When Qian Fei returned home, she saw Gui Lili sitting on the living room sofa, with her phone and laptop screens turned to maximum brightness. The two eerie lights cast on her face gave Qian Fei a chill.

Seeing her return, Gui Lili rushed towards her with tears in her eyes, like a poor person from the old society seeing the Communist Party.

“Qian Fei, you’re finally back! I was wondering what I’d do if my computer and phone ran out of battery!”

Qian Fei couldn’t help but roll her eyes.

She had already checked when she came upstairs – theirs was the only apartment without power in the entire building. So she said –

“This isn’t a power outage. The fuse must have blown,” Qian Fei told Gui Lili.

Gui Lili lifted her pretty face, looking at her with a puzzled expression.

Qian Fei sighed. It seemed impossible to expect her to figure it out on her own.

“Did you use several high-power appliances at the same time?” she asked Gui Lili directly.

Gui Lili’s expression changed, and she immediately denied it: “You suspect I blew the fuse? How is that possible? I didn’t use several appliances at once, Qian Fei!”

Qian Fei’s eyelid twitched. She gave up arguing with Gui Lili, went to her room to take off her coat, and then, using a flashlight, went to the kitchen to find the toolbox.

While looking for the toolbox, she noticed something in the kitchen’s waste basket. She shone the flashlight on it and saw it was a small, thin booklet. Upon closer inspection, she realized it was the instruction manual for a 2000-watt electric heater. Inside was a receipt showing it had been purchased a month ago.

Holding these items, she suddenly understood why the electricity bill had skyrocketed this month. She had previously thought there was a problem with the electric meter and was planning to schedule an appointment with the power company to have it checked.

She looked at the manual in her hand, thinking and hesitating about whether to discuss this with Gui Lili.

At that moment, she heard the front door open – Li Yifei had returned.

She heard Li Yifei ask Gui Lili, “What’s going on? Is the power out?”

Gui Lili responded with a soft, coquettish “Mm-hmm.”

Hearing that “Mm-hmm,” Qian Fei suddenly felt a bit irritated.

Li Yifei went to the bedroom to change clothes. Qian Fei went to the living room, holding the manual and receipt, and said to Gui Lili, “Gui Lili, you’ve been using the electric heater, right? You can’t keep it on all the time. Using it for too long can cause a short circuit. That’s probably why the fuse blew tonight. Also, this thing uses a lot of electricity. The electricity bill this month is much higher than usual. How about we split the bill this month?”

Gui Lili tilted her head, facing Qian Fei with her delicate, pretty face, “But Qian Fei, we agreed in the contract that you’d cover the electricity, water, and internet bills!”

Qian Fei felt annoyed, and she wasn’t sure if she was mimicking Gui Lili’s tone when she said, “But you’ve been using a high-power appliance!”

Gui Lili blinked her big eyes and said, “But you didn’t say in the contract that we couldn’t use them! It’s so cold, using an electric heater is normal. We can’t risk getting sick just to save on electricity, can we?”

Qian Fei was suddenly at a loss for words.

She felt a throbbing pain in her temples.

At this moment, Li Yifei came out of the room, having changed his clothes.

“We’ll pay for this month’s electricity bill,” he suddenly said.

Gui Lili immediately jumped up from the sofa and yelled at Li Yifei, “Li Yifei, are you crazy? I was alone in the dark, scared out of my wits, and you come back late at night only to side against me? What’s your problem?”

Li Yifei also lost his temper, “Don’t you know how much electricity you’ve been using every day? Are you taking advantage of her? Have you no shame? She’s poorer than us, can’t you see that?” He pointed at Qian Fei while shouting at Gui Lili.

Qian Fei listened from the side, feeling incredibly conflicted.

To be pointed at and called poor right to her face… Didn’t Li Yifei understand the concept of not rubbing salt in the wound?

They started arguing again, neither willing to back down. Qian Fei, enduring their flying spittle, opened the door and went downstairs to buy a new fuse.

She deliberately went to a hardware store far away, one that stayed open late. After buying the fuse, she lingered outside the apartment for a while, waiting until the voices inside had quieted down before entering.

She saw Li Yifei sitting on the living room sofa, with their bedroom door closed.

She asked Li Yifei, “Everything okay?”

Li Yifei glanced at her, “It’s fine. She’s cried herself to sleep.”

She responded with an “Oh.”

Li Yifei told her, “I’ll take half a day off tomorrow and have the property management come to replace the fuse.”

Qian Fei thought for a moment and said, “How about I try first?”

Li Yifei frowned, “You?”

Qian Fei handed him a flashlight, “I’ve already bought the fuse! Come on, let’s go to the corridor. You can hold the flashlight for me, and I’ll try to replace it. If I can do it myself, neither of us will have to miss work tomorrow!”

Li Yifei had a “don’t be ridiculous” expression on his face and asked her, “Do you want to write your will first? What if you get electrocuted?”

Qian Fei gave him a fierce glare, “No wonder they say Beijing young masters have sharp tongues! Can’t you say something more positive?”

Li Yifei shrugged, took the flashlight, and followed Qian Fei to the corridor.

For the next few minutes, he held the flashlight and watched in amazement as Qian Fei swiftly replaced the fuse.

“How do you know how to do this? Are you even a woman?” he couldn’t help but exclaim.

Qian Fei scoffed, “My dad was the electrician in their unit. I grew up watching him replace fuses at home!”

Li Yifei clicked his tongue and said, “Can’t your family buy some higher-quality fuses? Changing them every other day… Are the good ones too expensive?”

Qian Fei couldn’t help but roll her eyes, “Bro, that was just a figure of speech, okay?”

