Still cheerful, Peter happily pulled Soren over to sit down and handed him a can of beer: "Here's to celebrating the new year!"
Soren took the beer and couldn't help but smile.
He pulled the tab, holding the beer towards Kong Kenan: "Even though what you did was risky, thanks for bringing the beer. Alright, here's to the new year."
He raised his beer can.
Kong Kenan grinned, showing his white teeth.
"To the new year," Kong Kenan clinked his can with Soren's.
The four of them, in that small storage room, drank beer and enjoyed simple food as they welcomed the new year.
The beer cans were opened one after another, and the four of them hadn't had alcohol in so long that they were all craving it badly.
They gulped down the beer, and soon they were all drunk, with their clothes drenched in the malty scent of beer.
Most of the food had been eaten, and Kong Kenan proudly announced to Soren that the plate of dumplings had been secretly made by him in the kitchen and cooked with a heat ray.
Soren, unaware of Kong Kenan's terrible cooking skills, had naively picked up a dumpling, only to be nearly overwhelmed by the spicy kick of a chili pepper.
Who puts chili peppers in dumplings???
This was nothing like the dumplings he'd had in Chinatown!!
Soren, with his tongue sticking out and hissing from the heat, turned redder than the chili, tears in his eyes as he complained, "I've never had dumplings with chili peppers in them!! You're a fake Asian!!"
Kong Kenan, feeling extremely guilty, quickly used Ice Breath to chill a can of beer for him: "Well, there are many flavors of dumplings, and I thought you might like the spicy ones better—really, you should try chili peppers more, spicy things taste the best!"
Soren took a big gulp of beer and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand. "It's terrifying, I don't believe it!"
"You really have to believe me," Kong Kenan insisted earnestly, "When things are back to normal outside, I'll take you to our place for hot pot! No one can resist the allure of hot pot, and I guarantee you'll fall in love with spicy food once you try it."
"No way, I'm not eating it!" Soren shook his head vigorously.
Peter excitedly raised his hand: "I'll eat it, I'll eat it! I love Mexican food, and I love chili peppers!"
"You're on the ball," Kong Kenan praised him, giving him a pat on the back. "Alright, when you come to Shanghai, I'll take care of you. I'll show you all the best spots in Shanghai."
They drank and began to dream freely about a future where the world returned to its former state.
Kong Kenan and Peter settled their future travel plans, while Whitney dismissed their ambitions with disdain, claiming that after their victory, he would catch up on all the football games he'd missed over the years and have a great time in Hawaii.
Finally, they asked Soren what he wanted to do once they were back outside.
Soren, already half-drunk, lay among them and was momentarily stunned by the question.
"Me? I…" He raised his beer can to check if there was any more beer left, but the liquid overflowed from the edge and spilled down his neck.
He quickly sat up, wiped the beer from his neck, and nervously reached into his pants pocket, pulling out an old, well-worn Polaroid photo he had kept hidden for a long time.
He quietly took the photo out of his pocket, his thumb gently caressing the two figures in the picture.
One was him, with his face blurred by a sneeze, only the red knitted hat visible.
The other was an eighteen-year-old Clark standing next to him, smiling at the camera.
"I want to go back to that day," he said softly, gently.
He had been angry for a long time about the small mishap that day, spending an entire night lamenting why he had sneezed at such an inopportune moment.
Little did he know that it had turned out to be the happiest night of his life.
The windows along Fifth Avenue were intricately decorated and dazzling, Christmas carols floated through the night air, and on that snowy Christmas Eve, Clark walked beside him, his eyes brimming with exuberant joy as he looked at him.
They held hands, strolling down the lavishly lit and crowded streets of Fifth Avenue, heading together into an uncertain future.
The smile of Clark in the photo seemed like it was just yesterday, but in reality, it was a distant memory.
This young and somewhat childish Clark had his arm gently draped over him, his blue eyes mixing with a hint of hesitation and awkwardness as he looked at the camera.
Clearly, he wasn't accustomed to being photographed in such a public setting, which made his posture stiff, but his smile was still as warm as the brightest sunshine of a Kansas autumn.
At that innocent and carefree age, neither of them knew that they would eventually go their separate ways, ending up where they were now.
…A road that stretched across countless lives, growing ever farther apart towards the ends of fate.
Perhaps he was too drunk, but as he traced Clark's face in the photo with his fingertip, his gaze wandered somewhere into the past, his face carrying a silly smile.
He spoke to the young man in the photo with a tender and sincere tone: "I miss you so much."
He pressed the photo to his chest, folded his arms around it, turned his face, and slowly rested it on his knees.
As he closed his eyes, a smile still lingered at the corners of his mouth: "—Clark."
Before him, the eighteen-year-old handsome Clark looked up from the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Plaza, his sea-blue eyes shining with a smile as he gazed at him.