Lan Yan received an urgent commission.
Folk collector Mr. Tang Wangxiang sent over a damaged family letter, specifically requesting Lan Yan’s help in restoring it.
Back when Mr. Tang had been seeking medical treatment abroad, enduring illness and pain, it was his mother’s letters that had sustained him. After several moves, all the old photos and letters had been lost, but a few days ago, while sorting through the old house, he discovered this one still intact.
His mother had passed away over twenty years ago, and Mr. Tang said that to him, this family letter was priceless, worth a fortune and irreplaceable.
The damage to the letter was not severe—just some tears, creases, insect bites, and mold spots here and there. The restoration difficulty was not high, but the only challenge was that the studio lacked suitable patching material. Mend Orchid Studio specialized in painting restoration and mounting, so it always had various types of rice paper on hand, but this letter was written with carbon ink on South City University letterhead.
The postmark date was 1990, so if they could find letterhead paper from the same era and type for patching, that would be ideal.
“Hoo—” Lan Junwen blew on the combination lock of the old suitcase, sending dust flying everywhere.
Lan Yan nearly choked and turned her face away, using her hand to fan the air.
“All the letters your grandma sent and received are in here.” Lan Junwen slapped it with his hand, full of bravado.
But that bravado lasted less than two minutes. He tried the combination “000,” but it wouldn’t open. He went through “123,” “666,” “888,” “999,” and finally could only give an awkward smile: “…Let’s just pry it open.”
Lan Yan went to the kitchen to wring out a wet towel and wiped the dust off the surface of the suitcase.
Lan Junwen brought out a hammer, screwdriver, tweezers, scissors, and pliers in turn, finally managing to dismantle it successfully.
He pulled open the zipper and spread the suitcase flat. A stale, pungent plastic smell hit them in the face—likely from the severely aged glue used to adhere the lining.
Fortunately, the letters were all preserved intact, bundled neatly with cotton string.
Lan Yan’s grandma had been a high school Chinese teacher back then, and the letters were all from friends or students.
The envelopes had complete postmarks and sender addresses; they just needed to select those from the 1980s to 1990s sent from universities.
The two squatted on the ground, going through them one by one.
Lan Junwen said, “When your grandma passed away, she told me to burn all these. I thought it would be a shame, so I kept them. I was always afraid she’d blame me. But it’s good I didn’t burn them; now they can help you…”
Lan Yan didn’t know how to respond and just kept her head down sorting the letters.
Communication between loved ones and friends was a skill that grew rusty with disuse. She and her father hadn’t had a deep conversation in a long time, so when faced with this somewhat heartfelt exchange, she felt only awkward unfamiliarity.
Fortunately, Lan Junwen wasn’t one to wear his emotions on his sleeve either.
The father and daughter were almost exactly alike in that regard.
They finished one bundle, and Lan Junwen picked up the next, untying the cotton string. As if struck by a thought, he suddenly said, “Us squatting here picking through letters like this… doesn’t it remind you of when you were little…”
His words cut off abruptly, as if he realized “when you were little” was a forbidden topic for Lan Yan.
Lan Yan knew what Lan Junwen was thinking of.
When she was little, there was often a stall selling old books in the nearby park. On weekends when Lan Junwen wasn’t working, he was fully in charge of taking her out, and he’d lead her to the stall. Over time, the stall owner got to know them and would even provide two little stools as a courtesy. She’d sit on her stool picking books and could stay put for an entire afternoon.
Her fondness for old things might have started back then.
Lan Yan stayed even quieter.
Lan Junwen fell silent too.
In the silence, there were only the sounds of envelopes being picked up and set down. The air carried the scent of lignin breaking down over the years, mixed with dust and the sour mold from microbial metabolism.
Finally, based on the information on the envelopes, they found five that matched the criteria and moved them to the desk, ready to open and examine closely.
The sound of the front door opening suddenly came from the entryway, followed immediately by Liang Xiaoxia’s gentle voice: “Oh— Yanyan is back?”
The quiet of dusk was broken.
Lan Yan paused and raised her voice slightly in response: “Auntie.”
A flurry of cheerful footsteps approached the study. Liang Xiaoxia appeared in the doorway, leaning against the frame with a beaming smile. “How come Yanyan has time to come home today?” She must have stopped by the fresh market on her way back, as she carried a water-filled bag with a live fish that occasionally thrashed inside.
