The first time she got in Jin Yiken’s car, there was absolutely no talk of good people or bad people. She was only thinking about one thing at the time: having a bed to sleep in.

She couldn’t remember which argument with Long Xinyi it was—one that had nearly escalated to using weapons—but afterward, she used what little money she had left to buy water and instant meals at the convenience store near the residential complex entrance. Then, while eating dinner, she scrolled through nearby hotel room prices on her phone. It was the rainy season in March. The tremendous sound of rain and dampness kept pushing in through the automatic door. She got into another argument with the store clerk about the air conditioning being too strong. Just as the argument reached its peak, a car horn beeped once at the supermarket entrance. She looked outside and saw Jin Yiken sitting in the back seat of his family’s sedan, smiling at her.

She pointed at Jin Yiken’s family’s million-yuan car and said to the female clerk: “Never mind, someone’s volunteering to provide me with service.”

Then, without another word, she walked out of the supermarket and got in that car. The female clerk’s face turned alternately green and pale.

Long Qi slammed the car door heavily. The driver in the front seat glanced back at her. Jin Yiken, however, looked at her without a care, as if enjoying himself, even hoping to hear some novel profanity from her mouth. In any case, that look in his eyes completely conveyed the research-like interest an honors student has when facing the final high-scoring thought problem on a science exam.

When the car started moving, Long Qi was still in the cooling-down phase. She and Jin Yiken each sat at opposite ends by the windows. He rested his elbow on the window ledge, propping up his cheek, and said unhurriedly: “Do you want to give Zhuo Qing a call?”

“No need.”

After her instant answer, she remembered to glance at him, but said nothing. The car interior was temporarily quiet. Then she couldn’t help but look at him a second time: “Have we met before?”

Jin Yiken smiled. When he smiled, both the corners of his mouth and eyes overflowed with mirth. His eyes looked at her so brightly that for one second, it was unforgettable. Long Qi turned her head to look at the rainy street scene. He said in his original tone: “Two days ago, you saw me. You’re Zhuo Qing’s girlfriend, and I’m Zhuo Qing’s friend.”

“Oh.”

That’s what she said aloud, but in her mind, she rapidly skimmed through the meeting scene from two days ago. At the time, she had been preoccupied with the overt and covert verbal sparring with Bai Aiting, who had also been introduced. Only now did she remember that aside from Zhuo Qing, who had been frequently put in difficult positions, there had also been a male student who maintained an outsider status throughout, quietly watching the show.

Right, watching a show. That male student’s gaze at the time had been like watching a show, because he seemed to hear every one of Long Qi’s sarcastic remarks directed at Bai Aiting, and also understood those double entendres. He always watched the two of them battle covertly with great interest yet deliberate silence, helping neither person, and not helping Zhuo Qing either.

“You look pretty scummy,” Long Qi evaluated him bluntly.

Looked scummy, not actually scummy. In her worldview, male students who had even a bit of capital were mostly restless, relying on being somewhat handsome to take full advantage of the benefits that girls actively offered them. The more temptation they received, the greater the possibility of becoming scummy. So she didn’t initiate conversation with male students who had that tendency. And Jin Yiken’s type had reached the level of pretty scummy. She still didn’t know what kind of person he was, but with one glance, she knew this type of male student couldn’t even be touched.

She liked good people. She liked good people like Zhuo Qing. But aside from being good, Zhuo Qing seemed to be missing something, so for the time being, she didn’t really like Zhuo Qing that much.

Jin Yiken didn’t respond to this statement. He wasn’t like ordinary male students. He didn’t have the immaturity and vulgarity of those stinking boys, nor did he have that ingratiating energy of wanting to chat up girls. He only said: “I’ll find you a place to rest. When you want to notify Zhuo Qing, you can notify him yourself.”

“You’re really doing a competent job as a good brother,” she replied. “I’m quite satisfied.”

Jin Yiken booked a suite for her. The room charge was on him. Long Qi said she’d repay him later. He said no need.

“I’ll repay you,” she said, entering the room and placing her bag on the sofa. As she walked into the bathroom, she said, “After I do some activities, I’ll repay you. Within a week.”

After turning on the faucet at the sink, there was no response. Long Qi was focused on talking at the time and only habitually adjusted the faucet to maximum water flow. Two or three seconds later, water suddenly gushed out like a waterfall, startling her. After turning off the faucet, the water kept flowing nonstop with a rushing sound. Jin Yiken, having heard some commotion, knocked on the bathroom door from outside.

Long Qi came out dripping wet. Jin Yiken glanced at the chaotic scene, took a bath towel from the inner bathroom and gave it to her, then crouched down in front of the sink and opened the cabinet door to check the water pipes. She asked: “You’re going to fix it?”

