At the opening ceremony, Qin Ting stood behind Zou Songpu, silently staring at him. That silhouette looked more and more familiar, but no matter how she tried, she couldn't place it.
Absorbed as she was, she was tapped on the shoulder by Hao Yuguang beside her. "What are you staring at him for?" He pointed to the other side. "The director's talking. Pay attention."
"Thinking about what to eat when we get back," she said, fobbing him off with any old excuse. "My assistant cooks amazingly."
Hao Yuguang sighed. "What's amazing food worth? Trailers like ours are hand-me-downs from the company that nobody else wanted. Sleeping in one is luxury enough. You think you're cooking?"
Qin Ting went "ah." "My trailer has a kitchen. Want to come eat?"
"What?! Your company treats you that well?!"
Hao Yuguang was stunned. He'd thought his own company was good enough—he'd pulled who knows how many strings to wangle an audition, then distinguished himself among a crowd of actors to land a role that looked like the second male lead on paper but barely had any scenes. As a reward, the company had bought him a brand-new little trailer—with no cooking facilities at all, just a place to briefly rest and make commuting easier. This second female lead whose name he'd never heard—rumor had it Director Qin had asked for her personally, and her company had even given her a trailer with a kitchen. He found himself looking at her with new eyes.
Qin Ting was about to explain, then remembered it was better to keep a low profile away from home. She pressed her lips together and quietly made something up: "The company's renting it. We split the cost fifty-fifty. Sigh."
"Oh……"
Seeing the pity in Hao Yuguang's eyes, Qin Ting concluded this one wasn't overly bright.
Their conversation was quiet, but every word reached Zou Songpu in front. The man's brows were knit. He had no desire to eavesdrop, didn't care where her trailer came from, and cared even less about her company this and that. While Director Qin spoke his eyes stayed where they should, but his mind was elsewhere: that cat was in the same city as him. Since that last encounter the account hadn't updated; he'd rewatched the stream clips a good eighty or a hundred times, and even while running lines he kept a related video playing on a device nearby.
He'd gone back to the park too—sat all day under the banyan and never saw her. Sister Zhuang thought he was relapsing and threatened to quit, then set Assistant Chen tailing him everywhere, which annoyed him to death.
Once Director Qin got hold of a microphone, there was no stopping him. The plan was for everyone to file up and offer incense at the altar table in turn, then end with a brief speech. Instead he talked for over half an hour on his own, until the assistant director beside him, unable to bear it, quietly warned that they were running out of time—only then did he wind down.
After the group photo, Director Qin waved a grand hand. "Rolling!"
The stagehands swarmed in, striking everything not needed for the scene and setting the right pieces; lighting and camera adjusted positions and lamps.
The first scene today was Zou Songpu's solo: after graduation, betrayed at his first job, alone in his rented room, a monologue to himself. Qin Ting had nothing to do with it. Only too happy, she stayed in her trailer enjoying the air conditioning, reviewed the lines she had to memorize today, had Zhou Dao draw all the curtains, and recorded a little daily for the account on the story feature.
The fan who normally commented first was oddly absent today.
"Sis, it's been twenty minutes and our top gifter still hasn't commented. Don't tell me he unfollowed?" Zhou Dao cradled her phone, reading through everyone in the comments and replying to a few of the fun ones.
"No way. My follower count just went up by a few dozen."
"No no no, I have to go check. If the big spender bolts I will not survive it."
"Go scroll, then." Qin Ting stretched, boneless, draping herself over Assistant Zhou and watching her hunt for their patron among the crowd of fans.
Hard work pays off: ten-odd minutes later the account finally surfaced in the follower list, and Zhou Dao let out a long breath. "Okay, okay. Scared me half to death."
"How much has he actually given us?" Qin Ting had never really kept track. After signing with the company they'd set a split—fifty-fifty—and she paid Zhou Dao's salary out of her share, but what each gift actually converted to, that math was Zhou Dao's to do.
"He's nearly forty percent of it all by himself!"
"What?!" Qin Ting shot upright and snatched the phone, mouth agape. "He's not laundering money through us, is he?"
"What are you imagining? Even if someone were laundering money, they wouldn't do it here—there's a whole industry chain for that these days."
