On Lu Yicheng’s left hand were the watch and ring that Lu Siyan had drawn.

When they got home, Lu Yicheng took his son to the bathroom to wash their hands out of habit. Lu Siyan, impatient to get back to the LEGO set that Jiang Ruoqiao had bought him, didn’t even bother to dry his hands after washing them — he slipped out like a little eel. Lu Yicheng stood at the sink, stared at his left hand for a moment, then after only the briefest hesitation, squeezed out some hand soap and washed off the ink bit by bit.

In some sense, Lu Yicheng was not unlike Jiang Yan — somewhere deep inside, he too longed for a warm and loving home.

People were social creatures, and Lu Yicheng was no island. Since his grandmother passed away, he had been alone: alone during the New Year, alone through every holiday, sick and alone when illness came, and sometimes after long stretches of busy work, he’d come home to nothing but darkness. He had thought he’d already grown accustomed to that kind of solitude — until Lu Siyan arrived.

At first, he had been genuinely anxious and unsettled. Every night that period as he closed his eyes, what he hoped for was that he would wake up and Lu Siyan would be gone — returned to that future the child had spoken of.

He knew he would have great difficulty shouldering the responsibility of raising a child.

But now, he had grown accustomed to the child’s presence. Every evening before bed, he would go and look at Lu Siyan sleeping. And not just that — he would often wake in the middle of the night to pull the covers back over him, or coax him to get up and use the bathroom.

Lu Siyan’s arrival had also brought Jiang Ruoqiao into his life.

Everything that had happened in this time had given him a wholly new understanding of himself.

He had become worse. When she and Jiang Yan had not yet broken up, there had been emotions inside him that he didn’t dare examine too closely.

He had become cautious — more careful than he had been facing university entrance exam papers, as if he wanted to carry a measuring tape with him at all times, always watching the distance between himself and her.

……

He glanced down. The marks left by the pen Lu Siyan had used were stubbornly persistent — the faint trace of the ring on his ring finger was still faintly visible.

Jiang Ruoqiao, of course, had no idea how Lu Yicheng’s heart had been turning in circles over the ring incident.

In her life, there were simply far too many things that mattered more than falling in love.

Studying, work, her son — and of course, family.

From that dream she’d had, Jiang Ruoqiao wasn’t only concerned with what Jiang Yan’s mother had done to scheme against her, or the way she had mocked her. What she cared about most was her maternal grandparents’ health — that was far more important than anything Jiang Yan’s mother might be plotting.

She felt deeply guilty about it.

If something was wrong with her grandmother’s health, why had she never noticed it before? She couldn’t pass it off as mere inattention. The truth was, she had grown up. She had her own things now — things that had, at this point in her life, taken priority over her grandparents — and so she had let it slide.

Right now, she was genuinely grateful that she had been living inside a novel.

And she was grateful that she had dreamed of all those glimpses of the future — so that she could do everything in her power to prevent regret.

That evening, Jiang Ruoqiao called home to Xi Shi.

She phoned her grandparents once a week. The two elders had grown a little hard of hearing, so conversations on the phone always ended up a bit louder than usual.

“What?” Her grandfather’s rich, resonant voice came through the phone. “You want us to come to Jing Shi at the end of the month? What would we go to Jing Shi for?”

It sounded like her grandmother said something in the background, and her grandfather relayed it to her: “Qiaoqiao wants us to come to Jing Shi at the end of the month! Who knows what this child has in her head!”

Jiang Ruoqiao obviously couldn’t tell them she wanted them to come for medical check-ups.

Xi Shi had decent hospitals too, but in the original novel, her grandparents had come to Jing Shi — apparently because Jing Shi had the most authoritative specialists in the relevant field, along with the most advanced resources for treating that particular illness.

The only problem was that she didn’t know what illness her grandmother had been diagnosed with in the original story.

But if they had come to Jing Shi, there must have been a reason. Now, she didn’t want to waste a single moment.

“Grandpa, Grandma,” Jiang Ruoqiao said, very patiently coaxing them, “just come for a visit. You’ve both always said you wanted to see Jing Shi. It’ll be perfect — by late September it won’t be hot at all, and I’ll have time off, so I can take you around properly and show you a good time.”

Her grandmother’s voice drifted over: “What’s the point of spending all that money? The scenery is the same everywhere you go in this country — nothing particularly worth seeing.”

