Wei Zhi emerged from her shower, donning a fresh nightgown. Once again, she was the sweet-scented little girl, though her face remained pale from the hangover, with dark circles under her eyes more pronounced than usual.
As she exited the bathroom, she found that the man had already prepared some food in her small kitchen. He had cooked rice, boiled water, tossed soup dumplings into the pot along with the rice, and added chopped cabbage and lean meat from the refrigerator. Just before serving, he cracked an egg into the mixture and sprinkled some green onions on top.
The light, piping-hot rice soup was perfect for Wei Zhi’s empty stomach after a night of drinking.
As Wei Zhi walked out toweling her hair, and slippers shuffling, the man was using chopsticks to place some pickled radish into a small dish. He had removed his jacket and now wore a thin white sweatshirt with the sleeves rolled up to his elbows. His long, slender fingers deftly manipulated the chopsticks, their angles shifting subtly with each movement.
Wei Zhi stood five meters away, transfixed by his fingernails.
The room was filled with the appetizing aroma of food. Her stomach growled, snapping her out of her daze as she realized how hungry she was.
Tossing aside her towel, she hugged the man from behind. Feeling him tense slightly, she buried her face between his shoulder blades, nuzzling him and inhaling his scent with a contented sigh.
“You’re back,” the young woman’s voice was sleepy and sweet. “I missed you so much.”
The man carried the soup and pickles to the dining table, Wei Zhi clinging to his waist like a little tail, stumbling along in her slippers. After setting down the food, he turned within her embrace, picked her up, and placed her at the edge of the table, handing her a spoon.
“You missed me?” he asked.
She nodded.
The man’s eyes darkened as he scoffed, “If you had thought of me for even a second while drinking last night, you wouldn’t have come home so drunk you forgot to remove your makeup.”
Wei Zhi wasn’t particularly afraid of Shan Chong’s scolding or his stern face. What she feared was his sarcastic tone, which instantly transformed him from her boyfriend into the master who had once said, “You can’t push me down this slope” on Aiwen Avenue.
She fidgeted with her spoon, looking at him uncertainly. “Hadn’t we moved past this?”
“Who said that?”
“I did.”
He turned his chair, gesturing for her to face the table and eat.
Wei Zhi was genuinely hungry. She began eating under the man’s silent gaze, the warm food settling in her stomach and making her feel more grounded. The uncomfortable acid reflux disappeared instantly, and she felt revived.
Glancing at the man beside her, she initiated conversation: “Have you completed your isolation period already? Something doesn’t seem quite right.”
She spoke with the spoon still at her lips.
Shan Chong’s gaze lingered on her lips touching the spoon’s edge. He thought to himself that if they had a daughter or son who dared to speak with a spoon in their mouth during meals, they would have already been scolded. But for the person before him, he said nothing, merely tapping his knuckles on the table to indicate she should stop talking and eat.
Watching her obediently resume eating, he replied, “Would they have let me leave if I hadn’t completed the required days?”
“What if you escaped through a window?” she asked with a grin. “Because you missed me too much.”
“Heh,” he responded, instantly wiping the playful smile off her face without a single harsh word or rebuke.
The consequence of forced small talk was a brief, awkward exchange. Wei Zhi dared not provoke him further and focused on eating while checking her phone. Apart from the lively chat in her high school classmates’ group, she saw seven or eight unread messages from Wang Xin:
[Wang Xin: Has Shan Chong arrived?]
[Wang Xin: He left as soon as the hotel cleared him this morning. He didn’t even stay for the welcome back and celebration party we organized, leaving us all behind.]
[Wang Xin: Took the earliest flight, more diligent than a donkey. Do you have gold bricks under your bed or something?]
[Wang Xin: Keep an eye on him. He caught a cold in the last couple of days before coming home. Damn! A cold at this crucial time nearly scared us to death. Luckily, he didn’t have a fever. Watch him closely, and if it relapses, don’t take random medicine. The team doctor’s prescribed medication is in the side zipper of his suitcase—]
The remaining four or five messages were similarly rambling.
