陈小艺（互关互评）

Before getting married, I sent electronic invitations to all my ex-boyfriends. Not to show off, but to see who would come. In the end, three showed up. The first one started drinking as soon as he sat down, and when toasting me, he said, "If your husband treats you badly, I'll be the first to squat at your doorstep." My husband turned green standing beside me. The second one brought a bouquet of chamomile, which I like. When he handed it to me, he said, "You once said you wanted to see a sea of chamomile flowers, but I couldn't make it happen. Now someone else can give that to you." I almost cried. The third one was the most normal; he just gave a red envelope and left. The next day, I received a WeChat message from him: "I put an extra 500 yuan in the red envelope yesterday to pay you back for the meal I owed you when we broke up." My husband asked me, "Why did you invite them?" I said, "I wanted to know how many of those who said 'wish you happiness' were sincere." He asked, "Did you find out?" I said, "The first one was sincere because even drunk, he remembered to protect your face; he was afraid I'd make things difficult." "The second was sincere because he remembered every word I said." "The third was sincere because he even remembered to repay a debt from five years ago." My husband was silent for a long time and said, "What about me?" I said, "You are the best one." He said, "No. I'm the dumbest one for marrying a woman who invites her ex-boyfriends to her wedding."

My colleague Xiao Wang is 185 cm tall, has been working out for three years, and can squeeze a pen with his chest muscles. He has only one life goal: to find a rich woman and save himself thirty years of struggle. He bought the most expensive annual gym membership in our city, costing 12,000. Every day, he doesn’t use the equipment; he just hangs around the yoga room entrance because the women there are the wealthiest. Hard work pays off—he hooked a woman. She’s in her early forties, well-maintained, drives a Porsche Cayenne, lives in a riverside mansion, and always carries a Chanel bag when she comes to the gym. She said her husband is abroad for long periods and feels lonely. Xiao Wang understood immediately; he accompanied her from personal training sessions to late-night snacks, and from late-night snacks to the riverside mansion. Three months later, Xiao Wang quit his job and moved into her house. She bought him an Omega watch and said they would marry once her wife returned to China to complete the paperwork. Xiao Wang posted pictures of the mansion, luxury cars, and high-end restaurants on his social media, all captioned "Grateful to have met you." We all thought he had made it. Half a year later, he moved out, dragging a suitcase to live in the company dormitory. We asked him what happened. He smoked half a pack overnight and said: "Her husband was never abroad. The house was rented by her, the Cayenne belonged to her boss, and the Chanel was a high-quality fake." "Even worse, she was dating four guys like me at the same time. The four of us ran into each other at the riverside mansion." That night, the four men sat in the living room that cost 25,000 a month in rent, each calculating how much money she had "borrowed" from them. The smallest amount was 50,000, and Xiao Wang’s was the highest at 230,000. Her excuse was always the same: "My husband froze my card, can you cover me first? I’ll pay you back next week." Now Xiao Wang works in an office building during the day, does marketing at a bar at night, and works part-time as a gym coach on weekends. Last month, I ran into him at the subway station; he had lost 20 pounds and his chest muscles were gone. He said something to me that I still remember: "I thought I was on the fifth floor, but she was in the stratosphere. Trying to catch a rich woman? I was just the bait."

I have a childhood friend who’s always had incredibly bad luck. Not the kind of bad luck where you win the lottery, but the kind where you’re extremely unlucky and then bounce back. After graduating from college, he worked at a lottery shop with a monthly salary of 3500. After three months, the shop owner ran away, owing him two months’ wages. Unwilling to give up, he took home all the remaining scratch-off tickets from the shop, saying, “Consider this as payment.” There were 183 tickets in total, with face values of 5, 10, and 20 yuan. The first 120 tickets only won a total of 80 yuan. His girlfriend scolded him, “Why did you bring home a bunch of worthless paper?” He sat on the floor of their rented room, scratching each ticket one by one. His girlfriend got so angry she went back to her parents’ home. On the 121st ticket, a 5-yuan “Ten Times Good Luck” ticket, he scratched it off and won 400,000 yuan. He was shaking on the spot and called his girlfriend: “Come back, I won 400,000.” She said, “Are you drunk?” He said, “The ticket is in my hand, come see for yourself.” She took a taxi back, saw the ticket, and they both hugged and cried. The next day, after taxes, he received 320,000 yuan. He did something no one expected: He took the 320,000 yuan and bought the lottery shop that had run away. His girlfriend said, “Are you crazy? The owner ran away, and you’re taking over?” He said, “He ran away because he didn’t know how to manage it. I do.” And he really did. He renovated the shop, created a “Winning Wall” covered with the winning tickets he had scratched (including the 400,000-yuan one). A banner hung at the entrance: “The owner of this shop once won 400,000 yuan. Do you want to be the next?” Business boomed. Three months later, monthly revenue tripled. Even more incredible, six months later, the original owner came back wanting to buy the shop back for 500,000 yuan. My friend didn’t sell. The owner said, “You’re using my business license. If I cancel it, you can’t operate.” My friend smiled: “I’ve already registered a new company. I’ll cancel your license tomorrow.” The owner was stunned. Last Chinese New Year, I saw him driving a car worth over 300,000 yuan. His girlfriend had become his wife, and their baby was due in three months. I asked him, “Do you regret that the owner ran away without paying you?” He said, “I do. I regret not letting him owe me two more months.”