"Legends and Lattes", "宛转环"

Travis Baltree's cozy fantasy goes down about as smoothly as his voice. Who doesn't like to see how a nice coffee shop get built up piece by piece, friend by friend?

• “Well, you’re right. I don’t. But wood’s wood, and craft’s craft. I watched you work. Live long enough, you realize some folks can be handed a problem and some tools, and they’ll sort it out. And I never think twice about hiring that sort of fellow.”
• “Like I said, I watched you work. Sharp tools. You clean as you go. Your mind’s on your business.”
• They called it a café. People just sat around drinking it from these little ceramic cups, and I had to try it, and… it was like drinking the feeling of being peaceful. Being peaceful in your mind. Well, not if you have too much, then it’s something else.”
• Viv glanced sidelong at Laney’s mug of tea. “Say, you ever have coffee?” she asked.
  Laney blinked at her and looked affronted. “Why, I never have. And the way I was brought up, a lady doesn’t talk about her maladies,” she said primly.
• when the kettle whistled, she slowly poured boiling water through, a little at a time.
  “Is that a lady’s stockin’?” asked Cal.
  Viv glanced at him. “It’s clean. I don’t wear stockings.”
  “Just askin’,” he said mildly.
  “Hm,” she said. It seemed he was rubbing off on her.
• “Latte? That mean somethin’?”
  “Named after the gnomish barista who invented them, I think—Latte Diameter.”
  Cal gave her a long suffering look. “Can’t explain what one word means with another word nobody knows. What’s a barista?”
• Tandri’s polite smile thinned away, but then she deliberately appeared to apply a new one, at a significantly higher wattage. Viv got the distinct impression that Tandri was unveiling the barest edge of something she normally kept cloaked.
• Viv shrugged. She dunked one end into her latte and took another bite. Her eyes went wide. She chewed, swallowed, and allowed herself a moment to appreciate this subtle, elegant comingling of flavors. “Oh hells, Thimble. That old man was right. You are a genius.”
• The real genius, however, wasn’t apparent to her until Tandri pointed it out. “These will keep, won’t they? Overnight, maybe for several days?”
• Would you really want to throw all that away on some sort of misguided principle? The world is full of taxes and allowances and concessions that keep things moving forward. This is just another one of those.”
  He peered over the counter top, and in a voice like rumpled velvet said, “One latte, please, m’dears. And one of those delightful confections.”
  “I don’t mind tellin’ you, this beats the smell of horse apples, any day of the week.” Her eyes disappeared in the dried-fruit crinkle of her grin.
• “Well, there is going to be a payment, of sorts. Weekly, in fact.”
  Tandri’s brow wrinkled in consternation.
  “I guess she likes Thimble’s cinnamon rolls.”
• They ate and drank and talked about nothing much as some birds came to roost in the cherry trees. The sun drew down, and the chill of the river crept up in a slow, shivering wave.
• She took a bite that almost melted in her mouth, at once rich with butter and impossibly light. Comparing these to a loaf of bread was like comparing silk to burlap... Viv shrugged, took another, bigger bite, and found the molten core of chocolate inside. The taste was nothing like what she’d sampled yesterday—sweeter, deeper, richer. Creamy and decadent, with a subtle spice.
• “You probably would have, eventually.” There was that warm pulse again, increasingly recognizable.
  Viv was suddenly awash in an old feeling of fraught potential. A critical instant that hinged on the movement of a blade, the placement of a foot, a moment of trust extended or withheld. Failure to act was as much a decision as any other.
• By the end of the day, another sign hung outside the shop, painted in Tandri’s flowing script.
  - Live Music -
  Mornday, Tauday, Vintus, Freyday
  Five in the Evening
• That I was bending the rules—forcing some impossible streak of luck—and any moment, you’d find out who I really was, and then you’d be gone.”
  She breathed out, slowly.
  “But what a stupid thing to think. Unfair to you. Did I think so little of you? Did I think you couldn’t see who I was, really? Was I foolish enough to believe I could make you see something other than what was there?”
  She looked down at her hands for a moment.
  “So. I might not deserve you. And you might forgive too much. But I’m damned glad to have you.”

