One

It was Cen Jin’s first time stepping into Wei Lai’s apartment. She stood at the doorway and looked around for a good while, then tilted her head up and asked him: “Does anyone actually live here?”

Wei Lai said: “What kind of thing is that to say? A man’s room is a little clean and simple, and that’s grounds for discrimination?”

He had actually thought that as a bachelor, a room free of women’s stray hairs or any suggestive objects would earn him her approval.

Cen Jin begged to differ. This wasn’t clean and simple — this was desolate, devoid of life. There wasn’t even a wardrobe. The only piece of furniture with any real presence was the bed, and the blanket on the bed had actually been folded up neatly.

Cen Jin looked at him: “A man’s room — being moderately messy is actually fine. Like, a blanket left unfolded, a beer can lying on the floor… Being too clean or too slovenly both tend to give people unsavory impressions.”

She had once written a series of social commentaries on psychopathic killers, and Wei Lai’s domestic aesthetic, unfortunately, fit squarely into one of the major categories.

The blanket had been folded out of boredom when he got up — there was clearly no time to mess it up again now. Wei Lai said: “Hang on a second.”

He stretched out his arm and pulled down the aluminum folding ladder connected to the ceiling hatch, then climbed up to the loft in a few steps. When he poked his head back down, he was holding an empty beer can with an air of showing off: “Drank the last one a while ago, forgot to throw it out. There’s still dust on the loft floor — want to come up and have a look?”

Good. Very fitting for a man living alone, with a narrow social circle, and a restrained private life.

Two

Cen Jin’s villa was being reclaimed and liquidated, and she needed to go sort through and retrieve some of her belongings.

She said to Wei Lai: “Let’s find a car and drive over — it’ll be convenient for the trip back too.”

Wei Lai didn’t have a car. He called Milu to borrow his, and also asked him to help arrange a moving company, with particular emphasis on getting a large truck.

Milu said: “Wei, moving companies aren’t cheap, and on top of that, the bigger the truck the more expensive it is. Why don’t you check with Cen first? Maybe she doesn’t have that much stuff.”

Wei Lai felt there was no need to ask.

How could there not be much? She had such a large villa. All the things inside — tables, cabinets, odds and ends — his small apartment couldn’t even hold them all. They might even need to rent a storage unit.

As a boyfriend, thinking ahead on all fronts, being thorough, sparing his girlfriend the mental burden — that showed consideration.

On the agreed day, Milu drove over to pick them up.

When they arrived at the villa’s entrance, the large truck from the moving company was already there. Three or four strapping young men had come with the truck, sleeves rolled up to the shoulders, muscles bulging, ready to get to work at any moment.

Cen Jin looked up and saw them. “The collateral company is certainly in a hurry,” she said. Then: “Wait for me a moment — I’ll be quick.”

Wei Lai had a bad feeling about this.

After Cen Jin got out of the car, Milu turned around in the driver’s seat to look at him and reminded him once more: “Wei, moving companies are very expensive.”

Cen Jin came back out quickly, pushing a large suitcase.

That suitcase looked quite familiar — wheeled, an enormous thing, large enough to stuff him inside.

A line drifted through Wei Lai’s mind —

Moving companies aren’t cheap.

He got out of the car to meet her and asked: “Just this?”

“Just this.”

Wei Lai made one last desperate attempt: “What about the furniture? The decorative pieces? The paintings on the walls?”

“I settled those as collateral before leaving. All my personal belongings are in here.”

“Can I take a look?”

Cen Jin made an “as you please” gesture.

Wei Lai laid the suitcase flat, unzipped it all the way, and looked at the contents — all very familiar.

Five evening gowns, full-length, in their dedicated rigid plastic garment bags; five shoeboxes, each containing a pair of matching heels in various colors; one very heavy makeup case — he flipped it open to find it organized in layers and compartments, containing everything under the sun…

Milu stuck his head out of the car window: “Wei, regardless of whether you actually used their services, the moment their truck rolled out, you’re being charged. And it’s… not cheap.”

Three

Wei Lai came back from outside and had just opened the door when a paper airplane came flying steadily toward him.

He could have easily reached out to catch it, but he didn’t. Instead, he did a backflip on the spot, and when he landed, he snatched it out of the air with a swooping hand, then pretended to be out of breath and said: “That was close.”

Cen Jin laughed: “Open it and look.”

