Everyone had work tomorrow, so after dinner and some more playing, they dispersed.

Qin Lie finally waited for the group to leave, standing in the entryway with his hands in his pockets to see them off.

Qin Zhan and the others each carried a bag of trash as they filed out.

After everyone had left, Han Susu quietly asked Chen Xi, “Do you have time now?”

Chen Xi was stunned, then nodded and said, “What’s the matter?”

Han Susu: “Come with me to Yang Guan’s place.”

Qin Lie suddenly coughed lightly. Chen Xi glanced at him and smiled without saying anything.

Han Susu: “What, do you still have something to do?”

Chen Xi shook her head, “Nothing, I’ll go with you.”

She took her bag, walked to the entryway, and looked up to meet Qin Lie’s indescribable gaze.

“I’m heading back first. Sleep early, and call me if you need anything.”

Qin Lie leaned against the shoe cabinet, half-smiling as he looked at Chen Xi and nodded at her.

After everyone left, Qin Lie slowly wandered back to the living room and sprawled on the sofa.

For dinner, Qin Zhan had bought poplar braised flatbread from downstairs, a bunch of barbecue, and strawberry cake specifically for Yang Shan.

The room was empty, but the echoes of the earlier liveliness seemed to linger.

Qin Lie suddenly wondered if Chen Xi’s life all these years had been like this.

Gathering friends, never a quiet moment.

But it seemed quite addictive.

After a while, figuring Yang Shan had probably gotten home, Qin Lie grabbed his phone and called her.

She answered quickly, her voice somewhat surprised, “Hello, Brother Qin Lie, what’s up?”

Qin Lie: “I heard you mention used cars this afternoon. What was that about?”

…

Chen Xi sat in Han Susu’s car, driving past the brilliantly lit Dang River.

People strolling by the riverside in twos and threes enjoyed the most pleasant moment of the day in the evening breeze.

Chen Xi turned to look at Han Susu and asked with a smile: “Why do you need me to accompany you to Brother Yang Guan’s place?”

Han Susu gripped the steering wheel, looking at the road ahead, and said quietly, “To help me ask some questions.”

Chen Xi: “Can’t you ask him yourself?”

Han Susu smiled coolly, “If I ask him, he won’t tell the truth.”

Chen Xi looked at Han Susu meaningfully, almost blurting out:

“Didn’t you two settle things between you?”

The words reached her lips, but she managed to stop them just in time.

She unconsciously patted her chest, still shaken.

Han Susu glanced at her, “What’s wrong with you?”

“Nothing, nothing.”

Chen Xi smiled guiltily, trying hard not to think about the awkward scene she had witnessed that night.

Han Susu: “I’m being serious with you. Tonight, you must have a good talk with him. I just can’t let it go—I want to know what he’s thinking.”

Chen Xi: “If you find out, then what?”

Han Susu silently looked at the road ahead. After a long while, a bitter smile tugged at the corner of her mouth.

She said half self-mockingly: “Yeah, even if I find out, what then?”

The clinic wasn’t closed yet. Dr. Yang usually went to rest in the back courtyard at nine o’clock, while Yang Guan would stay in the shop until ten.

Han Susu parked the car by the roadside and followed Chen Xi, tiptoeing into the shop.

A faint scent of traditional Chinese medicine hit them. Han Susu took a deep breath.

She had loved the smell of Dr. Yang’s clinic since she was little.

There was no one in the outer room. Chen Xi lifted the curtain of the massage room and looked inside, but still saw no one.

Suddenly, a draft blew through, and a strand of hair by Chen Xi’s ear gently fluttered.

She caught a faint whiff of tobacco, so she walked through the massage room toward the back door.

She saw a figure sitting on the steps by the door smoking, a red spark flickering at his fingertips.

“Brother Yang Guan.”

Chen Xi called softly behind him.

Yang Guan recognized Chen Xi’s voice and said flatly, “Oh, Chen Xi.”

Han Susu stood behind Chen Xi. Hearing Yang Guan’s hoarse voice, her heart felt like it was gently pricked by something.

Under the dim light, his silhouette looked somewhat lonely.

His voice also carried an indescribable melancholy.

Han Susu stood frozen in place, watching him coldly, her eyes unconsciously reddening.