Jiang Ruoqiao coaxed them for a long while.

There was really only one reason the elderly weren’t willing to come: they didn’t want to waste money.

With no other option, Jiang Ruoqiao finally resorted to her trump card. “I’ve already bought the tickets! Canceling them would cost a big chunk in cancellation fees. I’ve already booked the hotel too — if you don’t come, that money won’t be refunded.”

Her grandparents: “…………”

In the end, they had no choice but to agree to come to Jing Shi.

The two elders were actually pleased about it, even so. They had never really traveled far in their lives, and both of them had a soft spot in their hearts for cities like Jing Shi.

Just a few minutes before they had been putting up a fierce resistance, and now they were enthusiastically discussing what clothes to bring.

After hanging up, Jiang Ruoqiao leaned against the dormitory balcony railing and tilted her head back to look at the stars outside.

How nice. It had only been a little while, really — and yet everything that had happened in this stretch of time made her feel as though years had gone by.

She had gone, in what felt like no time at all, from being a carefree, slightly scheming, slightly vain ordinary university student, to being an adult with elders to care for above and a small child below.

The day before the Mid-Autumn Festival, Mrs. Lin had, for once, managed to clear a full day to spend with her daughter, who hadn’t been home in quite some time.

The Lin family kitchen was open-plan, and that afternoon it was full of life.

Mrs. Lin personally made mooncakes. Jiang Yan’s mother helped alongside her. Lin Kexing sat quietly on a high stool to the side, eyes downcast, listening to her mother and her auntie chat.

Mrs. Lin asked, as if in passing: “University students should all have the same vacation schedule, shouldn’t they? How is it that Kexing came back, but Yan still isn’t home?” Without waiting for an answer, she smiled and teased, “Could it be that he went to his girlfriend’s family to spend Mid-Autumn?”

Jiang Yan’s mother instinctively glanced at Lin Kexing, then quickly looked back, returning her full attention to selecting the salted egg yolks.

She smiled and said, “Yan said he had something to take care of — he won’t be coming back for the Mid-Autumn Festival.”

Mrs. Lin feigned a knowing look. “I bet he’s with his girlfriend, isn’t he? You know how young people are — very understandable.”

Lin Kexing held her phone, her expression seemingly calm and undisturbed on the surface — but when she heard that Jiang Yan wasn’t coming back, a flash of pain crossed her eyes.

Jiang Yan’s mother smiled and nodded, appearing to accept Mrs. Lin’s words at face value.

Then Mrs. Lin shifted her tone, turned to her daughter, and asked, “Kexing, are you feeling down? How have you lost even more weight?”

Jiang Yan’s mother’s heart tightened at those words, but she kept her composure and said, unhurriedly: “Kexing has always had a sensitive stomach — she loses weight every summer. It’s really worrying. The school cafeteria certainly won’t be as carefully balanced as home cooking. How about this — from now on, I’ll go to the school every day and bring Kexing soups and dishes to help restore her strength?”

The smile on Mrs. Lin’s face deepened, growing ever more genuine. “That could work.”

How had she never seen it before?

Back then, she had always felt that Jiang Yan’s mother’s care for Kexing was sincere.

But if it were sincere, why had her daughter grown thinner and thinner, spoken less and less, become more and more timid and withdrawn?

“Although,” Mrs. Lin added, “Kexing — what do you think?”

She still wanted to let her daughter make her own decisions. From today onward, one small thing at a time.

Lin Kexing looked up with a vague, slightly lost expression. “Me? Either way is fine. Whatever Auntie thinks best.”

Mrs. Lin smiled gently. “Alright then. Still, let’s have Auntie Qin bring the food over.” She looked toward Jiang Yan’s mother. “There’s something I’m not comfortable leaving to anyone else, so I’ll need to ask you to take the trouble. The other day, Mrs. Wang and a few others were talking about opening a club — I’m interested too, but we haven’t settled on a location yet. Could you go and have a look for me? Everyone else is too careless and hasty — you’re the thorough one.”

Jiang Yan’s mother had no reason for suspicion.

Mrs. Lin had sent her to handle various matters before. It was just unfortunate timing — she was already worried sick about Jiang Yan and Kexing, and had been planning to devote more attention to the girl these next few days. But if she refused now, she worried that Mrs. Lin might begin to suspect something.

