“Jiu?”

Yu Jiuqi heard the soft inquiry from the kitchen. Barefoot on the floor heated by underfloor heating, she hopped over with a few thudding steps, poked her head out, and answered with a crisp voice and a smile.

“Yes, Brother Sun.”

Sun Xi stood at the stove cooking instant noodles. He turned his head, glanced up and down at her briefly, and asked: “Still extra vinegar?”

“Mm, yes.”

He said okay, his gaze still resting on her.

He saw her long hair piled high on top of her head with a few loose strands trailing down. Her oval face was rosy, her features small and full. She hadn’t brought a change of clothes here, had just taken a shower, and casually thrown on one of Sun Xi’s oversized T-shirts. Bare legs, bare feet—the heating was very strong, so she didn’t feel cold at all.

Sun Xi turned back, drizzled some vinegar into the cooked noodles according to her preference, watched the rolling thick broth, steaming hot, furrowed his brow, and suppressed a familiar sense of anxiety.

Then he quickly turned off the heat, called her to eat, and said it was hot, find something to put under the coffee table.

The apartment was being rented out for the first time and didn’t have complete furniture. The living room only had a set of combination sofas and a small coffee table. Sun Xi carried over the soup pot and saw Xiao Jiu take a kraft paper document folder from his unpacked luggage and place it on the wooden coffee table. His hand paused.

Xiao Jiu said there was nothing else around to use as padding, they couldn’t use clothes, would this document folder be afraid of the heat? Sun Xi placed the soup pot on it and said it’s fine, there’s nothing important in it.

Finding a random blanket to spread out, Xiao Jiu sat cross-legged on the floor. Without being polite, she scooped herself a small bowl of noodles and ate with large mouthfuls while hot, generously praising how well Sun Xi cooked. How are you so amazing? How can you make simple instant noodles taste so good? Look at how thick this broth is, and the noodles are perfectly chewy. If someone held an instant noodles cooking competition, I’d definitely send you to compete.

Earlier she’d been fussing about being hungry. Sun Xi looked around and found only two packages of instant noodles that Lin Hui had bought when they moved in—braised beef flavor. He just dropped in an egg, no vegetables or ham. Yet she was eating with such enthusiasm, praising so energetically.

Sun Xi sat across from her, seriously watching Xiao Jiu. Seeing that her satisfaction was genuine made him feel even more tender-hearted. He said next time I’ll make you something else, something more substantial. What do you want to eat?

Xiao Jiu lifted her head from the bowl and said that sounds great. Having been independent from a young age, Sun Xi’s cooking skills were excellent. He could make home-style dishes from both northern and southern cuisines, as well as noodle dishes and Western food. During that year in Beijing, Xiao Jiu’s palate had been spoiled by him. She’d been craving his cooking for a long time. She started listing dishes: she wanted his spicy blood curd stew, garlic prawns, braised fish and sweet and sour pork, oh, and also seafood fried rice.

Fried rice.

Sun Xi’s eyebrows twitched. The anxiety he’d just suppressed came rushing back.

Outside the floor-to-ceiling window were the neon lights of Shi City’s downtown—the only metropolitan feel remaining in this small city late at night. He leaned against the window, the neon lights flickering and reflecting on his face. What should have been warm and vivid colors, Xiao Jiu caught with a quick glance, noticing the obvious dimness.

She shouldn’t have mentioned it.

At that moment, a phone vibrated. Yu Jiuqi glanced at it—it was Ge Fan. She didn’t avoid it and answered on speakerphone.

Besides being drunk, Ge Fan’s voice also sounded somewhat vexed. He loudly asked where Xiao Jiu was. Without waiting for Xiao Jiu to speak, he said never mind, I know, you don’t need to tell me. Then he said directly that Sister Wen just called me, asking why you’re not home so late and not replying to messages, are you helping me shoot videos?

On the phone, Ge Fan let out a long sigh, complaining with resentment: “I said yes! I said we’re almost done! You’ll be home right away! Alright, I’ve done my duty. Deal with it yourself.”

