1990: Starting from Baojia Street

Zhou Yan originally wanted to control the pace and keep the signing time within two hours, but now with more and more people queuing up, he had to speed up.

Before coming, Zhang Youan asked Zhou Yan to design a simple signature to improve the efficiency of signing, but Zhou Yan did not accept his suggestion and still signed in Chinese characters as before.

The two characters "Zhou Yan" have many strokes, so it is not that fast to sign. Even if Zhou Yan tries to cram at the last minute, there is no way to speed up.

After signing every ten or so people, he would look back to see if the line was getting shorter, but every time he looked up, the line got longer, giving him a feeling that wild fire could not be extinguished and that spring breeze would bring new life.

At one point he wanted to change "Zhou Yan" directly to "Y" to improve efficiency, but this signature was too unethical, after all, the fans had spent money on it.

Forty minutes later, the queue reached a dynamic balance. The number of people in the queue neither decreased nor increased, and remained at around one hundred people.

Seeing this, Zhou Yan breathed a sigh of relief. It seemed that there was hope of completing the signing within at least two hours.

As time goes by, there will definitely be fewer and fewer people queuing. I guess after a while, there will be fewer people queuing.

While taking a break, Zhou Yan leisurely drank a sip of water. As the number of people in the queue decreased, he could slow down his pace again.

However, just when Zhou Yan thought he could relax a little, there was a sudden commotion at the door of the record store, and he vaguely heard someone shouting "Nick".

Just when Zhou Yan was confused, Huo Yilan ran over and said, "The Backstreet Boys are here."

Hoylen's face was full of smiles. He was naturally happy. He was very surprised to have invited Zhou Yan to hold a signing event in their store, but he didn't expect to be able to attract the Backstreet Boys.

Backstreet Boys are very popular now, and their records are also selling very well in their record stores.

Those who like Backstreet Boys are basically young people, and these people are also the main consumers of record stores.

Their record store often holds small concerts to attract customers and gather popularity.

Normally, their store invites less famous bands, and only on special days will they invite some famous musicians.

This time Zhou Yan came to hold a book signing event, which was a special day for them.

Sometimes customers will recommend their favorite singers or bands, and the Backstreet Boys are often mentioned by customers.

Hoylen also tried to invite the Backstreet Boys, but now the Backstreet Boys' schedule is too full and it is impossible to get them together.

When Zhou Yan heard what Hoylen said, he frowned. He didn't expect that the Backstreet Boys would come directly to the record store.

Isn't this making trouble?

Zhou Yan was about to say something when several members of Backstreet Boys came up to him surrounded by fans.

Because of the appearance of Backstreet Boys, the atmosphere became lively. Most of the customers at the scene, even if they were not fans of Backstreet Boys, had heard of them.

There were even some fans of Zhou Yan at the scene who became aware of him because of the Backstreet Boys. They first listened to the Backstreet Boys' "Yellow" and then got to know Zhou Yan as a composer.

The young men were very happy to see Zhou Yan. The journey from Las Vegas was not easy. The car broke down halfway and it took a long time to repair it.

Originally, Captain Kevin was planning to wait in the hotel for Zhou Yan to finish the signing, but Nick and the others insisted on coming to the signing site. Kevin had no choice but to communicate with Jeff Brown first, and after getting permission, he took the team members to the signing site.

Looking at the young men in front of him, Zhou Yan sighed secretly, thinking that he would probably have to work overtime today.

But seeing the few people, Zhou Yan was still very happy, and said with a smile, "Is the car repaired?"

"It's fixed." Kevin scratched his head embarrassedly, "Sorry to have kept you waiting for so long."

"It's not your fault. As long as we're safe, it's good." Zhou Yan looked at Huo Yilan again and suggested to Kevin, "How about you go to the lounge for a while. I'll come find you when I'm done here."

Before Kevin and the others could respond, Huo Yilan rushed to say, "Since this is your first time here, let me show you around the store."

Kevin smiled and said, "It's okay, we can just go shopping by ourselves."