Wei Zhi held her spoon with hot food at her lips, reading the messages intently. She couldn’t help but turn to look at the man beside her. He was now leaning back in his chair, looking completely relaxed and almost sinking into the single-seater sofa.
After nearly a month apart, his hair had grown a bit longer.
He was looking down at his phone, either chatting with someone or replying to comments on a short video platform, typing unhurriedly.
With his eyes lowered, his long eyelashes concealed most of the emotion in his eyes. His nose was high and straight, just like his personality—cold and unyielding.
She was suddenly reminded of him at the X-Games competition, wearing the same seemingly perpetually sleepy expression that seemed to regard no one as he bent down to adjust his bindings, then set off, jumped, and finally received a standing ovation…
These days, people showered Shan Chong with flowers and applause for his comeback performance. Wherever his name appeared, it was inevitably followed by praise like “genius,” “gifted,” and “most likely to win medals”—
But who knew?
A month ago, his cast hadn’t even been removed, and his body was covered in pain relief patches. During that time, Wei Zhi’s dreams were filled with the scent of medicinal ointment.
Few people knew how hard he worked, how much he cherished every competition opportunity…
He never mentioned it.
Perhaps it was Wang Xin’s vivid description, but now as she looked at him, she saw a kind of fatigue, like a soldier returning from a great battle and finding brief peace by the fireside.
His cold hadn’t fully cleared up, yet he had risen early to go to the airport, not even stopping at home before flying back to Nancheng. After all that rushing, he came straight to her small apartment upon landing…
Only to find her passed out drunk on the sofa.
…Wei Zhi felt like kicking herself just thinking about it.
She put down her spoon, wiped her mouth, took a sip of milk, and slowly walked over to him. As he sensed her blocking the light, he looked up. The young woman was already leaning in, climbing onto him like a koala.
Ignoring the cramped space, she insisted on squeezing into the small single-seater sofa with him. She sat on his lap without hesitation. The man put down his phone and supported her with his hand…
His palm paused when it touched the indentation left by her nightgown, as if confirming something, he touched it a couple more times.
Before he could speak, the sweet-scented young woman leaned in and kissed his cheek, saying, “I’m sorry. Yesterday at our class reunion, we saw news about your competition. Everyone was surprised that you’re my boyfriend… You know, a woman’s vanity was greatly satisfied at that moment, so I drank a bit more.”
She was quite honest. But also very cute.
The man’s tightly pressed lips relaxed a bit as he turned to look at her clear eyes gazing steadily at him… She didn’t seem to be lying.
What man wouldn’t be pleased to be his girlfriend’s bragging right?
After a few seconds of eye contact, his palm tightened slightly, feeling the soft flesh between his fingers. He looked up, meeting her gaze for several seconds.
She looked at him nervously, afraid he might not let it go… She had already said such nice things!
“Have you gained weight recently?” he asked.
“Huh?” Wei Zhi blinked. “What?”
“I’m a bit tired. Are you tired?” he continued.
Wei Zhi didn’t quite understand his train of thought. He hadn’t responded to her promise not to drink again. Was he no longer angry or just too lazy to deal with it?
Her lips moved weakly, but her instincts told her not to pursue the matter—that would only invite trouble. So she snuggled closer in the man’s arms and said, “I just woke up, so I’m not very tired.”
Shan Chong thought for a moment. “I’m a bit tired.”
Wei Zhi: “Oh.”
Then go to sleep.
Shan Chong: “You’re not tired. What should we do?”
Wei Zhi: “?”
In her confused silence, she saw the man lower his eyes and calmly ask after a while, “Shall we do it?”
Wei Zhi: “?”
The hand supporting her gradually warmed up, and he grabbed a handful of her soft flesh. She suddenly understood why he had asked if she had gained weight…
He had taken such a roundabout way to get there. Really.
…
After a month apart, her boyfriend seemed to have become a bit more perverted.
As the man’s large hand grasped her wrist, removing the arm covering her eyes, he leaned in to kiss her reddened eye corners. She turned her head away, feeling a bit disheveled.
Only then did he unhurriedly remove her legs from the armrest of the sofa.