Then he hung up.

Yu Jiuqi pulled up WeChat and looked—sure enough, Wen Wen had contacted her an hour ago. She looked up at the person across from her—that dimness had been hidden away. Xiao Jiu lowered her head and sent a reply message.

Sun Xi didn’t ask what she replied, but they still had that damned tacit understanding between them. He knew this beautiful night he’d been racing against time to cherish was coming to an end.

He stood up to clear the dishes. Xiao Jiu suddenly came over, said wait, pressed him back down, straddled his legs, and reached up with both hands to cup his face.

Sun Xi was startled but guessed she was coming to coax him. Deliberately not giving her a good face, not cooperating, turning his head randomly. But her hands were quite strong. He couldn’t resist. Expressionlessly, he looked up at her, thinking he’d been too easy on her earlier—shouldn’t have left her with any strength.

“Smile.” Xiao Jiu looked at him and said.

Sun Xi’s brows knitted tightly. His whole body bristled with sensitivity. He understood she was using that method he feared most to get to him, just like many times before. An ominous premonition—he was going to die at her hands again.

So he resisted: “Won’t smile.”

“Smile for me.”

Resisting again: “Why should I smile for you?”

“I want to see.”

“If you want to see, go smile yourself.”

“My smile isn’t as good-looking as yours.”

He was suddenly at a loss for words and just squinted at her.

Seeing him waver, Xiao Jiu bounced up and down while riding on him, rubbing his face: “Really, when you smile, you’re especially good-looking. So charming.”

“Only charming when I smile?”

“When you cry, you’re charming too.”

Sun Xi stiffened momentarily. What kind of nonsense was this?

She even elaborated: “You don’t know, do you? When you smile, it makes people’s hearts flutter. When you cry, it makes hearts flutter even more. Have you heard that saying? A man who looks good smiling and crying is truly sexy.”

Sun Xi admitted defeat. He suddenly couldn’t help but laugh out loud, forcefully turning his head away, not wanting her to see, but to no avail.

Xiao Jiu excitedly cupped his face, chasing after it to look, exclaiming with admiration: “Aiya, so handsome! Let me see. Our Xiao Sun, Brother Sun, Sun Dabao is really handsome. Hey, whose boyfriend is this? How can he look so good when smiling?”

Sun Xi felt bewitched by her again with some kind of immoral sorcery, pressed to the ground willingly beaten and surrendered. Emotionally, he was overjoyed, but rationally, he was in utter disarray. He rarely experienced such a huge surge of uncontrolled emotions—dizzy yet flustered, suddenly not realizing that this was essentially happiness, instinctively wanting to escape.

So he laughingly admitted defeat and called for a stop, saying Yu Jiuqi, that’s enough, stop fooling around.

Seeing Xiao Jiu still tormenting him, he forcefully thrust upward once, then looked at her, threatening that if you keep this up, you won’t be able to leave.

Xiao Jiu obediently quieted down, but didn’t leave either. Still cupping his face, under the neon lights of the hotpot restaurant, internet cafe, and chain hotel outside the window, she looked at Sun Xi tenderly, carefully tracing every detail on his face.

He wasn’t actually that kind of extremely handsome guy. Taking his features apart individually, they were just not unattractive. Single-fold eyelids, inner double eyelids when he just woke up, heavy eyebrows, thin lips, both brow bones and cheekbones rather high. But these details pieced together, paired with those sensitive and sharp eyes, just made people soften.

In Yu Jiuqi’s view, Sun Xi’s eyes were transparent to her, hiding nothing.

She could read the fragility in them, the bravado, the anxiety of gain and loss, and the desperately hidden sense of unworthiness, including the reluctance and anxiety when looking at her at this moment.

Looking down at him like this, recalling what he’d said not long ago, Xiao Jiu thought about it and felt it necessary to say something before leaving. She spoke in a voice only he could hear: “Sun Xi.”