Chen Xi glanced back at Han Susu, then silently walked forward two steps and sat beside Yang Guan.

She placed the bag of beer she was carrying on the steps and looked up at the star-filled night sky.

She said quietly, “Brother, there are so many stars tonight.”

Yang Guan smiled and also looked up toward the invisible night sky.

This boundless darkness sometimes made him feel utterly hopeless.

He also yearned for a ray of light to enter his life, even if his eyes couldn’t see it, as long as his heart could.

But just recently, he had personally extinguished that only ray of light.

Yang Guan’s lips curved in a smile—it seemed that apart from smiling, he could do nothing else for himself.

Chen Xi turned to look at Yang Guan and was suddenly startled.

She had never seen Yang Guan look so dejected—unshaven, with heavy dark circles under his eyes.

Even when he was diagnosed with irreversible vision loss, she had never seen this half-dead state on his face.

Chen Xi’s heart sank for a moment, then felt settled again.

She seemed to already know the answer to what Han Susu wanted to ask.

The two sat silently on the steps. After a while, Yang Guan asked quietly: “It’s so late, what are you here for?”

Chen Xi didn’t speak, picked up a can of beer, and handed it to Yang Guan.

Yang Guan took the beer, brought the cigarette between his fingers to his lips, and took a silent drag.

Chen Xi opened a can of beer and said softly, “Brother, drink with me.”

Yang Guan’s gaze looked into the depths of darkness. After a long moment, he extinguished the cigarette in his hand.

He opened the beer and raised it toward Chen Xi.

Chen Xi gently clinked her beer with his and tilted her head back to take a big gulp.

Yang Guan drank slowly without saying a word.

After a while, Chen Xi broke the silence.

“Brother, what’s going on between you and Han Susu?”

Yang Guan slowly drank his beer, saying nothing.

Chen Xi: “You’re aware of her feelings, aren’t you?”

Yang Guan drank sullenly. After a long while, he suddenly spoke.

“I’m aware.”

That was all he said.

Chen Xi sighed softly, “Do you have no feelings for her at all?”

Yang Guan took a swig of beer. In the darkness, a mocking smile curved at the corner of his mouth.

So what if he did? So what if he didn’t?

Between him and Han Susu, there was still a path of desperate gamble separating them from this question.

How could he let her walk into darkness along that path?

The two fell into silence again.

Insects in the corner occasionally chirped once or twice, making the small courtyard seem even more desolate.

Listening to the insect calls, Chen Xi suddenly laughed.

She asked with fond memories: “Do you remember? When we were kids, every summer we would pester you to take us cicada hunting at night.”

Yang Guan also smiled gently, “I remember.”

Chen Xi: “I remember once we ran to the poplar forest, and when we came back, it was too late. Han Susu was so tired she couldn’t keep her eyes open, so you carried her back.”

Yang Guan said nothing, and the smile at the corner of his mouth gradually grew cold.

“Brother Yang Guan…”

Chen Xi looked at him and suddenly said softly: “Han Susu said she’s liked you since she was very young.”

Yang Guan remained silent, pulling cigarettes and a lighter from his pocket to light another cigarette.

Chen Xi watched him exhale smoke and continued: “Elementary school, middle school, high school, until now.”

Yang Guan: “Stop talking.”

But Chen Xi wouldn’t stop.

“She said that in her eyes, you’ve never changed—you’ve always been her favorite Brother Yang Guan.”

“Just one smile from you could be the death of her.”

Yang Guan suddenly stood up, coldly interrupting Chen Xi’s words.

“Chen Xi, I told you to stop.”

He dropped these words, stepped down two steps, and walked toward his room.

Chen Xi suddenly asked coldly behind him: “Brother Yang Guan, she’s an able-bodied person, so does that mean the feelings she offers you with both hands deserve to be thrown to the ground and trampled on?”

Yang Guan’s footsteps suddenly stopped.

Chen Xi: “Or are you saying that you stand in darkness while she stands in sunlight, so she has no right to enter your world, is that it?”

Yang Guan stood with his back to Chen Xi, still silent, veins bulging on the hand holding his cigarette.

He suddenly spoke, his voice calm: “This is for her good.”

Chen Xi smiled and asked mercilessly: “Are you a fire pit?”

Yang Guan gritted his teeth and said nothing.

