When Yan Lie had no interest in being reasonable, there was simply nothing to be done with him.

He was the kind of unreasonable that carried its own justification — he would dismiss every argument you tried to make, and still manage to look as though he were the one being wronged.

After a prolonged silence during which no words came to her, Fang Zhuo decided not to make things difficult for herself, and let him take her hand as they walked out through the school gate.

Yan Lie had bought two movie tickets in advance. The cinema was on the fourth floor of the shopping center right next to campus.

The film was reportedly a very wholesome romantic comedy, starring two of the more prominent young celebrities of the moment. The rating wasn’t bad — a quick scan of the top reviews showed mostly glowing praise.

At that hour, there weren’t many other options playing, so Yan Lie had picked this one based on the premise.

The two of them walked into the theater with some anticipation, watched for half an hour, and realized they had been deceived.

The romance was quite wholesome, all right — wholesome the way a glass of plain water tastes after someone’s added a splash of strong liquor: transparently blank at first glance, and sharply unpleasant on closer examination. When the swelling emotional background music struck up in tandem with the exaggerated expressions of the two lead actors, someone in the front rows couldn’t hold back and swore out loud.

This movie is completely wrong for couples, Yan Lie thought. There’s not a single moment that could make anyone’s pulse quicken.

Whoever inflated this rating has no conscience. The thought kept circling. This is not a forty-yuan matter.

The interior of the theater was dim. Lush green forests played on the screen, casting a faint, deep light that fell across Fang Zhuo’s face.

Yan Lie turned to look at her. She was watching with total concentration, eyes unblinking, studying the film with the dedicated spirit of a researcher. Seeing this, he felt an unexpected pang of tenderness. It was probably a movie she couldn’t make sense of — which explained why her brow was so deeply furrowed, and why her profile, in the shifting light and shadow, had become so clearly defined.

Yan Lie leaned in slightly and asked in a low voice: “Is it any good?”

Fang Zhuo shook her head.

Yan Lie took her hand. “Then let’s go.”

Fang Zhuo turned her head just a fraction. Every taut line of her face spelled out four words — “I have a grievance” — and she said, clearly struggling: “Thirty-seven yuan.”

Yan Lie very much wanted to laugh, but managed to hold it back and stayed with her to watch out the full thirty-seven yuan’s worth of movie.

The second half of the film did finally show some improvement.

When the female lead rowed her boat across a lake scattered with shifting reflections, the movie finally had something worth mentioning. The plot still made little sense, but those images — carrying a quality of stillness and quiet — left a strangely familiar impression.

The female lead’s serene face grew gradually indistinct as the camera pulled back.

The breeze passing over the water followed the arc of a bird’s wing outward, lifting toward a distant sky. The image of the lake, layered with reflections, flipped and dissolved into a clear, bright expanse of blue.

Sunlight fell across an asphalt road lined with green plants. The leaves had been baked into every shade of green — dense and dappled, swaying gently, letting through fragments of shifting light that were scattered apart by a student bursting from the far end of the path.

Spring and summer were tangled together in this place, the way all confused and unclear thoughts tangle with fierce, burning feeling — until by the end all that remains is one thing: pure and deep and simply a kind of love.

Yan Lie turned the images over in his memory and suddenly understood — there was something of Fang Zhuo in there, which was why, for just a moment, it had so effortlessly reached into him and stirred something, then vanished as quickly as a caught illusion.

And yet the first time he’d really noticed Fang Zhuo had been at night.

The first time he’d walked her home had also been at night.

The first time he’d grabbed her hand and fled with her down an unfamiliar country road, holding on tightly because he needed her — that had been at night too.

The first time he’d asked her to carve his name into her future, the first time he’d written her into his otherwise colorless journal, the first time he’d kissed her and held her — all of it had happened at night.

And yet in that long night, drifting on the evening breeze with stars barely visible — when she appeared, when she turned back — it had, in an instant, become a place flooded with light, a view wide enough to fill everything in him.

The lights came up suddenly. The end credits rolled across the screen, the cluster of production names giving way to scattered voices around them as the audience trickled out in ones and twos.

Fang Zhuo stood and looked at Yan Lie, still lost somewhere in thought. She tightened her fingers around his and said: “Let’s go.”

Outside the shopping center, Fang Zhuo was still nursing her grievance. On the walk back to campus, she finally gave voice to it: “That was the first movie I’ve ever seen in a theater.”

Her tone was deeply indignant.

“Next time I’ll take you to see something good,” Yan Lie said with a smile.

Fang Zhuo nodded.

Her fringe had blown across her face in the wind. Yan Lie gently brushed it back and said softly: “I’m a little thirsty.”