“Mm.”

As lightly as possible, she asked: “In the past, have you ever had thoughts of dying?”

His brows furrowed. He didn’t hide it, looking at her: “I have.”

“And then?” Xiao Jiu heard her voice tremble slightly.

“I survived.” His eyes instantly took on a layer of mist.

Yu Jiuqi didn’t know how to express her sadness at this moment. She leaned down and kissed him gently.

Lifting her head again, she saw Sun Xi press his lips together, looking at her, his eyes carrying an inquiry he didn’t dare voice.

Xiao Jiu understood and answered: “I haven’t.”

Sun Xi’s gaze probed, carrying some relief.

“Because to me, that’s very selfish and cowardly behavior.”

Xiao Jiu thought about it and continued: “Dying is simple, easy. But what about those left alive? The burdens the dead think they’re putting down are actually transferred to those still living, and doubly heavy, doubly crushing. How unfair is that? How cruel? How pitiful are they?”

Sun Xi looked up at her, his chest full of shock, his vision blurred.

“So we won’t be that kind of person. We’ll walk forward slowly. It doesn’t matter if our steps are heavy, doesn’t matter if we’re slow. We’ll put down our own burdens ourselves, not leave them for others.”

“If you feel it’s too heavy, I can help share some of it.”

As she spoke, Xiao Jiu raised her hand, wanting to use her thumb to wipe the corner of his eye. Sun Xi suddenly dodged, reached out himself, and quickly brushed his eyes.

Then he looked back at her: “What about you?”

Xiao Jiu said: “I’m very strong. I can handle it.”

Sun Xi stared into her moist eyes against the light. Some words were pressed down in his throat. For the first time in his life, he had the urge to share with someone, wanting to try to bare himself somewhat, without hiding or covering, to see if it would bring mockery and backlash. But after much hesitation, he didn’t dare speak.

But Xiao Jiu understood everything, so she asked: “Do you really not want to go see him? If he really dies, there’ll be no more chances.”

Sun Xi’s nasal cavity and chest instantly surged with tremendous soreness.

All the strength in his body seemed drained away. He let her control him, let her comfort him, let her see through him with one penetrating look and expose him without mercy.

“Sun Xi, wanting to see your father once is human nature.”

“Or if you want to go find your mother, that’s not shameful either.”

“Do you want to go?”

Sun Xi vulnerably tensed his face and shook his head.

Yu Jiuqi watched him struggle to deny it. After holding back for a long time, she said somewhat chokingly: “I understand. Then we won’t go.”

Sun Xi couldn’t say a word.

“But forgive yourself.”

“Living is so beautiful.”

Sun Xi forcefully held her tight, embracing her, his face pressed tightly against her chest, forcefully feeling that vitality and heat. They sat quietly like this for a while before he saw her off.

Seeing her off to the entrance of her residential complex, he still pulled and hugged her, unwilling to let go. Clingy and swaying, the corners of his mouth and eyebrows holding back a smile that couldn’t be hidden.

Xiao Jiu looked at his silly appearance and asked what was wrong. Sun Xi thought about it and said he wanted to show off.

“Show off what?”

“My girlfriend.”

Xiao Jiu didn’t understand.

“I have such a good girlfriend. I really want to show you off to the whole world,” he said.

When Yu Jiuqi returned home, it was already late at night. As soon as she entered, the light above the dining table in the living room was on. A thin, lonely figure wrapped in a cardigan sat at the table.

“Mom.”

Xiao Jiu stood at the door and called out.

“You’re back.”

Wen Wen raised her head. She seemed to have just showered and removed her makeup, looking somewhat tired. She forced a smile that wasn’t relaxed: “Come here.”

Since the day Third Uncle came back, Xiao Jiu hadn’t been alone with Wen Wen. She admitted she was somewhat avoiding her, also afraid of saying things she shouldn’t say. She knew very clearly in her heart that her relationship with her mother could never return to what it was before.

