After taking a photo, Yun Li tucked the cardholder into her pocket and started the car. She drove around the neighborhood a few times, experiencing a completely different sensation when stepping on the accelerator compared to her previous driving experiences. This was her first time driving this model.
Though Yun Li couldn’t identify car brands, just a few minutes of driving told her this vehicle was in the mid to high-end range. She had always thought Fu Shize’s family was well-off, but Xia Congsheng once mentioned his parents were professors at Xi’an Science and Technology University. Her perception of his background had been limited by the idea of frugal academics.
As soon as she entered the house, she received a message from Fu Shize saying he had arrived in Yihe.
Yun Li cropped the photo of the cardholder to show only the portrait and sent it to Fu Shize: [This person looks quite handsome.]
Fu Shize: [Mm.]
She sent a photo of herself: [What about this person?]
When Fu Shize received the message, he could imagine her feigning ignorance. In the photo, she was hugging a half-fallen duiDui sleeve, looking up at the camera with a smile. He saved the photo locally and typed two characters: [Beautiful]
After exchanging just a few words with him, Yun Li received a new friend request. The profile picture was an oil painting-style landscape, and the user had noted “Yin Yucheng.”
Her first thought was: that Yun Ye must have stirred up trouble again.
After accepting the request, Yun Li stared at their chat interface, caught in the dilemma of whether to greet him. Saying hello would mean committing to further communication…
Yin Yucheng didn’t give her the chance: [Hi Yun Li. I’m Yin Yucheng. Your brother sent Yun Yi a New Year’s postcard these past couple of days.]
He also sent a screenshot showing part of the postcard’s content: [Yun Ye will visit his sister in Nanwu during this winter break. He’ll meet you then as a representative of our Class 15 ^^]
He added his comment: [Your brother is quite good at pursuing girls.]
[I’m a bit envious.]
“…”
Yun Li was speechless. Last time, they had jointly criticized Yin Yucheng for peeking at the postcard, yet Yun Ye still dared to write explicitly about visiting Yin Yun Yi in Nanwu.
She was more worried about Yun Ye’s intelligence.
How could he date with that brain?
Yin Yucheng got straight to the point: [Before they meet, would it be convenient to have a face-to-face chat? I’m not in Nanwu recently, but I’ll let you know when I’m back.]
It didn’t sound like Yun Li had a chance to refuse.
After all, their family’s “pig” was trying to “uproot” the other side’s “cabbage.”
Yun Li sighed and replied with a simple “okay.”
She scrolled back to her WeChat interface, but Fu Shize hadn’t sent her any new messages. During afternoon classes, Yun Li purposely checked her phone several times but saw no messages from him.
Life wasn’t exactly empty. The classes weren’t easy; on the contrary, the formulas and diagrams were quite complex. After class, she still had to buy groceries and cook. In the evening, she needed to do homework. There were also some videos left to edit.
Yun Li had planned her day to be packed full.
However, seeing the chat interface timestamp stuck several hours ago gave her a sense of mutual indifference and disappointment.
She wanted to occupy his world.
Yun Li decisively sent over an emoticon with no special meaning – three bears of different colors standing harmoniously in two rows, with blank expressions.
Fu Shize didn’t reply. After an hour, she sent another emoticon, the same dull-looking three bears, but in different positions.
A moment later, her phone vibrated.
[In a meeting]
Eager to receive messages from him, Yun Li would occasionally send Fu Shize emoticons she found online. When Fu Shize had time, he would reply with a few words.
After returning to her apartment from evening classes, Yun Li took the initiative to make a video call. Within seconds, Fu Shize answered, and his face appeared on the screen. The background looked like a hotel room. He pushed aside a half-opened takeout bag.
Having just returned to the hotel after work, he looked a bit tired but still focused his attention on the camera.
“You’re eating dinner so late,” Yun Li said, knowing he had digestive issues. She suggested, “When you return to Nanwu, we can have dinner together.”
Fu Shize: “Mm. When?”
Yun Li thought for a moment: “If I have time, I can cook for you.”
“If you’d like, I could do it every day.” After saying this, she seemed to feel she was being too forward and tried to save face by adding, “Although it might be a bit unfair to me, you are my boyfriend.”
“So, do you think that would be okay?”
Fu Shize patiently listened to her finish, her demeanor as if discussing state secrets with him. He placed the phone by the sink and casually responded, “Mm.”
This way, they could see each other every day.
That’s quite nice.
Fu Shize washed his hands, returned to the table, and moved the phone further away so the takeout box was visible in the frame. He opened the packaging and began eating leisurely, his gaze no longer returning to the camera.
His relaxed demeanor made Yun Li feel less constrained. She brought up what Tang Lin had said about Fu Zhengchu winning the basketball championship and naturally asked, “How’s your physical fitness?”
“…”
After a while, Fu Shize said, “You don’t need to worry.”
The person on the screen looked at the camera with pure eyes, seemingly unaware of any other implications in the question. Fu Shize chuckled, opened the soup container, glanced at her, then lowered his head again.
He seemed somewhat exasperated with her.
Just a few exchanged glances made Yun Li’s heart race. She moved to the bed, rested her face on the pillow, and asked him, “Today my deskmate saw you and told me you’re handsome. Next time, can I just tell her directly that you’re my boyfriend?”
Fu Shize looked up, and wiped the corner of his mouth with a napkin: “What else?” He put down his chopsticks, leaned back in his chair, and asked, “Friends?”
