In the past, the bar counter was the only place where you could have cordial conversations with strangers in bars.
Whether you are queuing up to buy a drink or sitting and chatting, as long as you want, you can open your heart at any time and talk about interesting topics with people you meet for the first time in your life. Astronomy, geography, relationships, career, as long as the other person is equally interested, you can chat all night long.
There was more noise and clinking of glasses in tonight's "Coast BAR" than ever before.
Against the noisy background, Zhou Jin poured a glass of cognac originating from France, and sat at the bar to taste it carefully, occasionally glancing at the crowd.
Yang Qinghua came over with a bottle of champagne. The aroma of white grapes in the goblet was strong, and her spike-shaped high heels made a "tata" sound when she stepped on the floor tiles. Zhou Jin couldn't help but notice it.
In my memory, Yang Qinghua should have worn tan oxford shoes that only exposed her ankles. She paired her lower body with denim wide-leg pants. She looked fresh and neat, but also had a sexy atmosphere because of her slender legs.
At this time, she changed into an aqua blue dress that hung down to her calf. When she walked, her fluffy skirt swayed in the wind, making her look like a young girl.
If Zhou Jin saw it right, the pair of bright blue shoes under the skirt were "sky-high" and the heels were 10 centimeters long and slender. Looking at her as if she were walking on flat ground, I really don't know how she could do it.
"Where did you find it?" Zhou Jin raised his glass in greeting.
Yang Qinghua covered her mouth and smiled softly: "This is my home court. It's not difficult to find clothes."
"Miss Yang," Zhou Jin admired, "this outfit suits you very well."
The other party smiled and asked: "At my age, can I still be called that?"
"Others may not be able to do it," Zhou Jin shrugged helplessly, "but... there are always exceptions for beautiful ladies."
Seeing that he seemed to be "telling the truth", Yang Qinghua couldn't help but burst into laughter.
She looked at the other person with bright eyes and said, "Thank you so much."
"Do you mind if I sit next to you?" Yang Qinghua asked.
The other party turned around and stood up, placed the palm of his left hand on his right chest and performed a gentlemanly bow of 15 degrees.
"I'm extremely honored." Zhou Jin said.
…
"What are you looking at?" After a while, Yang Qinghua asked curiously.
People in the center of the stage danced clumsily under the influence of alcohol. Zhou Jin looked at those people, suddenly feeling a little confused.
He asked: "You said...if there had been no disaster, where would these people be now?"
"Who knows?" Yang Qinghua brought the drink to her lips and took a sip, "Busy with life, busy with work, that's all."
"What about you, Miss Yang?"
"Me?" Yang Qinghua pointed at herself with the finger that was not holding the wine glass, "Midnight is still the working time of the bar foreman."
"Didn't you go home to rest?" Zhou Jin wondered.
Yang Qinghua raised her wine glass towards the light, and the wine became colorful as it was scattered by the stage lights.
"Rest?" Fragments of colorful light flashed on her cheeks, "When people rest, where can they earn money?"
"Is money important?" Zhou Jin thought.
"People of our class will lose many things without money. Future, dreams, family, quality of life, and even love. Money is never everything, and it cannot bring everything. But without money, people become No longer human."
"Aren't people like people anymore...?" Zhou Jin said he didn't quite understand.
Yang Qinghua put down her wine glass and looked into his eyes: "Without family and being far away from relatives and friends, do you think this person is complete?"
She didn't wait for Zhou Jin to answer and continued: "This disaster probably exceeded everyone's expectations. The outbreak of the disaster turned everything in the past into ashes. Whether it is money, wealth or honorary status, they are all so vulnerable in the face of the apocalypse. "
"Perhaps without this disaster, I would have been promoted from a foreman to a small supervisor. And I look forward to spending more time with my family one day in the future..." Yang Qinghua seemed to be thinking, "It has been months since the disaster broke out. Yu. Sometimes I also wonder - why were people so persistent back then? "
Zhou Jin thought for a while: "Maybe it's just because of emptiness."
Yang Qinghua looked at him, as if she didn't expect him to say such words.
"Let's have a drink." Zhou Jin toasted to her, "To the future Manager Yang."
"Cheers!" Yang Qinghua clinked glasses with him and corrected casually, "For the future."