Wei Zhi’s entire body ached, feeling as if she was about to fall apart. She mumbled incoherently, “So all your actions after coming back—telling me I stink, making me take a shower, cooking for me—was just for this… Ugh, I should have stayed smelly!”
He lifted her into his arms. She felt heavy, unable to muster any strength, curling up in his embrace.
“I hadn’t thought that far ahead at the time,” he said calmly. “Didn’t you go shower because you smelled yourself and thought you stank?”
“…”
She was speechless for three seconds—
“You still shouldn’t have done it on the… the sofa!” she exclaimed. “What if my mom suddenly walked in!”
“I locked the door when I came in.”
“…”
And he claimed it wasn’t premeditated.
Under Wei Zhi’s accusing gaze, the man walked between the bedroom and the bathroom, carrying her directly into the bedroom…
As she was placed on the bed, Wei Zhi sensed something was amiss. She wrapped one arm around the man’s neck, clinging to him and refusing to let go, looking back towards the bathroom. “Let’s go to the bathroom. I need to shower.”
Following her lead, he buried his face in her neck, inhaling her sweet scent, which was no longer pure but mixed with his own.
The sun had set, and the room was dark.
In the darkness, the man’s lips curled into a smile, his black eyes gleaming brightly. His voice was a bit hoarse: “What’s the rush? It’s only been once. Why shower already?”
“What? Once isn’t enough? Let me check if Wang Xin’s long list of instructions included abstinence—”
“Don’t be childish. There’s no such thing.”
“I don’t—ah!”
Wei Zhi got her wish to move from the sofa to the bedroom, but the infuriating man still asked why she looked unsatisfied when everything was as she wanted…
It was the first time in her life she’d met someone who could so thoroughly twist right and wrong.
The room was dim, with only moonlight filtering through the window and the glow from other residents’ homes… It was dinnertime for those returning from work, families gathering around their dining tables to discuss the day’s events.
A child ran wildly upstairs, with adults shouting at him to do homework. The harsh sound of chairs scraping masked all the heavy breathing in the room.
The sound of a child crying from the attic reminded Wei Zhi.
“Con-condom—” she struggled to reach out a hand.
Just as she pulled it out from under the covers, her wrist was caught by a large hand and pressed back into the blanket. The man leaned in to gently kiss the corner of her restless lips and said, “No need.”
“?”
What kind of scumbag talk was this?
Before Wei Zhi could react, she heard him add, “We’re getting the marriage certificate tomorrow. We’ll be officially licensed, so what’s the need for protection?”
“…”
She had forgotten about that.
“So we’re going tomorrow?”
At her question, the man who had been in motion stopped. He propped himself up on her right side, his fingertips brushing away a stray hair. “Having second thoughts?”
Looking up at him from her position, his face showed little emotion, half of it shrouded in moonlit shadow. He had an air about him that suggested if she nodded, he might just snap her neck right then and there.
It was truly hair-raising.
She shook her head.
She shook it so hard it nearly fell off.
Only then did the man smile at her, lifting her leg and launching his assault amidst her uncontrollable cries.
Finally…
Wei Zhi, though not sleepy, was exhausted into drowsiness.
Before falling into a deep sleep, she had an unspeakable feeling of being coerced into marriage—
How would she tell this story to her grandchildren in the future?
“Back then, your grandmother marrying your grandfather was truly out of helplessness. He was handsome but fierce, and his grandmother was tricked. In the future, when you meet handsome men or beautiful women, remember to stay away from them, or you’ll be eaten up.”
…
Early the next morning, Wei Zhi got up and carefully prepared herself, putting on a newly bought spring dress.
Outside, the sun shone brightly—perfect weather for getting a marriage certificate.
All the beauty was ruined just before leaving. As she crouched by the shoe cabinet carefully selecting shoes, the man standing behind her asked, “You brought your ID card, right?”
“Do you need an ID to get married? Yes, I brought it.”
“Phone? Wallet?”
“Brought them, brought them.”
“Household registration book?”
“…”
Three seconds of silence.
The young woman crouching by the shoe cabinet turned to look at him.
Shan Chong shifted his stance, moving his weight from his left leg to his right, and asked again: “Household registration book?”