Without looking back, he answered: “If you want to change rooms, I’ll get you another one, but I can fix this one.”

“Then fix it.”

She sat on the edge of the bed wiping her arms. After sitting for a short while, she heard a message notification sound from a phone. She reflexively looked toward the sound source, and coincidentally, Jin Yiken’s phone was lying on the nightstand closest to her. Part of a received message was displayed on the screen. It wasn’t a text message but chat records from a WeChat group. It wasn’t a message sent to him individually either, but shared information sent for more people to see. When Long Qi stood up to take the phone, the screen hadn’t dimmed yet. Outside the hotel, the rain was continuous. Inside the suite, the light and shadows were dim. Her figure stood quietly in front of the nightstand, silently looking at the information on the screen.

Only the first half of the message was displayed. This first half happened to be a text reply she had sent to Zhuo Qing a few days ago.

…

Why would it be here?

…

The messages were updating quickly. Before the screen dimmed, she heard two or three consecutive new message notification sounds. Her finger had already moved to the swipe lock position, while her gaze swept toward the bathroom. Through the half-open door, Jin Yiken was focused on fixing the water pipe.

Her gaze returned to the screen, and her finger smoothly swiped open the lock. She had originally thought that if he had set a password, she’d just forget it, but he hadn’t set a password. After the lock was swiped open, it went directly to the WeChat group message page. She just happened to see a friend of Bai Aiting’s (whose profile picture was a photo of that girl with Bai Aiting) sending a string of text chat records between Long Qi and Zhuo Qing in the group. After posting them, the girl also sent a smiling emoji worth savoring.

It seemed this wasn’t the first time. Someone in the group quickly replied: A new episode is here.

There was a buzzing sound in her head, but for now, she suppressed the shame and anger of having her privacy violated. Long Qi opened the group member list and looked at the profile pictures one by one. Of the dozen or so members inside, most were from Class 1—that is, Bai Aiting’s circle of excellent students. Bai Aiting herself was in there, and even more absurdly, Zhuo Qing himself was also in there.

The male students in the group successively teased Zhuo Qing: Your goddess is really cold.

Several female students “enthusiastically” helped analyze the meaning in the texts, reaching various conclusions like “she’s stringing you along again,” “she’s lying to you, definitely lying,” “actually she must be willing in her heart but just wants to act reserved.” It was as if they were treating this as a teaching case study for how men and women exchange texts. Bai Aiting didn’t say a word throughout. When she did appear, she only sent some inconsequential emojis. Only at the very end did Zhuo Qing send one sentence: Stop talking, all of you.

Oh, so he was actually online after all.

Long Qi looked toward the bathroom again. Jin Yiken was busy tinkering away with enthusiasm, not even talking to her. So she scrolled to the WeChat chat records between him and Bai Aiting. Their chat style was very polite, more like a couple treating each other with respect. They didn’t chat often, and the content was mostly things like “I forgot my something in your car, remember to bring it for me tomorrow.” They never gossiped or talked about other idle chatter.

This didn’t look like something Bai Aiting would do. So where did the text records come from? The only person of the opposite sex close enough to Zhuo Qing to look at his phone was Bai Aiting. That girl’s relationship with Zhuo Qing was just average.

At this time, Long Qi scrolled to a record where Bai Aiting asked Jin Yiken to help her buy furniture on a certain website, and also gave him her own website account and password. Long Qi memorized that password, found Bai Aiting’s phone number from Jin Yiken’s phone contacts, logged out of his own WeChat account, switched to Bai Aiting’s WeChat account, and entered that password.

Most people like to use the same password for different accounts. Long Qi had already gone rogue at that point, trying out one after another, and she really guessed correctly. When the page switched to Bai Aiting’s WeChat account homepage, her brain and spine maintained a rigid state for one or two seconds. Next, she couldn’t care about her surroundings and went directly to the chat records section.

Bai Aiting must frequently use Jin Yiken’s phone to log into her own account, so it retained quite a few of her chat records with classmates and family. At the same time, Long Qi discovered that aside from appearing in that WeChat group, she had another small group where all the girls closest to her were.

The chat records here were even more spectacular.

At twelve-ten today at noon, Bai Aiting had sent a screenshot from the internet into the group. The screenshot content was someone posting an exposé about the prices for dinner dates and overnight companionship of top models from various magazines. One line had Long Qi’s name, followed by an introduction: This chick isn’t top-tier, her temper is too explosive, she’s being suppressed by many higher-ups at Magazine X, and she herself has no ambition to become famous, but she’s genuinely beautiful, no plastic surgery, has some mixed-blood genes, attends a prestigious high school too. Very popular in the circle of appearance-obsessed bosses, but not famous so the price isn’t high—can be secured for one hundred thousand per night.