The tulip cup with a small mouth and wide belly is specially designed for holding brandy. It is said that this design can retain the aroma of the fermented liquor to a greater extent.
At this moment, there is less than one-third of the wine in the cup. When drinking, Zhou Jin usually holds the handle of the cup between his middle and ring fingers. The warmth of his hands is transferred into the cup to slightly warm the wine, thus increasing the flavor and aroma of the wine.
Zhou Jin shows a very educated side. After a quick drink, he was leaning against the bar. Viewed from the side, his facial features were three-dimensional and angular. His elegant demeanor seemed natural, and he seemed to have an innate aristocratic aura.
Noticing Yang Qinghua looking at him, Zhou Jin raised the wine glass in his hand and asked with a smile: "Try it? I'm used to drinking liqueur. Have you drank this?"
"Humph, never look down on women." Yang Qinghua winked at him, "Have you forgotten what I do for a living? It's not like I can't handle wine."
As she spoke, she raised her neck and drank down the champagne in the glass, then grabbed the bottle and poured herself a small half glass.
Shake the glass gently, and the shape of the liquid flowing along the wall of the glass is constantly changing. High-quality brandy is slightly thicker, so the sliding speed is relatively slow.
"You're really good at choosing. This is the old man's personal product of the shop owner." She muttered and took a small taste.
Zhou Jin raised his lips and said, "I also found it behind the bar."
"So spicy," Yang Qinghua squinted her eyes tightly and hummed, "But I like it."
Sitting across from him, Zhou Jin couldn't see how the delicate wine flowed through his throat and fell into Yang Qinghua's belly, but the looming swallowing movement under the snow-white neck was so charming that people couldn't help but think about it.
After taking a sip, Yang Qinghua raised her eyebrows at him: "How was it?"
He hurriedly laughed, raised his glass to her and said, "I made a mistake. I'm really sorry."
"I'm sorry, I should punish myself with a drink~" Yang Qinghua said with a playful expression.
"It's natural."
…
The brandy stored in oak barrels is mellow, delicious and aromatic, which is really wonderful. The color is even more crystal clear, amber-like golden, so noble and elegant, no wonder it is so popular.
However, these are fermented grapes and then distilled to obtain a high degree of alcohol, which is then stored in oak barrels. They are full-fledged spirits.
It didn't take long for Yang Qinghua to drink too much and her face turned red.
It’s no wonder that most people prefer to drink it by adding water and ice. Adding ice cubes or mineral water to brandy dilutes its alcohol content and increases its taste, making it easier to drink.
There are indeed only a few people like Zhou Jin who like to drink pure. Yang Qinghua has to try to keep up, and naturally her drinking capacity will soon bottom out.
"Why?" Zhou Jin asked casually, "If you choose to work all night, you can still do it by staggering your rest days by a few hours."
The other person looked a little delirious. Maybe he had a headache, so he reached out to cover his forehead.
"It can be done. But I do it voluntarily."
Yang Qinghua did not say the reason behind it.
Seeing this, Zhou Jin changed her glass of juice, clinked glasses with her, and chatted about the past.
"What did Miss Yang do before she became the foreman?"
"What have you done? That's a lot. A rebellious and ignorant child, a silly girl who eloped and had a flash marriage, a stay-at-home mother who did nothing, a divorced woman who was greedy for pleasure... I don't know which one you want to hear?" Yang Qinghua She curled her fingers at him, not knowing at all how seductive her charming eyes were to others.
"You know that's not what I meant."
"I'm kidding you." Yang Qinghua patted the other party's shoulder nonchalantly.
"In terms of work," she raised her head and recalled, her tone was as usual, "there were many. I did odd jobs, worked as a cashier in a supermarket, and also worked as a ticket seller in a late-night movie theater for a period of time. By the way, my sister-in-law helped me find a job. It was a job with good pay, but unfortunately the boss wanted to do something against me, so I kicked him in the vital part and sent me to the hospital."
"How's it going? You're awesome." At this time, Yang Qinghua was showing off like a naughty child, "So don't mess with me."
But she said it lightly, but Zhou Jin felt a little confused.
"Do Yang Bensheng and Sister Li know about this matter?"
Yang Qinghua's eyes suddenly became a little erratic.
"I didn't say it." She said silently, her voice low.
