

With a cigarette in his mouth and fingers plugging his ears, Xiao Nanzhu, who had thought he could have some peace, now had a massive headache. After repeatedly emphasizing to no effect, he thought for a moment and, frowning, cursed under his breath and pinched Valentine’s Day’s mouth again.

“You… you… damn… single… dog… I… curse… you… to… never… have… a… boyfriend… in… your… life (o#゜曲゜)o”

Glaring at Xiao Nanzhu with contempt, Valentine’s Day struggled for a long time but was still suppressed by Xiao Nanzhu with no room for resistance. Seeing this, Xiao Nanzhu smiled, simply and brutally grabbed him and began striding home. During this process, Valentine’s Day kept shouting, which Xiao Nanzhu treated as if he had gone deaf. But when they again passed the city square from earlier in the day, Xiao Nanzhu suddenly saw brilliant fireworks being set off in the square and crowds of people celebrating.

“Oh! Hahaha! Fireworks! Look!”

Passing couples embracing each other emitted joyful laughter. The fireworks illuminated Xiao Nanzhu’s dim pupils, making his cold expression become somewhat more genuine.

“Hey.”

Xiao Nanzhu spoke with a smile.

“What?”

Valentine’s Day glanced at him with puffed cheeks.

—”Happy Valentine’s Day.”