Jiang Yan’s mother gave a small nod. “Alright.”

Mrs. Lin’s smile grew deeper. “Then I can rest easy.”

She had only one daughter. After all these years among powerful families, she had come to understand many things clearly. A daughter’s marriage could go one of two ways: either into a union of matched status and interests, which in elite circles could sometimes be a sturdier bond than love itself — or with someone her daughter truly loved, so long as she was happy. If the latter, Mrs. Lin could overlook the man’s background and standing entirely. But she would have extremely high standards for everything else about him.

He had to be devoted to her daughter without reservation. He had to come from a clean, uncomplicated family background, so that her daughter could live her whole life without burden or unease.

Clearly, Jiang Yan met neither of those requirements. And so she had to steel herself and, with her own hands, cut off every last thread of possibility between her daughter and him.

As for driving Jiang Yan and his mother out of the Lin household — what was that, in the grand scheme of things?

She had known Jiang Yan’s mother for nearly thirty years, and she understood her better than anyone. She knew precisely what would cause the most pain.

On the day of the Mid-Autumn Festival, Lu Siyan earnestly requested that Jiang Ruoqiao come and spend the holiday with them.

Since Jiang Ruoqiao had no family in Jing Shi, she could find no reason to refuse spending such a holiday with her son.

She absolutely would not treat the house Lu Yicheng rented as her own home, so early that morning she brought along some fruit and milk. Back in her hometown, this was the custom — when you went to someone else’s house for a meal on a holiday, you never came empty-handed.

As it happened, Lu Yicheng was just about to head out with Lu Siyan to buy groceries.

Lu Yicheng had originally thought to have Jiang Ruoqiao stay home and keep Lu Siyan company, but today Lu Siyan would have none of it — and what could be a greater temptation than being with his mother? Going out to wander around, of course!

With both father and son heading out, Jiang Ruoqiao couldn’t very well stay alone in someone else’s home. After some deliberation, she had nothing to do anyway, so she went along with both of the Lu men to the market.

The market was exceptionally lively that day — people everywhere, no matter which way you turned.

Lu Yicheng had to watch that Lu Siyan wasn’t bumped into or stepped on, and at the same time keep an eye on Jiang Ruoqiao’s state of mind.

Jiang Ruoqiao was, indeed, not very at ease with all the noise and bustle. And the market sold all manner of things — pork and beef here, poultry there, seafood and fresh catch further along, fruits and snacks somewhere else entirely. It was full of the vivid, gritty energy of everyday life. Yet Jiang Ruoqiao remained ill at ease with it all, and even found herself holding her breath involuntarily.

Lu Yicheng was usually exceptionally frugal with himself, but today he was unexpectedly generous.

He weighed out spare ribs and pork belly, and also bought mandarin fish — pricier than perch — along with the chicken wings that Lu Siyan had been clamoring for.

Last of all, they came to the seafood and fresh catch section.

“Boss, how much is the hairy crab today?” Lu Yicheng asked.

Both Jiang Ruoqiao and Lu Siyan were stunned.

This was peak season for hairy crab, and hairy crab was never cheap at the best of times — let alone on a day like Mid-Autumn Festival.

The vendor said, “Depends what kind you want — there’s cheaper and more expensive.”

The cheaper crabs would be smaller; the expensive ones were large, with plump, generous crab roe.

Lu Yicheng didn’t even blink. “I’ll take three of the largest ones. Two females and one male — please select them for me.”

Jiang Ruoqiao: Oh my.

Lu Siyan: Yohoo!!

He loved hairy crab!

The vendor made his selection and weighed them out. The price was naturally steep. Lu Yicheng paid by scanning the code without so much as blinking.

Lu Siyan was a child who knew nothing of the cost of things, and even after they’d left the market he was still saying: “Three isn’t really enough. One for me, one for Mommy, one for Daddy.”

Lu Siyan was no ordinary child for sharpness of mind, and quickly added: “Actually, one is enough for me — but one isn’t enough for Mommy. Mommy really loves hairy crab.”

Jiang Ruoqiao: “……”

She very much wanted to say she didn’t and it wasn’t true, but this little rascal had spent five years as her son in the future and knew her tastes far too well!

Lu Yicheng glanced at Lu Siyan and said, “I know. So you eat one.”

