The scent of orange-scented laundry detergent.
It should have been the most comforting, safest embrace.
Yun Li’s nose stung as her vision blurred.
She couldn’t understand why Yun Yongchang had to be so domineering and rude, showing his displeasure to Fu Shize’s face without even basic respect.
She also didn’t understand why Fu Shize openly mentioned his leave of absence when he could have easily glossed over it.
His honesty made it seem like he didn’t care about Yun Yongchang’s opinion at all.
As if he didn’t care about his opposition.
Fu Shize’s voice was hoarse: “Li Li…”
“My dad has a bad temper and is quite traditional. He’s always wanted me to stay in West Fu,” Yun Li said, not trying to defend Yun Yongchang. She sniffled, “My dad shouldn’t have acted like that. He doesn’t know you. It was very impolite.”
She hesitated, “You didn’t have to mention the leave of absence…” Not wanting him to think she was criticizing him, Yun Li tried to sound casual, “Because many people don’t understand you, but I think you’re amazing.”
Fu Shize looked at her and nodded.
“I saw a video of you when I was in my first year of high school. It was you receiving an award at a competition. After the college entrance exam, I even went to West Science University to find you.” Recalling her embarrassing actions, Yun Li felt shy. “But I didn’t see you.”
He had been a brilliant youth in his prime.
He had supported her through the toughest times in high school and had once been her dream for the future.
“Wait a moment.” Yun Li’s mood lightened as she found her laptop and played the video she had treasured for so long.
Since their reunion, she had watched this video countless times.
The video was from years ago, with low resolution, but it wasn’t hard to make out his former teammates.
As Fu Shize watched these scenes, he felt suddenly empty.
He was back on that stage, with a sea of faces below, the room buzzing with noise, the lights blinding. In an instant, these images shattered into fragments.
He saw the person hugging him from behind and abruptly looked away.
“Don’t watch anymore.”
Yun Li was startled and closed the video.
She thought he might be in a bad mood because of Yun Yongchang’s opposition.
Helplessly, she said, “I admired you for such a long time. Back then, I hung your picture on my wall and did my homework facing it every day…”
She was determined to tell him that they had a connection long ago.
She had admired him seven years ago and fell in love with him seven years later.
She didn’t want them to separate because of Yun Yongchang’s opposition after finally getting together.
Fu Shize tightened his jaw, seemingly unmoved, listening to her stories absent-mindedly.
He appeared completely indifferent.
He wasn’t touched by the fact that she had admired him seven years ago.
It was like the behavior of someone who didn’t like her.
Yun Li’s enthusiasm waned. After a long while, she said, “Let’s go back to Jiangnan Garden.”
They were silent the whole way.
Long-term suppression bred anger. Upon reaching Jiangnan Garden, Yun Li purposefully went to his room and continued flipping through the photo album.
She turned to the very last photo.
She hadn’t absorbed any of it.
He was so smart, always in control of everything. He knew what she wanted to know. Yun Li clenched her fist weakly and asked softly, “Aren’t you going to tell me anything?”
Fu Shize turned his head and asked, “Tell you what?”
“…”
Fu Shize spoke without emotion: “You want me to go back to school, to become who I was before?”
Indeed, Yun Li did want him to return to school. She didn’t want him to be engulfed in endless darkness, his once-brilliant light dimmed. But that wasn’t what she wanted to ask right now.
Yun Li’s tone was stiff: “Yes.”
Fu Shize crossed his arms, leaning against the wall, silently watching her. After a long while, he said noncommittally, “I see.”
His tone and gaze were as distant as when they first met, full of detachment.
Yun Li waited for him to continue, to tell her about what had happened.
But he just leaned against the wall, making no move to come closer or speak further.
The buried time bomb exploded.
Yun Li felt increasingly powerless, the gulf between them seemingly impossible to bridge.
Why was she always kept at arm’s length, unable to enter his heart despite so many attempts? As if she were dispensable.
He didn’t need her to participate or share his burdens.
She couldn’t feel that he valued their relationship.
Yun Li slammed the photo album shut and forcefully put it back in its original place.
She never knew she could be so rough in front of Fu Shize. Without hesitation, she walked out with teary eyes.
Fu Shize grabbed her wrist.
Yun Li was angry and didn’t speak, simply prying his hand off.
Back in her room, it took Yun Li a long time to calm down. She sat sadly by the bed, staring at her door.
…
The sound of water stopped. The bathroom was filled with steam. Fu Shize placed a towel on his hair, water droplets falling as he slowly wiped his hair.
Yun Li was already asleep.