Zhou Jin opened his mouth, but after a long time he didn't ask "why".
"Want to hear a story?" Yang Qinghua suddenly smiled, "You happen to have wine here too."
Zhou Jin raised his glass: "I'm listening."
"I told you, right? I once had a job and worked as a ticket seller in a late-night movie theater for a while. To be honest, that kind of job was very relaxing and could be done by one person. But in fact, apart from being a little green and ignorant, The nightclub is sparsely crowded with couples. Usually when there are not many customers, I would hide behind the window and trade stocks secretly with my mobile phone."
"You know how to do this?" Zhou Jin's surprise didn't seem to be fake.
"To make money," Yang Qinghua spread her hands, "but I am a beginner, and I only have a little capital in hand. At the beginning, I made less and lost more, so I immersed myself in studying for a while."
"It was an early winter night. Because it was not yet Christmas and other festivals, and the theater I was in was a small theater with no reputation, so there was no one around at night. I had nothing to do from eight o'clock in the evening to midnight, so I had to Lying on the table playing with the 'Bank Transfer'. Until a cold barrel of a gun pressed against my forehead..."
"The heating in the ticket office is ineffective in winter, and I'm still not warm even though I'm wrapped up in a down jacket like a bear. Something suddenly touched my forehead, and the cold and solid touch shocked me. I didn't know what it was at first. Until the man outside the ticket window warned me, 'Don't move and hand over the money'."
"He didn't say anything like 'If you move, I'll shoot.' Maybe he thought it was nonsense and unnecessary. But I was really frightened at the time, and my first reaction was to lean back."
"I staggered and knocked the chair over to the ground. At this time, I finally saw clearly the object pressed against my forehead - a black pistol, and the muzzle of the gun was also black and intimidating."
"Probably he didn't expect that my reaction would be so violent. But the ticket window was so narrow that only one arm could be extended, so the muzzle of the gun couldn't move forward, and it couldn't touch my head again."
"In desperation, I threw everything in my hands and on the table, even the most valuable mobile phone on my body, just to buy one more second. Many things did not hit the target through the window, but just hit the glass window The thump made the man confused for a moment."
"While he was in a hurry, I took the opportunity to hide under the table. I tried my best to hide it deep under the table. I wanted to squeeze my body into the crack in the wall. The table was under the window. Maybe a bullet would do it. Pierce it. Whether he noticed I was hiding here, I don't know."
Since Yang Qinghua was able to drink and chat here, it must have been okay at that time. But Zhou Jin was still a little nervous when he heard this, so he frowned slightly.
"Perhaps it was a rare moment of sudden wisdom." Yang Qinghua continued, "With trembling hands, I threw the cash register that had fallen on the ground back from under the table. Then I heard the sound of it being taken away, but I I still huddled under the table and didn't move. I was afraid that this person had not left, and I was also afraid of a bullet that happened to kill me. In this way, I stayed under the table with my eyes open until dawn, until I reached the door in the store. Others come back in the morning, pull me out from under the table, and ask me what happened last night..."
"All this was captured by the store's surveillance. Later I saw in the video that the robber left after taking the money and never came back. Whether the robber was afraid of attracting attention or did not want to have more lives The incident, in short, everything was just a false alarm.”
"When I was hiding under the table and praying, many figures appeared in my mind, including my mother who was no longer alive, including my eldest brother, Xiaoxiao, and even the husband who made me regret my whole life. But the whole theater was empty. Who in the end Not here, just me and a gangster who could take my life at any time."
"It was also at that moment that I realized that distant water cannot dissolve nearby fire. At the moment of life and death, the only one who can really help me is myself."
"After what happened, I was fired as expected."
"Of course, the apparent crime is not to use the theater's money in exchange for one's life. It's about someone speculating in stocks during working hours and not doing his job properly."
"Haha, the result is no different."
Zhou Jin clinked glasses with her again: "So you didn't tell them about this, right?"
"Why bother?" She shrugged, "Anyway, everything is over. I was too willful when I was young and I have caused them too much trouble."
Yang Qinghua smiled at this time: "Everyone has their own secrets, right?"
"Of course there will be good things," she shook the glass in her hand, and continued, "In winter, it's the end of the year, and it's hard to find a new job. It's the shopkeeper here who took me in."