Liang Xiaoxia was Lan Yan’s stepmother—not entirely accurate, since she and Lan Junwen had been together for over ten years but had never officially married. Whether out of adult pragmatism or a belief that true love needed no paper certificate as guarantee, who could say.
Lan Yan gave a faint smile in reply: “Needed some patching material, so I came back to look.”
“Are you in a rush to get back? Stay and rest here tonight! I’ll make dinner…” Liang Xiaoxia held up her bag. “I bought a live fish. We can pan-fry it!”
Lan Yan often felt complicated emotions around Liang Xiaoxia.
Because Liang Xiaoxia wasn’t the stereotypical “wicked stepmother.” On the contrary, she was sincere, optimistic, enthusiastically positive, and possessed just the right touch of childlike innocence. In short, utterly adorable.
Even overlaying the disappointment of her father not staying faithful, the resentment of a stranger invading their home… all those negative feelings, Lan Yan still had to admit it: she was adorable.
It was only natural that Lan Junwen liked this Liang Xiaoxia.
Back in those days of subtle antagonism, Lan Yan had almost resignedly acknowledged this fact, which opened the door to her long-term self-loathing and guilt—because it made her seem like Lan Junwen, betraying her mother who had passed away young from illness.
So after high school graduation, Lan Yan went to North City for university, only coming home for holidays.
After grad school, she returned to South City but rented her own place outside. She rarely came home otherwise.
Lan Yan didn’t respond. Lan Junwen looked at her, his gaze carrying a hint of expectation.
After Lan Junwen and Liang Xiaoxia got together, their father-daughter relationship had become exceedingly cautious. One manifestation was that Lan Junwen rarely dared to make requests of Lan Yan, especially things like “come home for the weekend” or “stay for dinner.”
The fish thrashed twice more in the water bag.
Lan Yan lowered her eyes. “Okay. Sorry for the trouble, Auntie.”
“No trouble at all!” Liang Xiaoxia was happier than if she’d earned a commission at quarter’s end. “You and your dad keep busy. I’ll go make dinner…”
In the blink of an eye, the evening light shifted, darkening a few shades in the span of that short conversation.
Lan Yan pulled a small transparent ziplock bag from her bag. Inside was a fragment of the family letter, smaller than a pinky fingernail, which she’d brought back to compare material, aging, and color for patching.
She opened all five letters and laid them flat on the desk. Picking up one, she walked to the window and held it up to the natural light, carefully comparing it to the fragment in the ziplock.
A faint “oh dear” came from the kitchen.
Lan Junwen quickly said, “Your auntie doesn’t know how to gut fish. I’ll go check…”
He cut off abruptly again, as if realizing such eagerness wasn’t appropriate in front of his daughter.
Lan Yan’s expression remained unchanged. She gave a soft “Mm.”
Lan Junwen still hesitated: “Do you need my help?”
“No need.”
Lan Junwen nodded silently, stood there a moment, then turned and left.
Of the five letters, two were from her grandma’s students, both on letterhead with school logos—one from Tsinghua University, one from Xi’an Jiaotong University. Probably driven by that “returning home in glory” mentality.
The two letters were written in 1993 and 1994 respectively. Their aging was slightly less than the sample, and the color a bit lighter, but the material was very similar—likely because papermaking techniques hadn’t varied much back then.
The phone on the desk vibrated once.
Lan Yan slid her index finger across the screen to unlock it. There was a new WeChat message from her boyfriend Chen Boyu, asking if he should pick her up at the studio for dinner together.
Her hands were dirty, so she didn’t want to type. She tapped the bottom-left button to switch to voice, held it down, and said: “I’m home. Eating dinner here tonight.”
Chen Boyu replied quickly: Okay.
Lan Yan set aside these two suitable letters and repacked the rest. She took out a paper cutter, about to trim the patching material, when footsteps approached and someone lightly knocked on the open wooden door.
Lan Yan turned to look.
Liang Xiaoxia held a white porcelain plate with neatly cut square mango chunks, all uniform in shape and size. Mindful of dirty hands, she’d thoughtfully skewered them with toothpicks.
“Have some fruit, Yanyan.” Liang Xiaoxia walked over with a smile but hesitated upon seeing the items on the desk, unsure where to set it down.
“There’s a lot of dust here, and my hands are dirty too. Auntie, take it to the living room. I’ll eat after I’m done.”
Liang Xiaoxia smiled and said “Okay,” glancing at her hands out of curiosity: “You only need to cut this little bit?”