“Where’s Lu Zhou?”

“Gone. Competition.”

Lin Qing’s mother came back carrying sesame pancakes and fried dough sticks and was visibly disappointed to find Lu Zhou already gone.

Lin Qing was sitting alone on the living room sofa, folding clothes.

“Alright then, tell me. What’s going on.”

Her mother, finding the man already gone, made her way over without ceremony, dumped the greasy breakfast package directly onto the coffee table, and cut her daughter a look.

“Tell you what.”

Lin Qing was puzzled and stopped folding.

“What is going on with you and this Lu Zhou?”

A mother knows her daughter.

Lin Qing’s mother prided herself on having raised her daughter well — beautifully, cleverly, sharply.

“I’ve raised you to be beautiful, clever, and sharp from the time you were small. How is it that one man turns your brain into a bowl of mush?”

“When did my brain turn to mush?”

Lin Qing was annoyed and set down the clothes in her hands. Her mother was being completely excessive.

“You were feeling inferior just now!”

Nothing got past her mother’s eyes.

Lin Qing’s politeness and distance were simply a cover for a helpless, bottomless sense of debt she could never repay.

“My daughter — when has she ever felt inferior? There’s something here I don’t know about.”

Her mother picked up a piece of clothing and started folding it herself, a little crossly.

This morning’s encounter with Lu Zhou had made Lin Qing behave like a person with mush for a brain — utterly inconsistent with the clear-headed, emotionally intelligent family standard the Lin household maintained when it came to feelings.

Lin Qing turned and walked unhappily back toward the bedroom.

“Hey! You awful girl! Come eat breakfast!”

“I’m not hungry! I’m full!”

People will hide in composure and surface calm when they feel guilty or ashamed of having done something wrong — using an outward appearance of ease to mask that shame. It is only when the truth is punctured that people become angry, turning the hatred they feel for themselves outward onto others.

Lin Qing sat in Lu Zhou’s spare, immaculate bedroom — sat right on his bed with its pale grey sheets — and buried her face in her hands as a surge of complex, tangled emotion swept through her.

In the end, the moment Lin Qing lowered her hands, all of it dissolved into a few threads of quiet heartache.

There had been a real possibility that she and Lu Zhou might have been together.

First love is the white moonlight you carry forever.

But that summer after high school graduation, her brief reunion with Lu Zhou still haunted her and would not let her go.

It was also why, the moment she entered university, Lin Qing had quickly found a boyfriend — latching on to the wealthy second-generation Zeng Rui.

That summer. After the college entrance exams.

Lu Zhou had been admitted to Beijing Sport University, just barely clearing the cutoff by a little over a hundred points, and the news spread through the entire county.

As the “martial champion” of the county, Lu Zhou may not have been as celebrated as the students who got into the top universities in Beijing, but both the county education bureau and the sports bureau took the matter seriously — they came to offer commendations and rewards, and even sent the county television station and radio station to interview and film him.

Lu Zhou was already a celebrated figure at school. Now he was even more so.

His parents’ faces were bright and beaming — the entire extended family walked through the town those few days with smiles they couldn’t contain.

“Lu Zhou, you’ve finally finished your exams! You’ve worked hard this whole year of third year — is there anything you wish for? A trip somewhere? Or would you like to invite some classmates over?”

Faced with his parents’ encouraging prompts, Lu Zhou hemmed and hawed for quite a while before finally saying, face red: “I want to… invite a classmate over.”

“Is that even worth mentioning?” Lu Zhou’s mother first waved it off as nothing.

Lu Zhou had many friends — good buddies coming in and out of their home every few days. The Lu family home was practically the county high school’s unofficial canteen.

“Cooking a few extra dishes is no trouble at all… Wait. Why is your face red?”

“I… what do you mean, my face is red.”

“It is red! And so is your neck!”

Lu Zhou’s mother suddenly understood: “Son, this classmate you want to invite — is it a boy or a girl?”

“Heheh.”

The bashful Lu Zhou hugged a throw pillow and turned his head away.

“What are you ‘heheh-ing’ about? Your mother is asking you — boy or girl!” Lu Zhou’s father walked over with a mug of tea, looking guileless and broad.

Lu Zhou, already 187 centimetres tall at eighteen, sat on the sofa squirming and twisting like an extraordinarily long piece of dough — and his parents understood immediately.

“Oh my goodness! Would you look at that! Someone is thinking about romance!” Lu Zhou’s mother was the first to start making a fuss.

Lu Zhou’s father nodded with proud approval: “Not bad, not bad! The thick-headed boy has finally come to his senses! Come on then, tell us — which family’s daughter is it? Let us have a look too.”

“Lin Qing.” Lu Zhou said it barely above a whisper.

“What? Ni Qin? Which Ni Qin?”

Lu Zhou’s father hadn’t heard, and repeated the name back wrong.

Lu Zhou’s mother was equally baffled for a moment, then it hit her and she gave her husband a hard smack on the arm.