She walked over and stood in front of the dining table, mentally prepared. If it’s right now, if you ask me, if you want to lay it all out, I won’t hide it from you.

But Wen Wen lowered her head and just took Xiao Jiu’s hand, pinching two or three of her slender fingers and placing them in her palm, rubbing them, holding them. She’d always liked holding Xiao Jiu’s hand like this, ever since she was little.

“Mom…” After a long while, Xiao Jiu spoke first.

“Why are your hands still so cold?” But Wen Wen suddenly interrupted her.

Xiao Jiu looked down at her.

Wen Wen continued: “It’s been like this since childhood. Your hands get cold so easily, even in summer they’re cold. I even took you to see a doctor, remember? The Chinese medicine doctor said you had a cold constitution or something. You took so much medicine but it didn’t help. It frustrated me so much.”

Yu Jiuqi stood dazed, inevitably thinking of many fragments. Following time backward in pursuit, inch by inch, then heard Wen Wen mention that very first day.

“Maybe you were frozen on that day.” Wen Wen murmured, her voice very small. “By that river, it was so cold.”

Taking advantage of Xiao Jiu’s distraction, Wen Wen suddenly grasped her ice-cold fingers and pulled hard. Looking up again, a pair of tired eyes gazed at her.

“Jiu.”

Yu Jiuqi looked back at her, not knowing why, but extremely apprehensive about what she was going to say next.

“Tell me, am I a good mother?”

Xiao Jiu couldn’t speak.

“I’m not a good mother, am I?” She asked again.

Xiao Jiu hesitated, her eyes wavering: “Mom, what’s wrong with you today?”

“I just feel…” Wen Wen said with reddened eyes, taking a long time to finally say, “Like a failure.”

Yu Jiuqi was still wearing the down jacket she’d returned in. Inside was a layer of sweater, and inside the sweater was Sun Xi’s T-shirt. She didn’t know if it was his unique scent transmitting through her body heat, but Xiao Jiu gently sniffed, hazily recalling that sentence from his rental apartment earlier—the sentence she’d used to comfort Sun Xi, and also to convince herself countless times to tolerate all injustices.

Those who survive are all pitiable people carrying the burdens left by the deceased.

The Wen Wen before her eyes—wasn’t she the same?

Perhaps among all those who survived, the weight on Wen Wen’s back was the heaviest. She’d long been bent over by it, her spine broken. She lived prostrate, staggering forward, stubbornly refusing to unload even a fraction of the burden on her body, punishing herself like a martyr.

So Xiao Jiu said: “Mom, you’ve already done very well.”

“I know you’ve tried your hardest, Mom.”

“I’ll always be grateful to you.”

Wen Wen pursed her lips, looking at Xiao Jiu with grievance yet confusion, as if not daring to believe it. She said: “Really?”

“Really.”

“Then why did you…”

She suddenly stopped, forcefully cutting herself off. As if suddenly awakening from a dream, she realized she’d said the wrong thing. Silently blaming herself—the night was deceptive, blame that half bottle of foreign liquor this afternoon, blame the lies exposed in Ge Fan’s phone call, blame seeing them pulling and tugging at each other at the street entrance from the balcony earlier, blame her own weakness for almost revealing her biggest weakness and trump card.

She quickly released Xiao Jiu’s hand, rapidly adjusted her emotions, as if those words of weakness just now had never happened.

“Mom, what were you about to say?” Xiao Jiu asked, confused.

“Nothing. I’m tired. Going to sleep.”

Wen Wen left Yu Jiuqi standing there and returned to her room. She sat on the bed motionless, her face resolute and decisive, silently repeating the words she hadn’t finished.

—Then why do you deliberately hurt me?

—Why are you determined to leave me?

But you’re wrong, Jiu. I haven’t tried my hardest. At least in making you return from your mistaken path, my efforts aren’t enough yet.

I should be more ruthless, even if it means exposing my scars, facing the blood and gore directly, opening my chest, baring my shameful organs. I should be more ruthless. This is what I should do for you.

