For so many years, I couldn’t touch you—you were always just out of reach.

So, should I continue kissing you?

In the distant past, for a vast period, Ah Heng had never categorized Yan Xi as any particular type of person.

He was so far away.

Not distant in terms of physical space, but rather like watching a real-time video on a computer screen—you could see his every movement with perfect clarity. Yet when you wanted to touch his cheek, he was on the other side, forever unable to feel your gentle affection.

She was often dejected, feeling so out of control, how troubling it all was.

She would proudly tell everyone, “I have ten registered accounts in DJ Yan’s Fan Club, how impressive is that?” But what was so impressive about it, besides proving you were so idle that you invested ten times more love than others?

While others praised Wen Heng for being well-behaved and sensible, all she gained from her pursuit of love was failure, superficiality, and immaturity.

Just as she often quoted Yan Xi’s words: “So annoying, truly annoying.”

To like someone this much—even the author wanted to say: so annoying, absolutely annoying.

But Yan Xi endured it before he said “How could I like you more than I already do,” before he had developed any feelings for Ah Heng.

If it weren’t for that tangled mess of gratitude and guilt, our Young Master Yan would probably only ask “I’m sorry, who are you?” to someone he didn’t like; or occasionally, when in a good mood, show some kindness with a simple “Mm, thank you”—thank you for your affection.

Then, Ah Heng would occasionally steal a glance at Yan Xi, grown up, stronger, having moved on, and married.

As for Yan Xi, perhaps if there hadn’t been so much pain, he and the equally dazzling Chu Yun would have been perfect together.

Like a pot finding its matching lid.

If ten years were just one person’s ten years—Wen’s ten years, Yan’s ten years—Wen couldn’t compare to Yan, Wen couldn’t walk Yan’s path, Yan wouldn’t deign to walk Wen’s road. Never mind ten years, even if a hundred years were crossed out in the Book of Life and Death, it would pass in the blink of an eye.

He said, “Ah Heng, let me carry you home. Let’s go home.”

Ah Heng felt that she had somehow forcefully led herself and Yan Xi onto a path that was neither her predetermined route nor his proud path, but rather a strange new road—one they would walk together.

Is it eating with me or chatting with me?

Is it chatting with me or sleeping with me?

Is it sleeping with me or eating with me?

The key point is: with me.

She had worn Yan Xi out completely.

Yan Xi had lost his ears, his legs, and even… his ability to escape.

Lying on Yan Xi’s back, she asked, “Yan Xi, back then when you realized I liked you, what did you think?”

Yan Xi smiled, licking his lips as beads of sweat trickled down his fair face. He said, “I kept thinking about how to kill that notion in its cradle.”

He continued, “You weren’t at all my type—timid, rigid, silly, stuttering. The women I liked had to be as radiant as the sun, worthy of my lingering gaze.”

Ah Heng thought for a moment, sniffling, “I like you, Yan Xi. You never heard me say these words.”

Yan Xi smiled, set her down, and slid his slender white fingers along her hairline, studying her face intently—not kissing, not embracing, just looking.

He gazed at her with pure, flawless eyes: “Then, I realized I was wrong. Ah Heng, between you and me, Lu Liu was never the obstacle. The only real factor that could be considered betrayal was Chu Yun. When you left, I considered properly dating, loving a woman I deemed worthy.”

Ah Heng nodded, saying, “I know, I understand. Your feelings for her—I was always confused, couldn’t see them.”

Yan Xi said, “She was the purest woman I’d ever met, while you—you frightened me. Too persistent, too clever, too patient, too shy—each trait opposite to what I expected back then, except for your slowness with Mandarin.”

Ah Heng asked, “So? So why did you break up with her?”

Yan Xi smiled faintly: “I couldn’t do it. While dating her, my mind would constantly wander—was Gu Feibai taking good care of you? Was he buying you candy?”

He looked at his hand, suddenly clenching it, self-mockingly helpless. He said, “I… couldn’t accept it. Why, why wasn’t it me? Why wasn’t I the one taking good care of you, buying you candy? I could have done even better. Why did the Wen family reject all my efforts for you just because of my appearance? I could give up the sun, and stop being a sunflower, I just wanted my little Southern water turtle back. Why couldn’t I have that? Why did we need the whole world’s approval?”