He took a taxi to a nearby bar. Xu Qingsong had been waiting for a while and sneered when he saw him: “Why didn’t you bring Yun Li?”
Since Fu Shize started dating, Xu Qingsong couldn’t remember how many times he had failed to get him to go out.
Fu Shize remained silent, taking off his black coat and leaving only a white shirt, sleeves rolled up halfway.
Xu Qingsong looked up: “Fought?”
Seeing him not respond, Xu Qingsong tried to imagine two wooden blocks arguing and couldn’t help but say, “It’s hard to imagine.”
“…”
Fu Shize lowered his gaze, looking at the whiskey in his glass, drinking several glasses without a word.
After he came to EAW, Xu Qingsong had more contact with him and knew about his leave of absence. He had heard from others that Fu Shize’s personality had changed quite a bit.
In his impression, Fu Shize never cared about others’ opinions of him.
It seemed like how he lived was his own business.
The person next to him stared at the empty glass, his tone bitter: “I was better before, wasn’t I?”
“She likes who I was before.”
From these two sentences, Xu Qingsong could guess the gist of it.
Xu Qingsong wasn’t close to Yun Li but felt this was only natural.
Anyone who had seen his brilliance would find the current shadow jarring.
Xu Qingsong was silent for a moment: “Do you feel disappointed now?”
“…”
“It’s not so much disappointment as feeling like I’ve let her down,” Fu Shize said self-mockingly, swirling his glass. “I’m not the person she likes anymore.”
Fu Shize had considered this possibility.
After all, what was good about him now?
…
Yun Li woke up at six or seven. She rolled out of bed, her feet slipping into slippers.
They were a couple of slippers bought by Fu Shize.
She struggled internally for a moment before walking out to wash up.
Usually, her greatest anticipation upon waking was seeing Fu Shize.
Seeing his figure in the living room.
He would stand at the kitchen door, holding breakfast, asking her, “Awake?”
She went to the bathroom to wash up and saw two messages from Fu Shize, sent at around 4 AM.
[Breakfast is in the microwave to keep warm. Heat for one minute before eating.]
[Grandmother is seriously ill. I’m going back to stay with her.]
What a coincidence!
From Yun Li’s perspective, they fought last night, and their relationship was on shaky ground.
She couldn’t tell if this was Fu Shize’s excuse to avoid her, nor could she investigate.
He might not have liked her that much to begin with, and after seeing Yun Yongchang yesterday, he probably didn’t have a strong desire to continue with her.
The wound that had just healed was torn open again.
She dejectedly set the microwave for one minute. The ding echoed in the empty house.
Feeling empty inside, Yun Li sat at the dining table, staring blankly at the breakfast.
Eggs and toast, with a glass of milk.
Used to have two people in the house, she ate the toast as an overwhelming sense of loneliness washed over her.
Without notifying Fu Shize, Yun Li took a taxi back to Seven Mile Fragrance.
It wasn’t until the afternoon that she remembered to reply to Fu Shize: [Okay. Take care of yourself.]
She avoided thinking about the problems between them.
As if burying her head would prevent things from getting worse.
There were still drone videos and audio recordings in her notebook. Yun Li spent a few days editing and uploading the finished product to the E-station.
Fu Shize would send her WeChat messages, mostly recounting the day’s events.
He would send one message, and she would reply with one.
Sometimes late at night when emotions ran high, Yun Li wanted to pour out her inner struggles and doubts about their relationship to Fu Shize, but often she would type out a long message only to delete it in the end.
She didn’t want to confirm once again that he didn’t really like or care about her that much.
When Fu Shize called her, they would fall into long periods of silence.
They both wanted to say something but didn’t.
Love isn’t always sweet.
In love, there are many frictions, sadness, suspicions, and concerns.
Not everyone learns how to love in a relationship.
…
The room was filled only with occasional beeps from the machines.
Fu Shize looked at the elderly woman on the bed, her temples gray, her face wrinkled with the marks of time, her spotted hand holding his without strength.
He sat in place until the monitor flatlined.
Fu Shize tucked the blanket around her.
“I don’t want to attend the funeral.”
Leaving these words, he walked out. The temperature outside was three degrees. Fu Shize forgot to put on his coat. The people passing by all seemed like walking corpses, including himself.
His grandmother’s passing was predictable; machines had artificially prolonged her life.
But now, the person who had watched him grow up since childhood was gone.
Fu Shize had no memory of his parents from birth. When he was old enough to remember a bit, he knew his parents taught at West Science University, spending almost all their time in the school lab except for sleeping.