Wei Zhi: “…”
Wei Zhi: “It’s in my mom’s bedroom, left bedside table, second drawer. You go get it, I’ll wait at home.”
Shan Chong: “…”
Wei Zhi: “Hurry back, okay?”
Shan Chong: “Alright, just one question before I go. Given that your mom probably doesn’t know we’re getting married, what should I say if she asks why I’m taking the household registration book? That eggs are 90% off at the supermarket downstairs, limited quantity, and we need the book to claim them?”
Wei Zhi was momentarily speechless. “Don’t be so harsh,” she said tactfully.
Shan Chong’s face remained expressionless as he concluded: “So she doesn’t know.”
After a moment’s thought, he added: “I’m not being harsh. You do look like you’re about to go downstairs to claim some eggs…”
“No, why would I put on makeup to go downstairs for eggs, right?” Feeling that crouching lacked authority, she stood up abruptly. “Besides, you didn’t give me a chance to say anything last night! You came back, scared me, said I stank, then coaxed me into showering! Then you acted like you’d been starving for eight lifetimes… Wait, don’t blame me! You were busy yesterday too, did you tell your family?”
“Just did, on WeChat,” Shan Chong said. “Maybe my mom will give everyone in the family an extra bun for breakfast?”
“…”
Wei Zhi thought this approach might work, so she took out her phone.
She typed for a while, then sent the message.
A few seconds later, her phone lit up.
Shan Chong nodded at the phone: “What did they say?”
The young woman glanced at her phone and said “Oh”: “My mom replied with a question mark.”
Then the phone vibrated.
Wei Zhi: “And now my dad is calling. I don’t want to answer.”
She put the phone down.
Sighing, she burrowed into the man’s arms, hugging his waist: “Let’s have a son in the future. It’s so much easier with sons. They can just send a WeChat message to let you know what they’re up to. It wouldn’t work like that with a daughter. Imagine if your daughter sent you a WeChat saying ‘Dad, I’m getting my marriage certificate today,’ wouldn’t you fly into a rage?”
He thought for a moment, then nodded seriously.
“I would.”
“…”
“So you deserve to be scolded,” Shan Chong picked up the phone and handed it to her. “Can’t you do something sensible at your age? Answer the phone. You think not answering means you won’t get scolded?”
“…”
…
March 28, 2020, is a day worth remembering.
Amidst all the chaos, catching the last “bus” before the civil affairs bureau closed, enduring her parents’ reproaches on WeChat, and seemingly still hearing their nagging when they went home to get the household registration book, Wei Zhi upgraded from a middle-aged young woman to a middle-aged married woman.
The whole process seemed quite smooth.
There weren’t many people getting certificates at the end of the workday. Just before closing, the staff seemed particularly energetic as they stamped the documents.
Walking out of the civil affairs bureau, Shan Chong’s profile on the short video platform, which now had several hundred thousand followers, prominently displayed the words [Married] above all sponsor brand names, dazzling and eye-catching.
Wei Zhi held the two red booklets, taking a photo to post on her Moments as she had decided to do since she was sixteen—
[The weather is perfect, let’s get married!]
Then, as she had imagined, she received a flood of question marks.
And exclamation points.
Her WeChat private messages exploded. She tucked her phone into her bag along with the two red booklets, patted her bag contentedly, and turned to look at the man driving beside her.
His hand rested on the steering wheel, his expression relaxed and languid, completely different from his imposing presence on the competition platform… No one would imagine that once this man put on his skis and stood on the high platform, he could make countless opponents surrender with just his first two moves—
He lowered his eyes, the tips of his eyelashes catching a small halo of light.
There was no one in the world as handsome as him.
From the moment they entered the civil affairs bureau, the corners of Wei Zhi’s lips had been curled up like Doraemon’s, never dropping…
It wasn’t for any particular reason.
She just felt like she had hit the jackpot.
It seemed like she hadn’t done anything, hadn’t really tried hard, and yet heaven had arranged the best for her—
As if in her previous life, she had saved the Versailles planet of the Milky Way, and so in this life, every year, all the creatures on that planet would bring their families, young and old, to offer her their most sincere blessings.