Wen Wen sat like this in the darkness for a long time, slowly taking out her phone, opening her contacts’ block list, and looking at it for a while.

Then she unblocked a phone number from another province.

Time after New Year’s passed especially quickly. The commercial loan project Xiao Jiu was responsible for progressed smoothly. She stopped working at the counter and went on several business trips to the county and countryside with colleagues. In less than two weeks, she completed the entire month’s KPI. She could rest easy during the Spring Festival period.

Ge Fan returned to Le Sheng Huang a week later. Initially, that Tianjin distributor called him for three days demanding payment. He didn’t want to trouble his parents and was anxiously figuring out a solution when on the fourth day, the distributor told him that Le Sheng Huang’s boss had resolved it for him. He went to see Sun Xi, originally thinking at worst he’d write him an IOU. But Sun Xi directly handed over a prepared partnership agreement—salary plus shares, with that debt deducted from the dividends.

Ge Fan knew Sun Xi wasn’t someone who took losses. If he was asking him to come back, he definitely had his own calculations. But looking at the numbers on the agreement, it was quite sincere. Ge Fan had already turned the page on the Xiao Jiu matter, and he’d also rationally considered that compared to being a professional internet celebrity with fierce competition and a short career span, KTV was indeed the work he was best at. So he agreed.

Sun Xi was extremely busy those days. Working in coordination with Ge Fan, they quickly revitalized the scattered Le Sheng Huang that had just been taken over—recruiting people, attracting new customers, hands-on with everything. Every day, except for occasionally meeting Xiao Jiu, he was almost always at Le Sheng Huang with Ge Fan.

During that time, they didn’t see each other very frequently either. They basically just met directly at Sun Xi’s rental apartment, cooking meals in different ways and making love in different ways. Each time exhausted, having a full meal, then exhausted again.

Only at noon on a Monday two weeks later, Sun Xi suddenly sent Xiao Jiu a message saying hurry over, come to my place, urgent matter.

Taking advantage of her lunch break hour, Xiao Jiu hurriedly took a taxi over, thinking there really was some urgent matter. As soon as she entered, she saw Sun Xi holding two newly bought pieces of clothing, standing in front of a full-length mirror comparing them back and forth.

“Which one’s better?” he asked.

“Huh?”

Xiao Jiu looked carefully. One was a big-brand black thick jacket with an inverted triangle logo—wearing it would show broad shoulders and a straight posture, more business-style. The other was a trendy brand sweater—both the cut and color were very young.

“Both are pretty good,” Xiao Jiu said.

“You pick one.”

“Are you going to wear it for me to see?”

“Of course not.”

Xiao Jiu rolled her eyes at him: “Then who are you meeting?”

He didn’t answer, picked up the jacket and compared it: “Is this one too mature?”

Then picked up the sweater and compared it: “This one isn’t stable enough, right?”

Xiao Jiu was speechless and didn’t want to deal with it anymore. Thinking you dragged me here at noon for this, looked at the kitchen—you didn’t even make food. Feeling vexed yet also finding it strange—Sun Xi had never been so careful in preparing to meet anyone before.

“I’m asking you…”

“Don’t ask me.”

“Which one would your dad like?”

“My dad…” Xiao Jiu was puzzled. “Why do you care which one my dad likes?”

Sun Xi looked at her without answering. Xiao Jiu suddenly understood, looking at him in shock.

“Sun Xi, are you going to meet my dad?!”

“He asked to meet me.”

“What’s going on!”

He didn’t answer, just turned back to the mirror, picked up the sweater, as if he’d already made his choice.

Yu Jiuqi looked at the mirror, at his rarely nervous appearance, his eyes apprehensive yet revealing anticipation, also as if it had been premeditated all along. Then he raised his eyes and looked at her.

Through the mirror, their gazes collided, meeting each other’s eyes. Without saying anything, their hearts resonated thunderously together.

Full of hope, yet deeply aware that the road ahead was uncertain.