Meeting his gaze, Yun Li recalled the day they returned from the guesthouse, how he didn’t avoid Xu Qingsong and Fu Zhengchu’s presence. More precisely, Fu Shize had always been unconcerned with others’ gazes.
It seemed she was being too cautious.
“Friends work too,” he calmly answered his question. “Say whatever you want, don’t hold back because of me.”
By the time he finished eating, half an hour had passed. Yun Li browsed E-station for a while, where a hot search featured a replay of past years’ snowy mountain scenery in Nanwu’s suburbs. She paid close attention for quite some time, being a pure Southerner who had never seen snow.
Fu Shize stood up to clean up. Yun Li noticed his white shirt tucked into his trousers, the loose clothing and tucked-in part swaying before the camera as if she could almost see the waistline beneath.
“…”
His voice came through: “It’s going to snow in Nanwu in a couple of days.”
Yun Li snapped back to attention; his face was already back close to the camera as he informed her, “Going to throw out the trash.”
He briefly disappeared from view.
Checking her phone, she saw that Nanwu would indeed experience heavy snowfall in the coming days. Having never seen snow, Yun Li was excited about this news for quite a while. When Fu Shize sat back down, she talked to him at length about how to film videos and content themes for the occasion. Though he wasn’t very familiar with video production, he quietly focused on the camera, listening attentively.
“—But there’s one issue.”
Fu Shize tilted his head: “What?”
She brought up something completely unrelated to video production: “I think we don’t chat frequently enough.”
“…”
Fu Shize looked at her a few times.
Yun Li seemed to have just had this sudden thought, quickly switching the topic to Yun Ye’s matters, from gift-giving to his winter break plans in Nanwu. She somewhat reverted to her chatty self when talking about Yun Ye.
Fu Shize occasionally responded, not doing anything else, just lowering his eyes to listen to her speak.
Unaware of how much she had talked, Yun Li laughed in frustration: “I feel like I’m Yun Ye’s tool. He’s so direct, isn’t he afraid of scaring girls away?”
As soon as the words left her mouth, Fu Shize glanced at her.
Yun Li belatedly realized that Yun Ye’s pursuit strategy was similar to hers, perhaps even—she was more direct. It was as if she had indirectly described herself.
Just as Yun Li was thinking of how to smooth things over, Fu Shize suddenly said, “He’s like you.” He thought for a moment: “Girls probably can’t bear to reject him.”
“Well, my brother might be a bit annoying, but he’s still quite cute,” Yun Li followed his lead, praising Yun Ye. “He doesn’t know I’m dating yet. If he finds out, he might beg me for red envelopes.”
Fu Shize tilted his head slightly.
“He might beg you too.”
“…”
Recalling the siblings’ interaction he had witnessed in Xifu, and thinking of the forbidden fruit he had tasted, Fu Shize casually said, “When you come back, prepare some strawberries for me.”
After Yun Li agreed, Fu Shize asked, seemingly offhandedly: “What’s her brother’s name?”
She hesitated for a moment before answering truthfully: “Yin Yucheng.”
“…”
Seeing his sudden silence, Yun Li asked, “Is it not okay to meet other guys alone?”
He said, keeping a straight face despite his conflicting feelings: “It’s fine.”
Later, Yun Li would learn that the meaning behind this statement was—It’s fine, as long as I’m present.
The next day, after getting ready, Yun Li went to work at the company. Having passed the busiest season, it was now so quiet inside that she could see old employee Qin Haifeng playing Fight the Landlord at his workstation.
Fu Shize’s purchased coffee beans were still in the storage compartment of the break room, with one and a half bags already consumed. Yun Li made herself a cup of coffee, inhaling the aroma.
Although bitter at first taste, she could now detect the chocolate notes.
It was because of her that he had chosen the chocolate flavor.
She couldn’t help but think that perhaps earlier than she had imagined, Fu Shize had already been paying attention to her.
After idling at her workstation for a while, Fang Yuning assigned her to assist with interviews for social recruitment. As someone with a long-standing fear of interviews, her first reaction to this task was utter dismay. Yun Li spent most of her energy learning how to conduct interviews.
She became busy, yet miraculously, she would receive messages from Fu Shize every hour or so.
Woke up.
Eating breakfast.
Meeting someone.
Eating lunch.
Meeting someone.
Back at the hotel.
Each message was concise, just a few words. But it was more than twice as frequent as before. When Yun Li was busy, she could only reply briefly, but this didn’t affect his messaging rhythm.
The passing comment she made last night—he cared about what she said, even if he didn’t show it.
Yun Li couldn’t help but be a bit bolder, forwarding him a question from an online platform: [“Why doesn’t my boyfriend ever send me emojis on WeChat? Is he pretending to be aloof?”] After casually sending it, Fang Yuning sent her to the experience hall to act as an NPC, as there happened to be groups of high school students visiting the VR experience hall today.
She hurried over, and it wasn’t until an hour or two later that she checked her phone.
The notification bar showed that Fu Shize had replied with an emoji.
Presumably having seen her forwarded question, Fu Shize’s responses before this had been mostly pure text. When she opened it, Yun Li’s finger froze.
It was that emoji she had accidentally sent before, with the words ‘Be my wife’ and a fist now pointing at her, raising her heart rate to the maximum.
She pressed the side button of her phone to turn off the screen and held it tightly to her chest, unable to control the emotions flowing through her heart.