Wei Lai only then noticed that the reverse side of the paper faintly showed the impression of printed text — it wasn’t a blank sheet grabbed at random.

He unfolded it: “What is this?”

“I wrote a commentary piece and submitted it. This is the feedback sent back by the other party.”

Wei Lai opened it up.

The salutation read Miss Silvia — she had changed her pen name. Wei Lai remembered that her byline had always been Cen Jin before.

Rejection letters all followed the same pattern: first they praised you with a few lines, such as “accomplished commentary writing style” and “clear logic,” then they hit you with a “however” —

“Too flat, lacking in passion, the wording is too cautious. What we look for are sharp, combative pieces that make readers want to slam the table.”

Wei Lai said: “Ha, this person really doesn’t know Cen Jin at all.”

Then he looked at Cen Jin: “Why didn’t you use your old name?”

That name — even if she wrote something mediocre, magazines would still scramble to publish it, then add a follow-up piece analyzing why yesterday’s crusader had gone so uncharacteristically quiet, speculating whether she had encountered threats from powerful forces, and so on — riding the wave of attention all over again.

Cen Jin said: “The old name has too many enemies. I don’t want the trouble.”

“Then why not use your old style?”

“Now that I have a home and family, I need to think about my dependents.”

Home and family — those four words sent Wei Lai’s heart soaring.

That evening, he put in a spirited performance, so she would know: having a home and family is one of the greatest pleasures in this world.

Four

Now that I have a home and family, I need to think about my dependents.

So Wei Lai found an opportunity to tell Milu that he wasn’t planning to work as a bodyguard anymore.

Then, with wide eyes, he witnessed a demonstration of how far Milu had evidently advanced in his mastery of Chinese culture — the man performed an impeccably faithful rendition of the classic three-stage complaint method: first weeping, then making a scene, then threatening to throw himself from a height.

“Wei, is this because of Cen Jin? You’d cast me aside for a woman? Cast aside Ke Ke Shu too?”

Wei Lai said: “We can still be friends…”

“Friends don’t talk about dissolving partnerships! Wei, think about it — women are like shooting stars. One passes, and there’s always another one coming. Is it worth it? Giving up your career for a shooting star?”

Wei Lai said: “Didn’t you once say that being a bodyguard was like being a supermodel — it’s a career that feeds off youth? You even encouraged me to switch careers and become a writer…”

Milu denied it flatly: “Who said that? I absolutely never said any such thing. Wei, you don’t have the talent for it. No, I absolutely disagree.”

Wei Lai said: “Doesn’t matter. Your opinion isn’t something I particularly care about anyway.”

That same evening, Milu showed up at the door.

Wei Lai opened it, saw it was him, and didn’t let him in right away — he was afraid Milu would say something to stab Cen Jin.

Milu took two steps back, gesturing for him to see what he’d brought.

Flowers. And red wine.

When he met Cen Jin, Milu was respectful and deferential, and his very first word was sister-in-law. Wei Lai was in the middle of opening the wine bottle when he heard it — his hand jolted, and the opener slipped.

Milu then earnestly and patiently made his case, speaking slowly and at length.

— “Sister-in-law, it would be such a waste for Wei to just walk away like this. He’s an ace, you know. Having a home and family doesn’t have to stop him from being an ace. Look at Ke Ke Shu — he bought his wife so much gold.”

— “There are so many different kinds of bodyguard work. He could be an instructor, he doesn’t have to go on long deployments, he could be a consultant… How could he possibly switch careers and write things? Along this whole journey, you asked him to keep a diary — did he? Did he write even a single entry?”

Wei Lai gave a loud and pointed cough from the side.

Cen Jin listened attentively the entire time, and at the end she said: “Let Wei Lai make his own decision. I respect his opinion.”

Then she clinked glasses with Milu.

The clear, crisp ring of tall wine glasses touching, the dark red wine swirling in the cups.

Wei Lai was also holding a glass of wine, but no one clinked with him.

He felt a sour pang in his chest.

Five

Not long after Cen Jin moved into Wei Lai’s apartment, one day she suddenly remembered something.

She asked Wei Lai: “Didn’t you say you kept a ladybug? How come I’ve never seen it?”

Wei Lai remained perfectly composed and answered: “The ladybug flew away eventually.”