Zhou Yan didn't have time to take care of them at the moment. The line became even longer as he wasted time. He nodded to Kevin and then continued to sign autographs for the fans.

After about ten minutes, there was another burst of noise at the door.

Zhou Yan frowned and looked towards the door, but there were a lot of people in the store at the moment, and he couldn't see what was happening at the door from his position.

Just when he was wondering, he saw Mariah Carey walking towards him surrounded by people.

The moment he saw Maria, Zhou Yan's mouth twitched. One Backstreet Boy was not enough, Maria also came over to join in the fun.

Is she so free? The point is that there have been rumors about the two of them these past few days. If she comes here at this critical moment, isn't she giving the reporters material?

When Maria entered the store, the commotion she caused was much bigger than that of the Backstreet Boys. Almost everyone in the store knew her.

Maria looked at Zhou Yan from a distance, a bright smile appeared on her face, and then she walked quickly towards Zhou Yan.

When she got in front of Zhou Yan, she smoothed her hair and asked Zhou Yan with a smile, "Where should I go to buy the album?"

"Buy an album?"

"Isn't this a book signing? Of course I have to buy the album."

"you……"

As soon as Zhou Yan opened his mouth, Huo Yilun beside him handed over a copy of "Rainy Bells" attentively, "Here, Miss Kelly."

"Thank you." Maria took the album and then smiled and said to the people in line, "Everyone, do you mind if I cut in line?"

The fans waved their hands.

"Of course I don't mind."

"As you please."

After getting the fans' approval, Maria turned around and handed the album to Zhou Yan, "Then please sign it for me."

When she handed the album to Zhou Yan, the reporters nearby were pressing the shutter buttons frantically.

These reporters were lucky today. They originally came just for Zhou Yan, but they didn't expect to be able to take pictures of Backstreet Boys and Maria as well.

They knew that the rumors about Zhou Yan and Maria were unlikely to be true, but they also knew that the news about these two people must have been very popular recently.

It has to be said that Maria is really a bit "rebellious". Reporters all suspected that Maria came here specifically because of the recent scandal. She wanted to use this action to show that she doesn't care what others say at all.

Zhou Yan reluctantly took the song "Rain Bells" handed to him by Maria, and while signing it, he said in a voice that only the two of them could hear, "I thought you were busy with the new song recently."

Hearing this, Maria curled her lips, "Don't you welcome me?"

Although she did not deliberately raise the decibel level, she did not deliberately lower her voice like Zhou Yan, so her words were heard by the reporters and the fans in the front line.

"Of course you're welcome." Zhou Yan curled the corner of his mouth. He found that Maria was really not easy to mess with.

It’s better to just sign her name quickly and send her away.

After signing his name quickly, Zhou Yan handed the album back to Maria, but Maria was not satisfied. "Don't I have a little privilege to let you write a blessing message for me on it? At least write my name. Can you spell my name? MA..."

"I can spell it." Zhou Yan quickly stopped her from spelling her name.

Zhou Yan then wrote the title of the new song "Someone Like You" and her name "Mariah Carey" in Chinese characters on the album cover. Seeing that they were all Chinese characters, Mariah asked curiously, "What does this say?"

"The title of the new song is the same as your name."

"Is it so difficult to write our names in Chinese? I wanted to learn it, but now it seems that I will never be able to learn it."

Zhou Yan handed her the album and urged, "Hurry up, there are many people waiting behind."

Just a moment ago, Zhou Yan sped up and eased the pressure of the queue a little. But now, due to Maria's delay, the line has become very long.

Maria took the album with a smile, "Come on."

Then she didn't leave, but started walking around the store, and Huo Yilan hurried over to accompany her.

Zhou Yan didn't have time to care about her. His mind was now full of thoughts about speeding up the work and getting off work on time.

Even if you can't leave work on time, you can't work overtime for too long.

……

After signing for another half an hour, Zhou Yan rubbed his eyes and looked up at the team, and found in despair that after his half an hour of hard work, the number of people not only did not decrease, but increased.

He quickly called the staff and asked, "How many people are in line now?"