After Bai Aiting highlighted this line in red and posted it in the group, the first girl replied: Explosive!

The second girl replied: Don’t ever mention our school name, she’s completely disgraced us.

The third girl replied: Rotten apple.

(Long Qi had some impression of this girl—she had liked Zhuo Qing before.)

The fourth girl replied: Should remind Zhuo about this.

Bai Aiting replied to the fourth girl: Already told him, he won’t listen.

Afterward, there were mostly unpleasant comments. That fourth girl later mentioned: Has Zhuo still been in contact with her recently?

Bai Aiting: They’re in contact. A couple days ago he even had me and Yiken accompany them to dinner.

The fourth girl: That formal already?!

Bai Aiting: But looking at their text records, it doesn’t seem like it. She’s hot and cold toward Zhuo.

The third girl: How can this woman be like this?

Bai Aiting quieted down until three forty-five in the afternoon when she suddenly posted a text message record in the small group and said: Got their recent chat content.

The fourth girl quickly chimed in: I’ll post it in the big group.

Bai Aiting’s silence indicated tacit approval. Then immediately there was that content in the big group. These few girls who had cheerfully cursed her out in the small group all transformed into “enthusiastic” bosom friends helping Zhuo Qing, ostensibly analyzing the text content while blatantly distorting the information into all kinds of absurd meanings, step by step pushing her toward the image of a bad and pretentious woman. Their imaginative leaps were frighteningly large.

Zhuo Qing just silently watched them analyze the content, then at the end sent a pale “Stop talking, all of you.” He didn’t do anything else after that. At most, he only sent Bai Aiting a private message: Sigh, better not show them my texts anymore.

Bai Aiting probably hadn’t had time to reply before Long Qi hijacked the account. Her hands and feet were ice-cold as she looked at these records. The worldview in her mind was somewhat overturned. She finally knew what Zhuo Qing was missing. She didn’t want such a pathetic good person who was polite to everyone. She wanted someone with a sense of right and wrong values, with the power to refute and a sense of responsibility, someone with an aura of righteousness who couldn’t tolerate his own people being speculated about. He needed to take her side, to speak up for her at appropriate times, to rebuke those people with improper thoughts, not to always remain weakly silent or helplessly utter a “sigh.”

And Bai Aiting’s behavior—seemingly saintly but actually boring—was truly nauseating to watch. Her account was quickly logged back in by the owner. Long Qi switched back to Jin Yiken’s account and indeed received Bai Aiting’s inquiry: Did you just accidentally log into my account?

A few seconds later, she sent another message: Come eat dinner at my house tonight. My mom just learned to make a few soups. The joint exam just ended recently, and she said she wants to properly nourish you^^

It seemed she was afraid he really had logged into the wrong account, seen her little maneuvers in the small group, and was guiltily changing the subject. At that moment, old and new grievances rushed to Long Qi’s brain. She didn’t know that Jin Yiken was already standing behind her at that time. She had long ignored her surroundings, ignored them for a very long time, so she had no idea that Jin Yiken had also been standing behind her for a long time. He had both hands in his pants pockets, watching her while chewing gum, his cheeks moving slowly up and down.

Long Qi’s finger edited a line of text on his phone keyboard. Just as she was about to send it, he asked flatly: “Is my phone fun to play with?”

The act of sending was forced to stop. She didn’t turn around, only lifted her head slightly. Her finger pressed the delete key, deleting that line of text one character at a time. Then she placed the phone back on the nightstand and turned to face him: “Fixed it?”

He nodded slowly. His hand reached around Long Qi’s waist to take the phone. At that time, she also put her hand behind herself, deliberately pressing down on his hand the moment he grabbed the phone.

The two people looked at each other at close range. Long Qi said: “You helped me today. I’ll treat you to dinner.”

He looked into her eyes. After a while, the corners of his mouth showed a slight smile, as if he thought her proposal was too casual. Then he withdrew his hand from under hers and lowered his head to look at the content Bai Aiting had sent him.

Long Qi’s head was hot at that time. She was determined to make him stay. That heart of hers that was bent on opposing Bai Aiting was also agitated to the extreme. So in front of this male student she hadn’t known for even two hours, she lifted her T-shirt and pulled it off, leaving only a thin camisole clinging to her skin.

Jin Yiken glanced at her. Her breathing wasn’t steady. Her skin was ice-cold, but her eyes stared straight at him. He understood—of course he understood what this meant. But he still lowered his head to edit his message. Long Qi saw him send the two words “okay,” and her brain had a nuclear explosion right then, blowing up her entire mood unpleasantly. After Jin Yiken finished replying to the message, he put his phone in his pants pocket, picked up his jacket from the sofa, left the room card, and said to her as he walked: “I’m going to my girlfriend’s house. Sleep well.”