Cen Jin breathed a sigh of relief. She had no desire to share a roof with a ladybug. That creature — small, brightly colored, sometimes flying around here and there — what if she wasn’t paying attention and swatted it thinking it was a fly? How would she ever face Wei Lai after that? After all, his emotional and intellectual capacity did occasionally regress to that of a three-year-old.

Wei Lai also breathed a sigh of relief. If this topic had continued any further, he would surely have been exposed — after all, all he knew about ladybugs was that they could fly.

But as it happened, two days later, Cen Jin suddenly brought the old topic back up: “That ladybug you kept — tell me about it.”

Wei Lai said: “It flew away…”

“I know it flew away. But you kept it, and you even wrote a diary about it, so obviously you were attached to it. Does that mean once it flew away, you just forgot all about it?”

Of course not — a caring, devoted boyfriend was a good boyfriend.

Wei Lai began like this: “The first time I saw it was when I was little…”

Cen Jin calmly reminded him: “A ladybug’s lifespan is one to two years at most.”

Wei Lai corrected himself: “What I mean is, the first time I ever encountered ladybugs as creatures was when I was little. Back then…”

Clearly, a love-at-first-sight story needed the right setting.

“…It was raining outside. I hadn’t done well on an exam and had been left standing in the hallway as punishment by the teacher. I still remember that teacher to this day — he wore round black-framed glasses, just like a bookkeeper’s clerk…”

Cen Jin noticed that every teacher Wei Lai had ever had seemed to look like a bookkeeper’s clerk. This betrayed just how difficult and riddled with holes it was for a person of impoverished imagination to try to make up a lie.

“…I was feeling very sad, and just at that moment, a ladybug crawled across the windowsill. I don’t know why, but my mood immediately lifted.”

Milu was right — if Wei Lai ever switched careers to writing books, the outlook would be grim.

Wei Lai snuck a glance at Cen Jin’s expression, and felt that the first part had passed muster.

Good. Writing a story followed three steps: cause, process, outcome. The cause had been fumbled through successfully, the outcome was that it flew away, and now he just needed to invent a process in between — that couldn’t be too hard, could it?

He felt confident.

“Later on, in He’er Xinji, you know — living alone, it gets lonely, so I kept a few. Ai Lin keeps moon jellyfish, after all… Those ladybugs kept me company through many days. But ladybugs have such short lives, and every time one died I was devastated, so eventually…”

He let them fly away. The setting for the day he released them also needed to be well-framed — overcast skies, a light drizzle falling… Truly perfect.

Cen Jin listened quietly to the end, then said: “Wei Lai, not a single one of the ladybugs you kept ever reproduced?”

She had heard that some species of ladybug can produce five or six generations in a single year, laying anywhere from hundreds to thousands of eggs each time.

Why would a social commentator need to know so much about ladybugs? What if the ladybug simply didn’t want to reproduce? Was that anyone else’s business?

Wei Lai said: “The ones I kept were… all the same sex…”

Cen Jin gave a quiet “oh.” “Then one last question…”

“That ladybug of mine — compared to the ones you kept, which one do you like better?”

The scene rewinds to earlier that same day.

Cen Jin was at Ai Lin’s bar, watching her feed the moon jellyfish: “Moon jellyfish, when kept well, are genuinely beautiful. I don’t know what Wei Lai was thinking, actually liking ladybugs…”

Ai Lin thought the word “ladybug” sounded rather familiar, then suddenly remembered: “He even provided protection for a ladybug once — rich people really are… probably just have more money than they know what to do with.”

Why would someone hire a bodyguard to protect a ladybug? Wouldn’t finding an entomology expert be more reliable? Cen Jin couldn’t help asking: “When was that?”

“Around… April, I think.”

Six

Yi Fu called Wei Lai and invited him over for dinner.

Since Cen Jin had gone back to Ka Long anyway, and sitting alone at home was just sitting alone, Wei Lai accepted without hesitation.

Dinner was a lavish spread. Yi Fu had made cinnamon rolls, fish pie, and new potatoes with chicken-of-the-woods mushroom sauce. The atmosphere was warm and cozy — Yi Fu and Milu’s son and daughter were both old enough to sit at the table and handle their own forks, but still young enough to have that soft, milky quality about them, babbling away when they spoke. Wei Lai found his gaze drifting toward them for most of the meal.

Sure enough, wanting to settle down really does change a person. The last time he’d come to Yi Fu’s for a free meal, his eyes had been fixed on the food the whole time, terrified Milu would snatch the best bits.