“You deaf old man! What Ni Qin?! It’s Lin Qing! I remember now!” Lu Zhou’s mother broke into a belated flash of realisation. “That Lin Qing from Qingshui Town — Lu Zhou’s childhood friend!”

“Lin Qing?” Lu Zhou’s father struggled to recall, then slapped his own thigh and remembered. “You mean the girl whose father passed — is that right?!”

Lu Zhou’s expression shifted instantly, and he fixed his father with a look of clear displeasure.

His father immediately caught himself and started talking with his hand. “No, no — I mean, it’s your classmate! I know who she is.”

“Just stop talking.”

Lu Zhou and his mother said it at exactly the same time, in exactly the same tone of dismissal.

Lu Zhou had not been born into wealth and privilege, but by county standards, his family was solidly middle class.

His father was a middle school geography teacher; his mother worked for the telecommunications company.

With a background like his, taking up a sport was no problem — but something like golf or equestrian riding, those so-called “aristocratic sports,” was a bit of a stretch financially.

Fortunately, on one hand, Lu Zhou himself was exceptionally talented. On the other, he had been lucky enough to be born into a family full of genuine warmth and love.

From the time he was small, whatever interest Lu Zhou showed, his parents supported it with everything they had, no matter the sacrifice — and never once complained about what they gave up.

Parents like that are extraordinarily rare.

Perhaps most parents across the country could manage to sacrifice for their children.

But to do so with genuine willingness, without a single word of resentment, seeking nothing in return — that is an entirely different matter.

Growing up in a family like that, Lu Zhou developed a deep and unshakeable inner confidence and sense of self-worth. Channelled into athletic spirit, it became the bedrock of his ability to win against all odds.

“When is she coming? I’ll go to the market and get groceries! I’m going to put out a spread that puts any five-star hotel to shame.”

At this news, Lu Zhou’s father and mother were more excited than they had been when they saw his university acceptance letter.

His mother rolled up her sleeves, itching to get started.

“I’ll get your aunt and your other aunt to come over and help!”

The Lu family was a warm and close-knit extended family, and Lu Zhou was the adored centre of it all.

“Mum! Keep it low-key, please.” Lu Zhou had a sinking feeling.

Their household was about to erupt in a category-ten earthquake.

“Don’t go making decisions on your own.” Lu Zhou’s father put on the air of a seasoned veteran. “Five-star hotel? First you should tell your son to call and ask the girl what she likes to eat. That’s what’s called being strategic.”

“Being strategic? I’m cooking food, not being strategic! You old man!”

Lu Zhou’s mother was too excited to parse a figure of speech.

Then it sank in, and she realised her husband actually had a point.

So she grabbed Lu Zhou and said: “Your father’s right! Go call Lin Qing right now and ask what she likes to eat — so I know how to be ‘strategic’ about it.”

And so it was, under the earnest and expectant gazes of both parents, that Lu Zhou — eighteen years old, face flushed as ripe fruit — dialled Lin Qing’s number.

“Hello?”

Lin Qing was at her computer searching online for medical advice. Her mother had just been diagnosed with cancer, and she was urgently looking up traditional remedies, so her voice was a little flat.

But Lu Zhou, goaded by his parents and full of nervous excitement, didn’t notice anything unusual.

“L-Lin Qing, what do you… l-like to eat?”

He was so nervous he was stammering.

This was the first time Lu Zhou had formally reached out to arrange to see Lin Qing after three years apart since middle school graduation.

“Hmm?” Lin Qing was fixed on the health website and barely processing a word he said. “Oh, right — Lu Zhou! I have to go to the county next week anyway. We can meet up, but I can’t stay long.”

Lin Qing was planning to go to the county hospital to consult a specialist about her mother’s illness.

“That works perfectly!”

Lu Zhou glanced sideways at his parents, who were jabbing him with their elbows.

“I — I… I want to invite you over to my house for a meal.”

“For a meal?” Lin Qing sounded surprised.

“Oh! Just — you’re coming to the county anyway, and people have to eat. It’s nothing formal. Just come over for a simple home meal!”

Under the frantic eyebrow-waggling of his parents, Lu Zhou finally summoned the courage to get the whole invitation out over the phone in one piece.

“OK.”

At the time, Lin Qing genuinely thought it was just an ordinary simple meal. She said yes casually and hung up.

“What’s wrong with your mouth — did it just grow in?” said Lu Zhou’s father.

“That whole thing came out completely broken! Is your tongue in a knot or something?”

“Wait wait wait — what does the girl like to eat?”

“I forgot to ask — I was too nervous!”

Lu Zhou stood there holding the phone, cornered by both parents at once, his brain completely shut down.

“Useless.” Lu Zhou’s father clasped his hands behind his back and walked off. “Nothing whatsoever of my youthful charm in him!”

Lu Zhou’s mother rolled her eyes and walked away too: “Such a naive little thing! Exactly like your father was back in the day!”