Unable to provide companionship, his parents left him to be raised by his grandparents.
Jiang Yuan and Chen Jinping were born on the same day, which led Chen Jinping to believe the two families were destined to be connected.
His earliest memory was from when he was three years old. At that time, Jiang Yuan was seven and, worried he might stumble, held his hand as they went to buy pomegranates from a roadside stall.
He bought two and gave one to Fu Shize.
Fu Shize was restless as a child, with a bit of a rascal personality. He had too many tutoring classes, but whenever he had free time, he would drag Jiang Yuan around to wander and cause trouble.
When his grandparents found out, the older Jiang Yuan would take all the responsibility.
Jiang Yuan had a gentle personality and would use sweet words to coax his grandparents. He often laughed and told Fu Shize to learn from him.
He and Jiang Yuan attended the same elementary and middle schools. Fu Shize was four years younger than Jiang Yuan, but after skipping grades to enter middle school, he was much younger and shorter than his classmates.
The two always went everywhere together. One day, Jiang Yuan had something at home, so Fu Shize went back alone. Some older students, whose families had compared them unfavorably to this ten-year-old prodigy, confronted him.
Fu Shize had never been afraid of trouble. Ignoring that there were four of them, he walked straight ahead with his school bag.
The students beat him up and dumped everything from his bag into a nearby ditch.
He didn’t care.
After all, when Jiang Yuan came back, two against four should be more manageable than one against four.
That was the only time Fu Shize was bullied. He didn’t tell Jiang Yuan right away.
Someone else texted Jiang Yuan about it. He ran straight back to school from home and pushed those few people into the ditch.
It was one of the rare times Jiang Yuan lost his temper, coldly reproaching him: “Ah Ze, you’re grown up now. You don’t tell me things anymore, do you?”
After that, Fu Shize never kept anything from him.
In high school, his parents wanted to transfer him to West Fu Experimental Middle School, but he refused.
The only reason to stay in South Wu was to attend the same high school as Jiang Yuan.
Later, they went to the same university, studying the same major.
He grew up under Jiang Yuan’s protection.
Jiang Yuan taught him how to interact with people, how to love, and what it felt like to be loved.
Over time, he became more and more like Jiang Yuan. Jiang Yuan was his brother, playmate, and best friend.
Before the college entrance exam, his grandfather passed away.
Two years ago, Jiang Yuan said goodbye to him.
After Jiang Yuan left, these two years seemed nonexistent.
Fu Shize hoped they truly didn’t exist.
Today, his grandmother had also left.
It always rained when loved ones departed.
Why did South Wu always have so much rain?
Numbly starting the car, surrounded by a sea of vehicles and people, the information around him became highly blurred. The rain exploded violently against the windshield.
He couldn’t and didn’t want to lose anyone else.
He wanted to be by her side.
He didn’t want to make empty promises.
He just wanted Yun Li to give him some time. He would become the Fu Shize he used to be.
Stopping the car, Fu Shize panted, his body soaked as he walked to the entrance of Seven Mile Fragrance. As he raised his hand, for just a moment, he suddenly remembered.
Oh, she didn’t like him this way.
He shouldn’t appear before her in such a wretched state.
After leaving Seven Mile Fragrance, Fu Shize drove to South Wu City Cemetery. Dark clouds gathered; at 3 PM, it looked like night.
Fu Shize was alone on the pitch-black road.
Following the familiar route, he arrived at his usual spot. The person in the photo smiled as if it were still the beginning.
“Grandmother is gone.”
Jiang Yuan wouldn’t respond.
“I still have Li Li.”
He remembered the day he went to West Fu. After a year and a half, he returned to the Control Engineering Building and went to Jiang Yuan’s office, only to find his workstation had been replaced.
It was neatly arranged with someone else’s computer, pen holder, notebook, and coat.
There had been countless times before when he’d come in and seen Jiang Yuan’s coat.
No one remembered him anymore.
The void in his heart grew larger.
He walked down the stairs in a daze, unable to see the path ahead. He felt only endless darkness until suddenly he saw an end.
Her face was red from the cold, her eyes bright as she handed him the cardholder.
The void in his heart was filled.
Fu Shize repeated: “I still have Li Li.”
After speaking, he laughed self-mockingly: “Li Li saw me seven years ago.”
He lowered his gaze, leaning against the tombstone, curling up: “What she wants, what she likes, is that Fu Shize.”
“I dare not tell her.”
“That Fu Shize can’t come back.”
“I dare not tell her.”
He murmured, rain entering his eyes. As night fell, wrapped in darkness, he forgot the passage of time.