A few seconds later—
F: [I’m downstairs.]
It had been half an hour since Yun Li went up. Without replying to the message, she slipped on her shoes and headed downstairs.
Fu Shize was still at the same spot. Hearing footsteps, he looked up, their eyes meeting.
She slowly moved towards him.
They stood under a tree. Yun Li looked down, noticing two bottles of chocolate milk in Fu Shize’s hand—her favorite brand.
He casually opened a straw for her. “I just went to the supermarket.”
Yun Li took it reflexively, realizing the milk was warm, its packaging damp. She wondered where he had found hot water to soak it.
“How did you hear it?” Yun Li asked, cradling the milk. She preferred it warm but was usually too lazy to heat it herself.
Fu Shize always remembered.
“I went to a restaurant across the street and ordered soup,” Fu Shize glanced towards the complex entrance. “They gave me some hot water.”
It was the familiar sweetness she hadn’t tasted in a year.
“Um…” Yun Li leaned next to him, gathering her courage. “Were you waiting for me at the stadium today?”
Fu Shize: “Yes.”
He turned his head, pondering for a long while. After seeing Yun Li at her building, he had initially planned to return to his dorm. Passing by a store, he saw chocolate milk displayed at the entrance.
As if everything was connected to her, he unconsciously walked in.
Holding the two cartons of milk, he had been thinking about when to speak up. Before tonight, he had hesitated endlessly, but after silently accompanying each other on the rooftop for so long…
He felt that he shouldn’t hesitate for even a moment, or wait a second longer.
As Yun Li was about to speak again, Fu Shize’s gaze returned to her face. He paused for several seconds as if making up his mind: “Li Li.”
He spoke slowly, enunciating each word: “Can we get back together?”
Yun Li’s carefully prepared words died on her lips. She hadn’t expected Fu Shize to be so direct.
She stared at him for a while, only brought back to reality by the cicadas chirping overhead.
In the darkness, Yun Li could hear both their breathing. She involuntarily squeezed her palm and asked, “Can I ask you something?”
Before opening up, she wanted to clarify one thing.
In her memory, every detail pointed to Fu Shize truly loving her. During her lonely days in Cambridge, she had confirmed this countless times in her recollections.
Only one thing remained unclear.
Yun Li brought up what happened during their breakup: “When Yun Ye was sick, you didn’t reply to my messages for two or three days.”
“I wasn’t honest last time,” Fu Shize’s eyes darkened. “I had just had surgery for a perforated ulcer. Before that, I had a high fever and woke up in the hospital.”
“I didn’t want to worry you. I planned to come to Xi Fu after I was discharged.”
Yun Li had never considered this reason. She even wanted to ask Fu Zhengchu if Fu Shize had fallen so ill because he was heartbroken over their breakup.
Yun Li vividly remembered being in the hospital, under the harsh white lights, ignoring his dozen or so calls. Her emotions had collapsed, and she had blurted out the breakup in frustration.
She remembered thinking Fu Shize didn’t love her as much because he hadn’t come to Xi Fu.
She never imagined he might have been suffering too.
Yun Li’s throat tightened: “Then why didn’t you tell me when I suggested breaking up…”
“You gave me this,” Fu Shize took out the paper moon from his wallet. He often looked at it, and its edges had started to crumble.
—Seeing you is like seeing the moon.
In the lamplight, his face looked thin and lonely, with tired shadows under his eyes.
“But when you saw me, I was no longer the moon.”
“At that time, I had no right to ask you to stay.”
So he went back to graduate school, wanting to become the person she used to like again.
This was what he could do for her, and what he was willing to do.
For Fu Shize, before those two years, he didn’t know his life could become such a mess.
Fu Shize didn’t care about degrees or titles for himself, but he felt he had no right to ask Yun Li to be with someone so dejected.
Yun Yongchang’s opposition wasn’t unreasonable. His daughter was actively pursuing her education, and he hoped she could find someone of equal standing. Or at least someone who took life seriously.
Fu Shize took out the moon-shaped badge of the Unique team from his pocket and handed it to her. In the darkness, Yun Li could sense his nervousness.
“I’ve become my old self again.”
Yun Li stared at the badge, her eyes stinging.
She hadn’t forgotten how their relationship became strained after Yun Yongchang came to Nanwu. She hadn’t forgotten how Fu Shize’s first reaction upon arriving at Qilixiang was to pull her into his arms. Then the memories entered a painful stage, with the two of them stiffly looking at each other, the atmosphere suffocatingly heavy.
—”You want me to go back to school, to become who I was before?”
—”Yes.”
—”I understand.”
So he agreed to break up, returned to school alone, and fulfilled his promise from back then.