===========================
慕明这篇很有点姜味，但还缺一点帮读者完成 leap of faith 的那把力气。

__ 再看这屋舍，因为有了空，户牖，墙壁才有了各自的用途。没有空，实也不存在，正所谓有形但为无形造。看画也是一样，人只知有画处是画，不知无画处皆画。画的空处，往往是全局所关。若求纸上云林，何处留空，如何留空，比如何画一木一石更重要。最精妙的画，若说是墨色画就，倒不如说是由空白画成。

“这里叫做瓶隐。”爹爹笑道，“古时有异人叫申屠有涯，放浪云泉之间，随身携一瓶，困乏时，就跃身入瓶，世人都叫他瓶隐子。今日爹爹也取此意，把这三间卧房筑成瓶形。”

“不，那亭子是人建的。” 茞儿摇头，“匾额上有他的名字。他叫子冈。”
他的笑容忽然凝住。那个吴越乃至天下都为之震动的名字，那个使有史以来最杰出的玉工断送了性命的名字，他并未向茞儿提起过。

后来他渐渐明白，并不是所有人都像他一样长大。他们的生命里没有文章义理，没有诗情画意，没有至亲的谆谆教诲，也没有爱人的心心相印。士人习以为常的自尊自爱，其实都需滋养，而当日复一日地挣扎于温饱，被侮辱损害的时候，卑微地活下去，才需要最大的勇气。祁幼文虽不能体会他们的切肤之痛，也并不愿只将他们看作硕民愚氓。

第一丝秋风吹来时，爹爹的纸形也像院中的梧桐叶一样，被翻得哗啦啦响，两人又往园中去。坐在小船上，从满河白绒绒的芦草间穿过，看着船后的水纹分开又合上，微明的天光从细如针尖的芦花上透出来。蝉与青蛙都噤了声，只有水鸟不知藏在哪里，扑腾拍打着翅膀，忽然就有了一点凉意。 <>
小船绕过一片青林，就从水路到了园子。茞儿摸摸眉毛，像是凝了盈盈的露，衣袖也沾了淡淡的湿气，还未进园，已身在琉璃国了。泊舟登岸，透过长廊看去，是让鸥池。风动清波，池中山影袅袅，如海上仙山，分不清何处是云，何处是水。

“世人只道桃源在画中。” 爹爹叹了口气，“却不曾想，只有把吾辈所在的空间当做画中，再跳出去，桃源人才能有取之不尽，用之不竭的美池良田。空间可以舒展蜷曲，乾坤可以环环相套，明白这点，才能得知桃源的真意。古人言，有洞天福地，隐于名山大川之间，唯有仙家才得其门，实际上，洞天，只是那更高层的世界，在吾辈所在空间中的一处嵌入罢了，所谓仙家，也不过是那世界的众生。”

“西学精深，西人并非从上往下看，而是假想这浑圆大地被围在一中空圆筒内，其纬线与圆筒相切，然后再假想圆球中心有一灯，从里往外看，把球面上的图形映到筒上，再把圆筒展开，即得此图。此图保持了圆球上的角度方位，如循着图上两点间的直线航行，海船方向不变，可直达目的。西人长于航海，此图居功甚伟。”

这世间曾有多少隐约显现的秘密，指向令人震颤的事实，却一次次被人遗忘。他窥见了极度虚幻的真实，世界熟悉的形状片片剥落，露出苍白骨架，摧毁了一切语言。

画卷展开成为世界，世界跌落成为画卷，虚空中，她仿佛走过了千山万水，又仿佛只在咫尺之间。行走在这个无向世界里，天空有时在她脚下流淌，湖水有时在她头顶盘旋，她想起了幼时的宛转环梦，丹崖白水，犹在眼前。颠倒的是天地，还是自己？所见所感，是真实，还是幻梦？

宛转之园终究是建成了。只是它不光扭转了空间，使得那高层世界显现，也扭转了时间。时空本为一体，是交织而成的网，时与空，是这网的经线与纬线。高层世界是在时间的刻度上，将现实展开而成。武陵人再也回不到桃源，不仅是由于空间的封闭，也是在时间的刻度上错过了。

//附记：琢玉和造园中，柔性空间的引入，既可以用传统画论解释，也可以用数学中黎曼空间的概念解释。从物理学角度看，物质的分布改变了时空的形态，即为“琢空”的设置来源，