Chen Xi pressed on: “Brother Yang Guan, you know yourself best—do you think you’re a fire pit?”

Yang Guan suppressed the ice and fire in his heart and roared hoarsely: “What do you want me to do?”

“Be selfish once? Go crazy once? Chen Xi, this is about living life, not playing house.”

Chen Xi stepped down and walked in front of Yang Guan, saying quietly, “Brother, let’s not talk about living life tonight. Han Susu wants you so much—I just want to know, do you want her?”

After Chen Xi finished speaking, the courtyard fell into deathly silence, with only Yang Guan’s heaving chest and heavy breathing.

After a long time, he suddenly smiled bitterly.

“Yes.”

He spoke quietly, “I want her like crazy.”

He threw away his cigarette and cursed.

“I’d rather go to hell than not have her.”

Chen Xi stared at Yang Guan’s face, slightly distorted from restraint, and her nose tingled.

She looked toward Han Susu standing on the steps, but only saw her retreating figure…

After a while, Chen Xi came out of the clinic and saw Han Susu crouched in a small patch of shadow by the door.

Her chin rested on her folded arms, revealing the stubborn cowlick on top of her head.

Chen Xi pointed at the cowlick on her head and asked with a smile: “What are you doing?”

Han Susu looked up at Chen Xi, smiled, and said, “Thinking about things.”

Chen Xi: “Thinking about what?”

Han Susu: “Thinking about how to handle my parents.”

As she spoke, she suddenly grinned widely, her smile brilliantly radiant.

The night couldn’t dim it, and even the starlight couldn’t compare.

Chen Xi was stunned, then unconsciously smiled too.

“Then you’d better work hard at it.”

Among the three of them—her, Yang Shan, and Han Susu—Han Susu’s parents were the most concerned about their child.

When Chen Xi and Yang Shan were still running wild in the alleys, Han Susu was already being forced to learn piano.

Later, when the couple discovered that Han Susu wasn’t piano material, they enrolled her in dance classes.

Chen Xi and Yang Shan didn’t like going to Han Susu’s house much when they were young because her mother had too many rules.

Back then, every family lived in single-story courtyard houses, but only Han Susu’s family required changing into slippers before entering the house.

No smacking lips while eating, no making noise while drinking soup.

Chen Xi was like a tomboy back then and often got scolded by Han Susu’s mother.

They held their daughter in their palms, raising her to be the most beautiful flower.

Naturally, their standards for choosing a son-in-law were sky-high—no young man had ever caught their eye.

Thinking of this, Chen Xi couldn’t help but worry for Han Susu.

“How are you planning to handle your parents?”

Han Susu smiled bitterly, watching a young couple walk hand in hand.

She said quietly, “Seems like I can’t handle them.”

Chen Xi sighed softly, “You know that too…”

Han Susu’s gaze followed the receding figures of the young couple as she said slowly: “Actually, in those ten-plus minutes just now, I thought through the path I’ll walk for the rest of my life.”

“My parents, relatives, classmates, colleagues—the way they look at me will probably all change.”

“Whether to my face or behind my back, there won’t be anything nice to say.”

Chen Xi made a soft sound of agreement, “You can’t control other people’s mouths.”

Han Susu smiled and said softly, “I know. Let them talk about me, just don’t let them talk about Brother Yang Guan.”

“I’m the one who’s been persistently chasing him. I’m the one who feels that if I don’t end up with him, this life would be wasted.”

She stood up and exhaled gently.

“It doesn’t matter if I can’t handle my parents. Anyway, I’m going to spend my life with Brother Yang Guan. As long as he’s willing, it doesn’t matter who objects.”

Dr. Yang’s clinic wasn’t far from Fan Mingsu’s small courtyard—it was only a ten-minute walk.

Chen Xi didn’t let Han Susu drive her home. The night breeze was cool, and she wanted to stroll.

Walking alone on the street, there were still quite a few people out on summer nights.

Passersby brushed past, chatting as they gradually walked away, while across the Dang River were thousands of homes with lights on.

The small city was quiet, with all its noise melting into this rich human atmosphere.

Chen Xi looked up at the night sky and smiled gently.

Han Susu and Yang Guan—though it would be difficult, she believed that blessings from parents and friends would come eventually.