Hard drive in hand, Qian Wei wandered her way over to Lu Xun’s dormitory building and sent him a text. Sure enough, before long, Lu Xun came downstairs.

He’d just showered, dressed casually in a cotton shirt and pants that neither fit close nor showed off his figure, and yet he still radiated a kind of lazy allure. His hair wasn’t fully dry yet, and a stray drop of water slid down along his ear toward his small earlobe, which had flushed slightly pink from the heat of the shower.

Unfortunately, the owner of such an endearing earlobe was anything but endearing himself — cold and aloof as ever, his handsome mouth producing only three words: “What is it?”

“A gift for you!”

Qian Wei was long since used to Lu Xun’s personality, so without further ado, she held out the hard drive. “Thanks for saving me when I fell in the water. I saw your hard drive broke, so I bought you a new one specially.” She grinned, ingratiating. “There’s a few gigs of good stuff on there too, all handpicked and downloaded specially for you.”

Once she’d said her piece, feeling oddly shy for some reason, she didn’t wait for Lu Xun’s reaction and waved goodbye, running off.

“Qian Wei!”

The moment Qian Wei got back to her dorm, she received an enthusiastic welcome from Liu Shiyun. “Come, come, have some hot water to soothe your throat, sit down, let me give your shoulders a rub.”

“Just tell me, what do you want from me?”

Liu Shiyun laughed sheepishly. “So, you know that professional skills competition I mentioned before? It starts next weekend. We’re just a few people short — could you sign up for next week?” She kept pushing. “Top three finishers get prize money, over a thousand yuan each, and get this — Lu Xun’s signed up too!”

Qian Wei was genuinely surprised. “Lu Xun? Didn’t you say he only enters international-level competitions? How did you manage to convince him to lower himself to something this small-scale?” A thought bloomed in her mind — could it be that because she’d once pushed him to sign up for something, he really had agreed just because he’d promised her? But she quickly dismissed the idea — people were prone to falling into the “he glanced at me, he must care about me” or “he smiled at me, he must like me” delusions, and she reminded herself she shouldn’t get so full of herself as to think she had that kind of influence over Lu Xun.

Liu Shiyun shrugged. “Honestly, I never even had to ask him. Just last week, Lu Xun came to me out of nowhere and said he wanted to sign up for this competition — I was thrilled. You know what? Ever since I put the word out that Lu Xun was joining, girls in our law school responded en masse, tons of them signed up right away! We’re just a few short now! Please come too! Please!”

Worn down by Liu Shiyun’s relentless pestering, Qian Wei finally agreed to sign up.

Back in her dorm at last, Qian Wei changed into her big floral pajamas, let her hair down, and settled in to watch some variety show to unwind. But the moment she turned on her computer, she heard the dorm supervisor bellow from downstairs.

“Qian Wei! Someone’s here for you!”

The booming voice startled her.

Curious, Qian Wei went down after quickly changing back into something presentable, and found — of all people — Lu Xun standing at the entrance. His hands were shoved in his pockets, his head bowed, his expression unreadable. But even if he’d buried his head in the sand like an ostrich, that striking figure of his was probably recognizable to any girl passing by the dorm. Several girls walking by now couldn’t help but sneak glances at him, a few of the less composed ones even blushing outright.

There happened to be a lot of foot traffic outside the women’s dorm entrance right then, and Qian Wei tried to keep a low profile, not wanting anyone to notice Lu Xun was there for her — but that little effort at discretion was instantly ruined by Lu Xun himself.

“Qian! Wei!”

The moment he spotted Qian Wei, Lu Xun practically snarled out her name through gritted teeth.

Qian Wei had no choice but to brave the curious stares of everyone around and walk over to him, bracing herself. “What’s wrong?”

She noticed he was holding the hard drive she’d bought him in one hand. “Is there a quality issue with the hard drive I got you?”

“The hard drive you bought is perfectly fine.” The words seemed to come out of Lu Xun one syllable at a time.

Qian Wei probed carefully. “Don’t like the color, then?”

Lu Xun’s face had gone dark. “You have the nerve to ask that. You know full well what you put on this hard drive for me.”

“Wasn’t it curated imported films???”

Lu Xun let out a furious, mirthless laugh. “Yes. All imported films.”

“There’s study materials too, isn’t there?”

Hearing this, Lu Xun looked like he was about to explode. “Not only do you want me to watch it, you want me to study it too?!”

Now Qian Wei was thoroughly confused. “What’s wrong with wanting you to study? Doesn’t this mean you can relax with movies and study at the same time? What’s the problem?” To further ingratiate herself, she lied, “And those few gigabytes of good stuff, I curated and downloaded them myself, bit by bit, on our dorm’s painfully slow internet — I swear, heaven as my witness, that took real dedication!”

“You really are something.” Lu Xun bit out each word deliberately. “I suppose I should thank you for persevering through all that hardship to download me ten gigs of porn, complete with a bonus five gigs of position tutorials?”

“…” Qian Wei felt as though lightning had struck her out of a clear sky. Her knees nearly buckled. “I’m innocent! This — this wasn’t me! I had no idea!”

Lu Xun laughed coldly. “Wasn’t it you, downloading it bit by bit yourself, bravely, on our terrible dorm internet? And weren’t you the one so sure it was ‘imported films’ and ‘study materials’?”

