Chapter 19: This wasn't all
At the breakfast shop, Su Can pulled out a stool and sat down. Xue Yiyang and Liu Rui, who were already eating rice noodles, nodded to him. "Morning, Brother Su Can!" "We've already ordered your beef rice noodles, Brother Su Can. Enjoy!"
Liu Rui was shaking ground Sichuan pepper into his bowl as he spoke, without the slightest trace of respect on his face. Xue Yiyang scooped a generous spoonful of chili bean paste into his own bowl, grinning just as mischievously.
The rice noodle shop was famous throughout the area, and customers streamed in for breakfast every morning. Often, even with several tables set up outside, people still had to stand around waiting. The pair's performance made Su Can the center of attention for a moment. Even some customers who had been eating with their heads down looked up.
Ever since their encounter with Tang Wu, Liu Rui had enjoyed teasing Su Can by calling him "Brother Su Can." After hearing about it, Xue Yiyang had joined in too. But he knew all about the ambiguous relationship between Tang Wu and Su Can at school, so he wasn't as surprised as Liu Rui.
The beef rice noodles arrived as soon as he sat down. Breakfast in later years simply couldn't compare with breakfast in 1999. The bowl was generously filled with springy rice noodles, topped with a layer of large chunks of beef braised until tender without losing their chew. Each bite brought meat and tendon together, filling his mouth with that classic braised flavor-a flavor that had vanished in later years and could never be replicated.
Sitting at one of the tables the shop had set outside, bathed in the morning sunlight, the three of them fished mouthful after mouthful of noodles from