"So he's just plain rich?"
"Rich is good. The richer the better—may he keep raining gifts on us." Zhou Dao's portion of the pay was commission-based; the more he gave, the more she made.
A knock at the trailer door punctured Assistant Zhou's daydream.
"Teacher Qin, time to get ready."
It was Qin Ting's first time working on a proper set, and even the makeup station outclassed her old crews by a mile. Her face was finally free of that chalk-white plaster, and her legs, of those thick fleece tights.
"All done—have a look." The stylist plucked the last clip from her hair.
"Thank you, thank you for your hard work." She leaned in and checked the mirror this way and that, genuinely delighted with how she looked today.
Zou Songpu's side was nearly finished; he was behind the monitor reviewing how the takes had come out. Getting Xiao Zhou's message, Qin Ting hurried over just in time to see his face on screen, absolutely hollowed out with despair.
In the story, on top of his rent, he sent part of his pay home to his mother and younger sister. Now, framed and fired in a scheme, even a top law graduate from a famous school felt his mind go blank—he had no idea what tomorrow would look like, and the future was a fog.
He'd graduated only last summer, a year of work to his name at most. His hair was clawed into a bird's nest, the lights were off, and as the camera pushed in, all that was clear on that handsome face was the twitch of muscle and eyes rimmed red.
Qin Ting watched from behind, spellbound. For the first time she truly felt what a great actor's craft looked like—and how poor her own was. Their next scene together was the one with him and the mother at home, and suddenly she had no idea how she was going to act at all.
"That's a good take! Moving on!" The director clapped Zou Songpu on the shoulder. "Good energy today. Go fix your hair—we're changing locations soon."
"Okay." The scene just shot had only a few lines, so his voice was still normal for now.
The next scene was a flashback from the film: mother and daughter seeing Zou Songpu's character off to college, the three of them packing his luggage together at home.
Since his father's illness and death, the family martial arts school had struggled more and more. His mother coached martial arts too, but her name never carried as far as his father's, and with fewer and fewer kids in the small town, they scraped by month to month. Thank goodness the son tested into a good university, and the student loans helped; only then could they breathe.
"Once your big brother graduates and finds work, things will get better for us all." The actress playing the mother had won Best Supporting Actress several times over; older now, she took roles like this.
Qin Ting took the clothes her mother handed over and put them into her brother's suitcase, though her voice came out unnatural. "Yes…… that's right……"
"Cut!" The director's voice came through the loudspeaker. "What are you doing?"
"I'm sorry, Director—I wasn't ready. Can we go again?"
Qin Ting apologized in a rush. The director waved it off, the props team reset everything, and they rolled again.
The exchange with the mother went smoothly enough, but Qin Ting never quite dropped into the scene. Every second she was thinking: Can I act this well? Should I say it like that? Is this the right emotion? Question marks kept flooding her brain until even her eyes went glassy and vacant.
The mother noticed something off, seized her hand, and said, "Xiao Qing, your brother hasn't even left yet, and you're already getting weepy?"
The line was improvised; the director didn't call cut. Qin Ting picked up her scripted reply and only then came back to herself. Luckily it didn't jar.
"Mom, I got everything you asked me to buy. They were out of the milk tea Xiao Qing likes, so I got you a different flavor." Zou Songpu's character, Tian Yuan, had both arms full and another bag hung around his neck.
Zhenqing hurried over to take it off him, but couldn't reach, and rose on her toes. "Ge, lower your head a little."
Tian Yuan planted his feet wider and stooped to her eye level. "So this is the world from a shorty's point of view."
It was completely against Zou Songpu's usual style. Qin Ting was stared right out of the scene, her face warming; she shoved him hard. "You're the short one!"
The shove didn't move Zou Songpu at all—the recoil sent her staggering back instead, and she nearly went down. Luckily he dropped everything in his hands and yanked her steady, sparing her full embarrassment on the very first day of filming.
"Cut!" The assistant director pulled off his cap and marched up to Qin Ting with the megaphone. "Are you half asleep or what? Improvising nonsense! I didn't want to say this earlier, but you've got this dead-eyed stare—people will think you're reciting homework. Perform if you can. If you can't, get lost!"