Li Yifei let out an “Ah” and then asked, “What else can you do?”

Seeing his friendly attitude, Qian Fei couldn’t resist showing off a bit more, “I can do lots of things! My specialty is soldering radios. Give me a bunch of components, and I can put together a multi-channel radio for you without even needing a circuit diagram!”

Li Yifei snorted, “You’re exaggerating! Can you solder mobile phones then?”

Qian Fei was stumped for a moment, “Well, no, but my dad says if you can solder one thing well in your lifetime, you can impress people. Back when my radio for listening to English broke down, I learned how to solder radios from my dad. If I had known English would be removed from the college entrance exam, who would bother soldering for listening practice? I would have learned to solder money printing machines instead!”

After she finished speaking, she heard Li Yifei chuckle.

“If you’re so good with electricity, why did you end up in investment banking?” he asked her.

Qian Fei sighed dramatically, “To live up to my surname, of course!” (Note: Her surname “Qian” means “money” in Chinese)

Li Yifei laughed.

They tidied up the tools and went back to the apartment, turning on the lights to test them. The lost electricity had successfully returned.

Qian Fei went to her room to get ready for bed. After washing up, she checked her phone. Hu Zining hadn’t sent her any messages. It seemed he was still upset.

She thought for a moment and took the initiative to send Hu Zining a WeChat message: “Good night, Zining.”

There was no response. Qian Fei thought he must be asleep.

She turned off the lights and got into bed.

Before falling asleep, she suddenly found some things quite interesting.

At first, she thought Gui Lili was easygoing and approachable, while Li Yifei, with his nose in the air, would be difficult to get along with. But after interacting with them for a while, the reality turned out to be quite the opposite.

Gui Lili was genuinely difficult to deal with. Now, just thinking about interacting with her gave Qian Fei a headache. On the other hand, she felt that she and Li Yifei were starting to get along better.

The next day at lunch, Qian Fei asked Xiao Yuan, “If your boyfriend wanted to, you know, and you didn’t let him, how long would he usually be angry with you?”

Xiao Yuan bit the end of her chopsticks, grinning mischievously, “He wouldn’t be angry. He’d immediately kneel and thank the heavens I spared him for a day!”

Qian Fei was shocked, “I had no idea you were so… voracious!”

Xiao Yuan rolled her eyes at her, “As if you don’t have physical needs!” She changed the subject, “What’s up? Did your new boyfriend want to do it and you didn’t let him?”

Qian Fei nodded, putting on a righteous face, “Yeah, I don’t know why, but I just wanted to be noble and virtuous for once.”

Xiao Yuan clicked her tongue, “You? Wanting to absorb yang energy to treat your facial hair, and you call that noble and virtuous? If you ask me, you just don’t truly like him!”

Qian Fei thought hard about it.

“But I feel like I do like him!”

Xiao Yuan blinked and asked her, “So, you didn’t let him do it, and now he’s angry?”

Qian Fei put down her chopsticks and hung her head, “Yeah, he’s been ignoring me since yesterday!”

Xiao Yuan said, “That’s easy to fix! Find an opportunity to let him do it once. You’ll balance your yin and yang, you won’t grow facial hair, and his anger will dissipate. Problem solved!”

Qian Fei glared at Xiao Yuan, “Sis, can you have some sense of chastity? I don’t even know if we’ll end up getting married, so how can I casually sleep with him? If we break up later, I can’t ask for a refund for that one time, can I? That would be a big loss!”

Xiao Yuan said, “With your attitude, you’re lecturing me about chastity? Alright, don’t overthink it. I’ve been with countless men in bed, and guys like your current boyfriend who act so delicate aren’t worth coddling. The more you try to please him, the more arrogant he’ll become. Just ignore him for a few days, and he’ll come around. In a few days, he’ll come crawling back to you!”

Qian Fei looked incredulous, “Really?”

Xiao Yuan batted her eyelashes, “Of course! Would I lie to you? Men just can’t be spoiled!”

Qian Fei said, “No! I mean, you’ve been with countless men in bed?”

Xiao Yuan crumpled up a napkin and threw it at Qian Fei’s face.

Qian Fei decided to follow Xiao Yuan’s advice and ignore Hu Zining for a few days.

In the late afternoon, just before leaving work, Director Jin from the Back Office Support Department assigned her a task to help with the “Investment Banking Quarterly Business Information Statistics.” Director Jin told her, “This was originally Xiao Ma’s job, but she went on maternity leave last week, and no one’s been doing it! You’ve done this before and know how to compile the statistics, so Qian Fei, I’m afraid I’ll have to trouble you with this!”

She used to work in the Back Office Support Department and transferred to the Project Department after breaking up with Wang Ruohai. She couldn’t refuse her former boss’s request, so she had no choice but to accept.

Director Jin needed it urgently, saying it would be best if she could give it to him by the next morning. Qian Fei had no choice but to work overtime at home that night to get it done.

Before she knew it, it was 11:30 PM, and she started feeling drowsy, yawning with tears in her eyes.

She got up and opened the door to go to the kitchen, hoping to find something in the refrigerator that could keep her awake, like coffee or tea.

But as soon as she opened the fridge door, she was met with an overwhelming sight of face masks, face masks, and more face masks…

She silently closed the refrigerator door.

She had truly been so tired that she forgot the fridge was no longer a fridge; it had become the homeland of face masks.

As Qian Fei was passing through the living room to return to her room, she heard the front door open. It was Li Yifei coming back, carrying a bag of something. Gui Lili wasn’t with him.

She casually asked, “Just getting back?”