As the pampered darling of the Lu family, the news that Lu Zhou was inviting a female classmate over for the first time spread quickly through the extended family group chat.

And in the days that followed, the threshold of the Lu family home was nearly worn through.

First came a rotation of uncles, each pressing envelopes of money into Lu Zhou’s hands.

“A man who’s courting a woman can’t do it without spending money. You need to take her out for a proper meal, and you need to get her a gift! The men of our family have to be gentlemen!”

“Exactly! These days that iPhone 7 — wait, is it the 7? — is quite the thing among you young people. If you’re going to give a gift, give one that’s worth something.”

Then came Lu Zhou’s uncle.

“Hey, I heard the Lu boy is getting himself a girlfriend, yeah? Come here come here! Perfect timing. I wore a tailored suit to a wedding banquet this past spring — got it fitted especially. I brought it over for you, big brother — put it on! You’re the boy’s father, you need to look the part!”

“Are you out of your mind? My son’s girlfriend is coming to visit, and you want me, the father, to strut around in that thing like some peacock-dressed old relic? Take it away take it away!”

“Clothes make the man, big brother. What do you know!”

“I don’t know! You know! Take your ‘making the man’ suit and get out, go, go, go!”

Then came the aunts and uncles on the other side.

“Old Lu, we brothers-in-law had a little discussion this weekend — we’re not going anywhere! We’re coming to your place. We’re going to repaint all four walls fresh white for you. It’s the girl’s first time visiting — first impressions matter enormously!”

“Right! And you should replace some of your furniture too! I know someone at Ximen Rosewood Furniture. Might as well redo the whole living room in rosewood.”

And so, after an enormous amount of frantic preparation and family mobilisation, Lu Zhou finally counted down the days until Lin Qing arrived.

When Lin Qing came, she was already very late.

Lu Zhou had said eleven-thirty, but Lin Qing had been delayed so long at the county hospital that by the time she stepped through the Lu family’s door with her bag of medicine, it was nearly one o’clock.

She had been so preoccupied with worry for her mother that, despite Lu Zhou sending message after message and calling again and again to check on her, she arrived for her first visit without even buying a gift.

When the entire Lu family lined up to welcome her at the door, Lin Qing found herself standing in the full warmth of their gathered eyes — holding nothing but a plastic bag from the County People’s Hospital.

For the first time.

With all her inner pride, Lin Qing felt, for the very first time, what it meant to feel inferior.

It had been so long since she had felt the embrace of a family like this.

Since Lin Qing’s father had passed, her mother’s disputes over the bereavement money had left things deeply strained with her grandmother’s side of the family. For over a decade, they had essentially maintained a silence as distant as strangers.

And now that her mother had been diagnosed with cancer, her aunts — afraid she would come to borrow money to fill a bottomless pit — had grown quietly distant from the two of them as well.

Lin Qing had never felt inferior because of fate, because she believed that through her own effort she could change it.

But one’s family of origin — that could never be undone.

When Lu Zhou saw Lin Qing, all the familiar warmth of three years ago came rushing back at once.

And yet the ways she had changed and matured over those three years also made him feel suddenly bashful.

Lu Zhou’s face flushed deep as the God of War, and he took her by the sleeve and guided her inside — through the living room full of warm, lively relatives — and to the dining table.

Lin Qing kept her head bowed the entire time. She didn’t even notice the softness brimming in Lu Zhou’s eyes through all his clumsy, nervous expressions of feeling.

Lu Zhou gave the sleeve of her bowed head a gentle tug.

Lin Qing said quietly, embarrassed: “I thought it was just a simple home meal. Why does your family have so many people?”

Before Lu Zhou could respond, his younger aunt jumped in with a laugh: “Oh sweetheart! We didn’t come by invitation — we insisted on coming ourselves! Lu Zhou told us not to, but we were just too curious…”

“Curious about what.” Lin Qing kept her head down, gripping the thin plastic bag tightly in both hands.

Lu Zhou’s mother immediately shot her own little sister a look that could wilt flowers, telling her to shut her mouth and not say anything to put their guest on edge.

“Let’s eat, let’s eat!” His mother smoothed things over. “Young lady, we didn’t know what you liked — I just threw a few things together.”

Lin Qing lifted her eyes a fraction and saw a table laden with chicken, duck, fish, pork, wine, egg dishes, and rice — including a red-braised pork belly topped with abalone, and a plate of mantis shrimp nearest to her, each one as long as her whole hand.

“Lin Qing, you like this.”

Lu Zhou, like a male lead from a television drama, performed under the full viewing attention of the whole family — right there in front of everyone, he used his chopsticks to place, piece by piece, every dish he remembered Lin Qing loving onto her plate.

Lin Qing’s bowl piled up like a small mountain. Lu Zhou’s sat empty.

His gaze never left her the entire time.

In the end, Lin Qing spent the whole meal with her head bowed, gritting her teeth, eating every last bite.