Night Tokyo reopened. Even though it was a weekday, plenty of people came. From a little after eleven, customers began arriving one after another, and the restaurant quickly became bustling.
"Boss Wang, help me out here. My friends all came to show their support—it wouldn't look good if there weren't any seats for them." Tao Tao nagged beside Wang Yan.
This was on the street outside Linghong's boutique on Jinxian Road. Wang Yan sat in a chair with one leg crossed over the other, a cigarette dangling from his mouth.
He glanced at Tao Tao squatting beside him and shook his head. "Even I, a shareholder, don't have a place to eat. I just had two flatbreads Old Liu made at the intersection, and now I'm sitting by the roadside, aren't I? Lingzi arranged for your friends to eat here at Linghong's place. That's already pretty good, so be satisfied. If I went to talk to Lingzi now, I'd get chewed out too."
Wang Yan was not lying. Lingzi was already run off her feet—greeting and seeing off guests, taking orders, serving dishes, settling bills, and more. She was exhausted but happy to be making money, with no time to bother with idle people like them.
Tao Tao let out a long sigh from where he squatted on the ground. He took a deep drag of his Huazi and watched the blue smoke he exhaled scatter in the wind.
He said, "Before the new place opened, I kept thinking about how great Night Tokyo would be afterward. But now that it's open and so busy, it feels like there's nothing to it. It was better before, when everyone laughed and joked around every day and we weren't all that busy. Those were the happy days."
Teacher Ge nodded. "Tao Tao's