This was a reason Yun Li had never considered.
She hadn’t thought that if Fu Shize just went back to his old self, everything would be fine. Nor had she imagined that the feelings of inferiority and sensitivity she harbored would appear in Fu Shize as well.
“Did you think I broke up with you because of what my dad said? Is that why you agreed to the breakup?” Yun Li murmured, lowering her eyes and opening her mouth.
“I never told you, but I felt quite inferior when I was with you. So I was always insecure. If you didn’t do or say something, I would think you didn’t like me that much.”
For so long, Yun Li had found these words difficult to say.
“At that time, I couldn’t reach you, and I thought you didn’t want to be with me anymore because of my dad,” Yun Li said softly. “Then Yun Ye had surgery, and I wanted you by my side.”
“Yin Yunyi flew over and sat in the hospital corridor waiting for Yun Ye’s surgery to finish. When I saw that, I felt devastated.”
“I didn’t know you were sick. I just felt… that you didn’t like me very much.”
“After we broke up when you didn’t come looking for me, I thought maybe you had wanted to break up all along.” Her thoughts returned to the countless days and nights before going abroad, always looking at her phone, thinking that maybe Fu Shize would contact her.
“Later, when I went on exchange, it wasn’t like I told you last time. I didn’t have such a good time abroad. I wasn’t good at socializing, my spoken English was poor, and the landlord of the first place I rented tried to cheat me out of money.”
“I called the police, but because my English wasn’t good, I couldn’t argue effectively. In the end, I didn’t pay much, but the landlord said some very nasty things. At that time, I didn’t know who I could talk to.”
“Living alone over there, I started to recall many details of our time together, and I realized that you did like me very much.”
“I wanted to find you, but I felt I wasn’t good enough.”
Up to this point, Yun Li had controlled her voice to remain calm.
After a year and a half, having been stubborn for so long, she finally said at this moment—”I didn’t want to break up.”
“I was just saying things out of anger then, but I never really thought about actually separating from you.” Yun Li’s voice choked.
“I regretted it for so long.”
“But I was also so worried that with my personality if I found you and we got back together, we would break up again because of my character.”
Her voice was very weak for the last sentence: “This past year, I’ve been trying hard to change, to socialize, to integrate with others, to learn how to communicate. I’ve become better.”
“I’ve already tried so hard, I don’t want to separate again.”
Fu Shize closed his eyes briefly and pulled her into his arms.
“Li Li.”
Fu Shize had thought that since she had initiated the breakup, it wouldn’t hurt her as much. He thought she wouldn’t be so sad.
But for over a year, she had been struggling alone abroad. He watched her livestreams, but even when she wasn’t happy, she forced a smile to chat with her fans.
He dared not imagine how she, with her introverted nature, had been pushed to call the police in a foreign country, only to endure insults after reporting.
He also dared not think about how, even though it wasn’t her fault, she had forced herself to do all sorts of things to alleviate her sense of guilt.
If only he had asked one more question back then.
But at that time, he didn’t even dare to ask one more question.
“I’m sorry if I had talked to you about these things back then… instead of overthinking on my own…” Yun Li hadn’t cried in over a year, forcing herself to be strong in any situation.
But now, endless guilt overwhelmed her. Her eyes reddened, and her voice trembled.
“We wouldn’t have broken up.”
They wouldn’t have been apart for a year and a half, healing their wounds alone.
If she hadn’t been so impulsive and said things she didn’t mean, if she had listened to Xu Qingsong’s words, if she had asked others about Fu Shize’s situation instead of stubbornly believing he didn’t like her, they wouldn’t have been so hurt.
Fu Shize wouldn’t have had to spend that cold month alone while ill, wouldn’t have had to return to West Science University alone, just because she said she hoped he would become his old self.
She hadn’t thought that her rash actions would cause both of them to have such a difficult year and a half.
“Li Li.” Fu Shize wiped away the tears from the corner of her eye. “I don’t blame you.”
In countless trembling nights, he had never blamed her.
During their time together, his feelings for Yun Li were simple and passionate, and Yun Li’s feelings for him were equally sincere and pure.
That beauty would never allow Fu Shize to harbor resentment towards this relationship or her within it.
Fu Shize lightly kissed the corner of her lips.
As he had done countless times before, Fu Shize leaned close to her right ear and told her, word by word, with solemn determination.
“Li Li.”
“We won’t separate again.”
Yun Li heard the cicadas chirping incessantly in the night and his words. She heard the promise in his voice, like gentle waves pushing her onto the shore. When she looked up, the familiar features were close at hand, and she saw the familiar emotions in his eyes.
That gloomy year and a half dissipated like smoke.