Young children really shouldn’t eat too much hairy crab — one was more than enough.

“Your mother will have two,” Lu Yicheng said, pausing for a moment before he did.

Lu Siyan: “?”

Jiang Ruoqiao looked over at him too.

Lu Yicheng’s expression was perfectly composed and matter-of-fact. “I don’t like it. I won’t have any.”

……

Mid-Autumn Festival was a day for reunion.

After they got home, Lu Yicheng washed his hands and started in on preparing the meal. With so many dishes, it would naturally take considerably more time. Jiang Ruoqiao, mindful of her role as a guest, even made a deliberate trip to the kitchen to ask: “Is there anything I can help with?”

Lu Yicheng looked around the kitchen. It was already quite narrow.

With two people in it, turning around was a little difficult. He was about to say “it’s fine” — but then he caught sight of her bright, clear eyes, and swallowed the words back. He scanned the countertop…

The meat dishes were definitely out of the question for her.

Whether the spare ribs, pork belly, or chicken wings — they were a hassle to prepare, and she’d end up with hands coated in oil. She probably wouldn’t enjoy that.

The hairy crab was definitely out as well. Crab pincers were sharp — if they caught her, there would be blood. Besides, she clearly looked like the type who would be nervous handling live seafood.

That left vegetables.

Green and red peppers? No good — if she accidentally got chili seeds on her hands, they would burn and sting.

In the end, Lu Yicheng handed her a potato, a carrot, and a peeler.

“Help me peel the potato and carrot,” he said. “The kitchen is a bit hot — you can go peel them in the living room. There’s a trash bin out there.”

Jiang Ruoqiao: “Just that?”

Lu Yicheng nodded. “Just that.”

“Alright then.” She reached out to take the potato.

Lu Yicheng caught a glimpse of the dirt on it and pulled his hand back.

Jiang Ruoqiao grabbed at air. “?”

“There’s some mud on it — let me rinse it,” Lu Yicheng said. He turned on the tap and scrubbed the potato thoroughly until not a speck of mud remained, then handed it to her.

Lu Yicheng was busy in the kitchen.

Jiang Ruoqiao sat in the living room peeling potatoes and carrots, while Lu Siyan, the little young master, lounged on the sofa watching Paw Patrol.

But the atmosphere was warm and pleasant. Lu Yicheng would occasionally come out to glance around — it was a habit of his. Even when Jiang Ruoqiao wasn’t there, he did the same, no matter what he was doing: stepping out from time to time to check on what Lu Siyan was up to.

Jiang Ruoqiao sat on the sofa nearby, occasionally glancing up at the television and asking which one was Ryder — and Lu Siyan would launch into a vivid and animated description.

There was a warmth in Lu Yicheng’s eyes that even he himself hadn’t noticed.

With such a grand spread of dishes, lunch didn’t start until half past twelve.

There were potato-braised spare ribs, carrot and corn spare rib soup, steamed mandarin fish, pan-fried pork belly, chicken wings for Lu Siyan’s sake, and steamed hairy crab.

Jiang Ruoqiao propped her chin on her hand. “Strange — there’s no vegetable dish at all.”

Lu Siyan also found it peculiar. “Right, there’s no vegetables — not even a leafy green.”

Lu Yicheng patiently worked at cracking open Lu Siyan’s crab for him. “Today I’m making an exception for you two.”

Jiang Ruoqiao was absolutely devoted to hairy crab. Throughout the meal, Lu Yicheng spoke very little — it was mostly Jiang Ruoqiao and Lu Siyan keeping the conversation going. Still, it was warm and cheerful all around — a very lively, very cozy Mid-Autumn Festival.

That evening, Lu Yicheng sat down as usual to record the day’s expenses.

Today’s… had very dramatically exceeded his normal standard.

After writing it all down, he flipped back to check his expenses from last year’s Mid-Autumn Festival. Last year he had spent it alone — he hadn’t bought much of anything. It had been a busy day, and he’d been rushing to get through several academic papers, so he’d only bought a bundle of hand-pulled noodles, some Shanghai green vegetables, and a few eggs.

This year’s Mid-Autumn Festival and last year’s were worlds apart.

You could see it just from the spending.

Still…

Lu Yicheng had to admit: this Mid-Autumn Festival — exhausting as it had been — was a little happier than last year’s.

—