The store didn't do any statistics in advance, and when the staff heard Zhou Yan's question, they hurried to count.

After a while, the staff ran over and said, "There are more than 300 people."

"How many?"

"More than three hundred people." The staff member repeated.

“How many have you signed?”

"There should be more than 400."

Zhou Yan felt a headache when he heard that he had only signed more than 400 tickets in an hour and a half, and there were still more than 300 people in line.

At the signing event today, each person could only sign two albums, and those who had signed before him basically each had two albums, which meant that in this hour and a half, he only signed more than two hundred people.

It would take at least an hour and a half to sign all three hundred people now, and that’s even if the line doesn’t get bigger.

Normally, during a book signing, in order to control the time, they control the number of tickets sold, but today they didn't expect so many people to come, so they didn't decide the number in advance.

Zhou Yan did not set a quantity, so Huo Yilen naturally would not set a quantity either. He certainly hoped to sell as many as possible.

Sighing, Zhou Yan said to the staff, "Stop selling, and don't let people queue up later."

The staff couldn't make the decision either, so they could only say to Zhou Yan, "I'll go ask Huo Yilan."

Zhou Yan thought for a moment and then said, "Tell Huo Yilun to finish the signing early so that I can still have some time to perform two shows on the spot."

……

It was already 4:20 when Jessica and Hardison arrived at the record surplus.

Seeing the long line in front, Hardison breathed a sigh of relief, "Fortunately, we caught up."

Jessica also laughed, “Well, I caught up.”

Zhou Yan's signing event was not widely publicized, and neither of them knew about it beforehand.

If they hadn't happened to go to the video store in Hollywood today and heard the owner tell them about this, they would have missed Zhou Yan's autograph session right outside their home.

Fortunately, they were close by, so it didn't take them long to get there from the video store.

The two picked four albums of Zhou Yan from the shelves in the front row, then ran excitedly to the checkout counter to pay, but the cashier's words were like a bucket of cold water poured over their heads.

"Sorry, the autograph signing line has ended."

"Ah?" Hardison's eyes widened. "Aren't we still queuing?"

"Yes, but there are only so many people in the line, and it ended twenty minutes ago," the cashier explained.

"Can you..."

Hardison wanted to fight for it, but as soon as he opened his mouth, the cashier seemed to know what he wanted to say, "Sorry, no."

"Ok."

Hardison hung his head. They missed each other after all. He said to Jessica apologetically, "I'm sorry. I should have paid more attention to his news."

Jessica was also disappointed, but she didn't blame Hardison.

"It's okay. I don't blame you. There was too little publicity for this book signing event."

"Yeah, too few." Hardison sighed, and then looked at the queue, "With so little publicity, why are there so many people coming?"

“Maybe we just don’t know.”

Now that the queue was over, there was no need for them to buy albums, because they already had all the albums sold here, and buying the same ones would be a waste of money.

But just as they turned around to put the album back on the shelf, the cashier said, "Although the line for the autograph session is over, you can still buy an album. As long as you buy an album, you can get a seat."

"Get a seat?" Hardison asked puzzled.

"Well, after the book signing, Y will be performing on the spot."

“You have to buy the album to listen to it?”

“You can listen to it without buying the album, but if you buy it, you get a seat.”

When he heard there were more performances to listen to, Hardison immediately said, "Let's buy two tickets."

"Ok."

……

It was already half past six when Zhou Yan finished signing all the albums.

He originally thought that the people behind him would be able to finish signing in two hours at most, but he didn't expect it to take nearly two and a half hours. This was mainly because his hands were too sore as he signed later, and his signing speed dropped significantly.

He had just stretched when Hoylen asked with a smile, "Mr. Y, do you want to take a break before starting the performance? You must be very tired after signing for such a long time."

His words sounded like he was concerned about Zhou Yan, but in fact he was reminding Zhou Yan not to forget the performance.

Zhou Yan was of course aware of Huo Yilan's thoughts, but he did not point it out. He just smiled and said, "It's okay. I'll get ready and start in five minutes." (End of this chapter)