Fang Zhuo gave a helpless look, glanced around, spotted a cold drinks shop nearby, and said: “Then I’ll buy you a glass of double-skin milk.”

Yan Lie stood at the doorway and watched as Fang Zhuo stepped into the small shop, leaned on the front counter, and asked the vendor the price of the double-skin milk.

She hadn’t brought much money with her. She reached into her pocket and pulled out a handful of change — notes and coins mixed together — and counted them out carefully for the vendor, exchanging them for one cup of double-skin milk. Then she carried it out.

That careful, tentative way that was entirely Fang Zhuo.

That irrational indulgence that was entirely for Yan Lie.

Fang Zhuo held the cup out toward him. “Here.”

Yan Lie looked down at her, and slowly blinked. His expression was unbearably soft.

“Don’t you like it?” Fang Zhuo asked with mild confusion. “I only added raisins and red bean paste.”

Yan Lie put his arms around her and rested his head against the curve of her shoulder.

“I like you,” he said, holding on tightly. His voice had gone a little rough. “Fang Zhuo — I really, really like you.”

The unexpected declaration left Fang Zhuo momentarily at a loss.

“Was the movie that good?” she said, a little flustered. “I didn’t actually… think it was that great.”

“It has nothing to do with the movie,” Yan Lie said with a quiet laugh. “I only like you.”

Fang Zhuo paused, then said: “I know.”

“When I asked you to be my girlfriend,” Yan Lie continued, “I didn’t say it then — but I genuinely liked you. This whole life, I’m never going to meet someone I like more.”

You never even actually said “be my girlfriend” properly, Fang Zhuo thought to herself.

Passersby had started to glance over. Fang Zhuo, feeling her face grow warm, gave him a small nudge and said quietly: “Alright, I know. How many times are you going to say it?”

Yan Lie released her, leaned in quickly, pressed his lips to her cheek, and said: “Don’t push me.”

Yan Lie’s WeChat Moments updated at eleven that night.

“Happy birthday, my darling. No expiration date.

“— 9.28”

The comment section was as lively as ever.

That small, warm happiness Yan Lie carried lasted a long time. Because it came from Fang Zhuo, it ran on an extended battery — it didn’t even disappear when a sponsor came at him with unreasonable demands.

One evening, after the external affairs division finished its meeting, he stayed behind in the activity room to sort through documents. Halfway through the task, he checked the time, then took a moment to send Fang Zhuo a message telling her to eat properly.

The busy recipient didn’t reply immediately. Instead, a wave of perfume drifted in from the doorway toward his table.

Yan Lie frowned slightly and said: “Our department has this classroom booked and the time isn’t up yet. Please wait outside.”

“We’re all classmates, there’s no need to be so cold,” the girl said, pushing a strand of loosely curled hair back and sitting down across from him. “I saw your Moments post yesterday.”

Yan Lie answered without looking up: “Did you?”

The girl leaned against the back of the chair. “I think I’ve seen your girlfriend before. I’ve observed her a bit — she was your high school deskmate?”

“Yes,” Yan Lie replied, tone perfunctory.

“What do you like about her?”

Yan Lie finally looked up and glanced at the person across from him. Not unfriendly, not hostile — just that kind of response that was entirely still, that gave no foothold for anything else to grow.

“I genuinely can’t figure it out,” the girl continued. “She’s not witty. She’s not funny. She’s not striking in that way. She’s pretty, sure, but she has no idea how to dress herself up.” She tucked a loose strand behind her ear and asked: “Am I less attractive than her?”

“Of course,” Yan Lie said as a matter of fact.

She didn’t seem bothered. She asked with genuine curiosity: “Do you like that type? I’m curious — men like you, is that the kind of girl you prefer?”

“What kind?” Yan Lie asked.

She considered for a moment and said: “Distant. Reserved. Occasionally lets her guard down, looks like she needs protecting. Doesn’t really know how the world works — lives in a simple, sheltered version of reality. Maybe stubborn, strong sense of pride. Needs you to make allowances for her.”

Yan Lie gave a short, contemptuous laugh, as though he’d just heard something thoroughly absurd. “It seems you don’t understand my girlfriend in the slightest. But regardless of what type she is — most people don’t like someone who assumes they already know everything.”

“Then what type do you think she is?” the girl asked.

Yan Lie stacked the stamped documents neatly together, slipped them into a folder, and packed it along with his laptop into a black shoulder bag.

“Custom-made,” Yan Lie said, a faint smile at the corner of his lips. “The privilege of the exceptionally lucky. Nothing to do with you.”