Yang Ruoqian had always respected emptiness.
An empty office meant no one was planning a useful project. An empty meeting room meant no one was discovering a new interpretation of his orders. An empty cinema hall, most importantly, meant electricity, staff, and rent were being consumed without the vulgar interruption of success.
So when Director Chen reported that morning screenings still looked empty enough to be useful, Yang Ruoqian felt the rare comfort of a man seeing an old friend return.
"Keep them that way," he said.
Director Chen wrote it down too seriously.
Yang Ruoqian immediately became alert. "I mean, do not promote them. Do not create a morning brand. Do not say peaceful, nostalgic, silver-age, slow life, or anything that sounds like people might enjoy it."
"Understood," Director Chen said. "Only normal morning screenings."
"Not even normal. Just screenings."
"Plain screenings."