After dinner, Yi Fu seemed to want to say something but hesitated.

Wei Lai noticed: “Something the matter?”

Yi Fu said: “I heard about Cen’s situation.”

Heard what you heard — so why the look of such deep concern? Wei Lai didn’t quite understand.

“Wei, what are you going to do? She’s been sentenced to ten years.”

Wei Lai knew immediately that Milu had passed the message along in a wildly garbled form.

He shot Milu a look, then patiently explained to Yi Fu: what had been sentenced was ten years of mandatory service — each year, no fewer than two weeks of time had to be spent doing voluntary work at Ka Long’s justice tribunal, assisting with case review, prosecuting perpetrators, compiling relevant historical records, and so on.

Yi Fu could hardly imagine it. Milu had shown her some archival photographs, and she had only glanced at one before covering her eyes and shrieking: “Take it away, take it away! I’ll have nightmares!”

“Wei, that’s too cruel. It’s a form of psychological torment.”

Wei Lai smiled slightly and said: “It’s alright.”

For some people it would be psychological torment. For Cen Jin, it might be medicine. Being able to face it squarely was better than spending a lifetime in avoidance.

Wei Lai strolled home, passing through the city center square. He stopped for a moment in front of Amanda’s bronze statue and called Cen Jin.

She picked up quickly: “Mm?”

“What are you up to?”

“Just finished. Washed my laundry, hanging it out to dry now — the sun’s almost setting.”

Wei Lai smiled, picturing the village where Ka Long’s volunteers lived — simple wooden plank shelters, clotheslines strung on ropes outside the doors, laundry swaying on the line, the setting sun framing her silhouette.

“Lift your head. Look to the right. About 45 degrees — do you see it?”

Cen Jin said: “Don’t try that again!”

The first time he’d said this, her heart had gone thump thump, and she’d thought he’d actually shown up unexpectedly, about to give her a surprise… but when she looked in that direction, what she saw was a stray dog.

When she’d told Wei Lai, he’d said: “Right. I was reminding you to watch out for the dog.”

And here he was trying it again — he’d clearly developed a taste for it.

Wei Lai coaxed her: “Look, I promise this time is different.”

She lifted her head and looked: “…A utility pole.”

Wei Lai said: “I really wish I were that utility pole.”

After hanging up the call, Cen Jin walked over to that utility pole, gave it a sideways once-over, and said: “Get lost!”

Seven

Ke Ke Shu received Wei Lai’s wedding… notification card.

That’s right — just a notification card. No ceremony, no banquet, not even an invitation for him to attend.

Ke Ke Shu was furious, convinced Wei Lai was taking revenge on him.

Granted, he hadn’t told Wei Lai when he got married either — but his attitude had been perfectly sincere, and he had even indicated that the next time he got married, it would absolutely not be like that. Why was Wei Lai being so petty?

The man should know that, given the depth of his friendship with Wei Lai, he absolutely would have given a generous gift. Even if he wasn’t particularly fond of Cen Jin, he would still have given her a gold necklace at least as thick as his little finger!

Solid gold!

Ke Ke Shu was seething with indignation and called Milu to lodge a complaint.

Then his sense of grievance was partially mollified — Milu had also only received a card.

Apparently, Wei Lai and Cen Jin had gone to a Chinese restaurant called “Hua Xia Tian Fu” and eaten a meal of dumplings, after which Wei Lai had taken Cen Jin to La Pu Lan, saying he wanted to stay in a kota, see the northern lights, and go ice fishing on a frozen lake.

The mere thought sent a shiver down his spine. What a different breed of person, truly.

He hung up the phone and looked at that little card over and over.

It was simple: the middle section bore both of their handwritten signatures.

Wei Lai & Cen Jin.

There was a single line of text at the bottom.

In April, your destiny came into harbor and carried me aboard.

Ke Ke Shu barely understood it, though Wei Lai had mentioned more than once that he thought of his fate as a small boat.

But as someone who had been through it all himself, Ke Ke Shu felt it was his duty to remind Wei Lai: in a marriage, poetry and romance alone were not enough — an additional layer of protection was necessary.

Just like when he himself had gotten married, sternly and repeatedly warning his wife: “If we ever divorce, you’ll have to return all the gold!”

And look at how loving they were now.

He felt that this card needed one more line added at the bottom —

Anyone who tries to disembark will be fined ten million. US dollars.