Chapter 7: Shades of Swagger

The brief respite from Haizhou's summer inferno ended overnight. By morning, the air hung thick as wet cotton.

Li Mu's parents left for work on the mine's shuttle bus. From 9 AM, their landline rang nonstop—classmates checking exam answers, panicking over scores, or like Zhao Kang, his childhood buddy, inviting him for an all-nighter at the internet café.

Zhao lived in the same coal-mining compound. Their friendship spanned diaper days through twelve years of school. In Li's original timeline, Zhao's college hopes had crumbled this summer. Forced to retake the gaokao, he'd rebel, vanish, and become a ghost haunting Li's New Years with cryptic calls from payphones.

"My folks are gone by noon," Zhao's voice crackled through the receiver. "KFC? My treat."

Li Mu grimaced. In 2001, Haizhou's first KFC still drew snaking queues—a status symbol for teens. "Greasy crap. Let's get proper stir-fry."

"Screw that!" Zhao protested. "I'm splurging! Twelve sharp."

As Li Mu hung up, the phone rang again.

"Li Mu?" Chen Wan's voice. "Address. I'm coming over."

"My parents aren't home," he teased. "A girl visiting a boy alone? Scandalous."

"You're a kid! I'm bringing snacks."

Glancing down, Li Mu muttered, "This 'kid's' been combat-ready for years." He gave directions, adding, "Bike here. No more road hazards."

Preening before the bathroom mirror, Li Mu scowled at his reflection: bowl-cut hair limp as seaweed, wispy teenage mustache. Grabbing his father's razor, he scraped clean.

Time for upgrades.

At the compound's barbershop—$0.60 haircuts advertised with peeling posters—a stylist sporting neon spikes eyed him skeptically. "What's this 'pompadour' you want?"

Li Mu gestured. "Shave the sides, leave an inch on top. Texture it."

The stylist—hair dyed corn-yellow, bangs veiling one eye—sneered. "Bowl cuts are in. Grow it like mine—" he flipped his greasy curtains "—girls'll flock."

"I prefer college girls." Li Mu deadpanned. "Chop-chop. Or the mine gang hears you botched it."

Twenty minutes later, Li Mu emerged transformed: cropped sides, tousled crown styled with mousse. The mirror showed cheekbones he forgot he had.

The stylist stared, crestfallen. Where his own look screamed "discount street thug," Li Mu's oozed Hong Kong film-star charisma.

"Mousse?" Li Mu tossed a $2 bill—double the rate. "Keep the change."