Qian Wei felt like crying with nowhere to turn — being confronted like this felt exactly like being caught red-handed, and no amount of explaining or denying would do any good… She thought, that salesman, looking all clean-cut and wholesome while harboring such filth inside! She’d trusted him for nothing!

“Qian Wei! There you are!”

Fortunately, in this awkward moment, Mo Zixin’s heavenly voice sounded from behind Qian Wei. She turned and, sure enough, saw Mo Zixin standing there, dressed today in a pink skirt, her lightly made-up face even more striking than usual. She seemed a little surprised to see Lu Xun there too, and smiled, greeting him. “I didn’t expect Lu Xun to be here as well.”

“What’s up?梓心, you must have something important to talk to me about, right?” Qian Wei said, blinking meaningfully at Mo Zixin, hoping she’d rescue her from Lu Xun’s death glare.

Mo Zixin smiled. “Are you free right now? I mentioned before that I really wanted to introduce you to my cousin. I’ve arranged to have dinner with him tonight, actually — come along.”

Qian Wei jumped at the chance. “Let’s go, let’s go!”

“No need to rush, we’re not meeting for another hour.”

Desperate to escape Lu Xun’s stare, Qian Wei made up an excuse on the spot. “No need to wait an hour — I suddenly really want to fall in love. I can’t wait to meet your brother.”

“But… but my cousin won’t get there for another hour either.”

“That’s fine, I’m feeling really nervous right now, so it’s actually good he’s not there yet — I need the extra time to mentally prepare myself, so I can put my best foot forward when he arrives.”

Mo Zixin glanced over Qian Wei’s outfit and offered, carefully, “Do you maybe want to go change first? This looks a little too casual, doesn’t it?”

Qian Wei looked down and realized that the outfit she’d hastily thrown on while rushing downstairs was actually the crow-black jacket Lu Xun had bought her that rainy day. Mo Zixin calling it “too casual” was already being quite generous…

“This outfit… I don’t think it really suits you. You have a great figure, but this is too loose, it doesn’t show it off at all.”

As Mo Zixin continued her gentle attempt at persuasion, Qian Wei glanced over at the very person who’d bought her that jacket, and sure enough, he was watching her with a raised eyebrow, a look on his face that clearly said, “let’s see how you handle this.”

Workplace survival rule No. 1: Never question the boss’s taste.

Qian Wei patted Mo Zixin’s shoulder. “No, I think this jacket is wonderful. Loose clothes are comfortable, casual with a touch of effortless flair, and effortless flair is full of personality! I think, if someone really likes me, they won’t just superficially like me for wearing clothes that show off my figure — they’ll love me no matter what I’m wearing. And black is such a classic color too, dignified and elegant, very stylish!”

Mo Zixin probably hadn’t expected Qian Wei to talk such nonsense with a straight face; she was too taken aback to even bother being tactful anymore. “Black is a classic color, sure, but don’t you think the cut of this jacket is a little… dated?”

Workplace survival rule No. 2: When someone questions the boss’s taste, defend the boss at all costs!

“How could it be? Meixin, that’s where you’re wrong. Sure, it’s not the latest style, but that’s not ‘dated,’ that’s ‘nostalgic’!”

Mo Zixin looked at her with an expression that practically screamed “are your eyes broken,” and Qian Wei had no choice but to grit her teeth and keep smiling under that incredulous gaze.

“Anyway, no time to waste, let’s get going! I’ll just go as I am, unembellished! After all, if you love someone, you should love the real them!” Not sure if it was her imagination, but Qian Wei felt Lu Xun watching her with amusement. Feeling a little guilty, she grabbed Mo Zixin’s arm and hurried off.

Mo Zixin turned out to be right — they’d arrived far too early. Mo Zixin had picked a Japanese restaurant not far off campus, and at this hour, it wasn’t even dinnertime yet, so aside from the staff, there were no other customers in the restaurant. The TV was playing some Japanese news broadcast, the language a rapid, unintelligible murmur.

Mo Zixin explained, “My cousin’s helping the department head translate for a forum event this afternoon. The event isn’t over yet, so he can’t get here any earlier.”

Qian Wei waved a hand. “No worries, no worries.”

“Since we have to wait an hour anyway, we shouldn’t waste the time.” Mo Zixin cleared her throat, then pulled out a red-covered booklet. “Let’s take turns reciting legal provisions!”

Qian Wei: ???

Qian Wei looked closer and saw that the red-covered booklet Mo Zixin had produced was indeed the Civil Procedure Law of the People’s Republic of China. She protested weakly, “I’m not great at Civil Procedure, I can’t recite it…”

“Ah, I see. Never mind then, let’s skip Civil Procedure.” Fortunately, Mo Zixin seemed very understanding.

But before Qian Wei could even fully breathe a sigh of relief, Mo Zixin pulled out the Contract Law, the General Principles of Civil Law, the Marriage Law, and more, one after another.

Mo Zixin smiled. “So let’s recite these instead!”

In that moment, she radiated the aura of a model student — truly a shining example of ambitious youth, Qian Wei thought. If it were up to her, this hour would probably just be spent chatting and gossiping…

Faced with this stack of red booklets, all Qian Wei could think, in that moment, was that she wanted to die.