Ah Heng burst out laughing: “Yan Xi, I’ve eaten three-yuan noodles and five-yuan noodles. The three-yuan ones weren’t as good as the five-yuan ones.”

She honestly admitted that Ah Heng wasn’t as good as Chu Yun.

Yan Xi also laughed: “I’ve eaten ten-yuan and hundred-yuan noodles too, so what? Only the three-yuan ones had the braised pork ribs I liked.”

Suddenly, Dr. Wei’s door opened, and the old man shouted: “If you want to eat noodles, go home to eat! What’s with all this crying and laughing in front of my house?”

Both children turned their heads, staring at him blankly.

Seeing the old man, Ah Heng’s remaining tears returned: “Dr. Wei, next time I promise I’ll cover his face well, so you won’t have to see it…”

Yan Xi buried his face in Ah Heng’s embrace, teary-eyed: “I didn’t want to look like this either…”

The old man maintained his stern expression, then after a while, turned around: “Fine, come in.”

Ah Heng didn’t know why Dr. Wei had accepted them again, but the old man’s expression remained gloomy.

While Yan Xi was receiving acupuncture, Ah Heng sat waiting in the adjacent room. Large pieces of glass lay on the table, and through the transparent glass were many photographs of a not-so-old Dr. Wei with a young girl who had a simple, honest smile. The girl looked very much like him.

After finishing Yan Xi’s acupuncture, Dr. Wei washed his hands and came to his room for a towel. Seeing Ah Heng staring at the photos, he walked over and gazed at them, smiling: “This is my daughter. She was quite foolish, couldn’t even learn half my medical skills.”

Ah Heng said, “I’ve never met her.”

Dr. Wei touched his daughter’s photo through the glass: “She’s gone.”

Ah Heng swallowed hard: “Where did she go?”

Dr. Wei, his hair completely white, spoke softly: “Thirty years ago, she begged me to save a man, then married him—a man of status and wealth, renowned far and wide. My son-in-law found my small clinic embarrassing and asked me to close it, but I refused. Later, my daughter became pregnant, had complications during childbirth, and passed away before we could save her. That man remarried before my daughter’s body was even cold, and my grandson, influenced by his father, never came to see me once. On my daughter’s death anniversary, when I forcibly took him to see his mother, he asked me, ‘Who is this woman lying here?'”

Ah Heng remained silent for a long while before asking, “Was your son-in-law very handsome?”

Dr. Wei laughed coldly: “Nothing but a beast in gentleman’s clothing. Blue eyes, high nose, flaxen yellow hair—how handsome, how sincere. But all of this was just a precondition for such beasts to deceive others, to bite you viciously when you let your guard down. If I hadn’t saved him back then, he would have long been nothing but white bones. It was my soft heart that harmed my child.”

Ah Heng rubbed her nose, sheepishly: “No wonder you hate handsome rich people.”

However, blue eyes, high nose, flaxen yellow hair—why did that sound so familiar…

Someone knocked on the door outside, calling loudly “Grandpa.”

Dr. Wei slammed the table, his face turning blue, and shouted at the door: “You little beast, get lost!”

Yan Xi, who had just gotten dressed, was startled: “Whoa, old man, what are you doing? You’ll scare someone to death!”

Ah Heng covered Yan Xi’s mouth—this thoughtless fool, looking like that and still daring to talk back.

Yan Xi made muffled sounds, staring with his beautiful big eyes, looking at the door, then at Dr. Wei.

The person outside continued calling “Grandpa,” and Dr. Wei gritted his teeth, shouting: “Speak human language!”

The person outside deflated, obediently calling out in Chinese: “Waigong.”

Ah Heng watched sheepishly as the old man’s expression softened slightly, then went to open the door, and her eyeballs nearly fell out: “How is it you? Edward?”

Standing outside was indeed the tall, blue-eyed, blonde foreign hottie Edward.

Edward narrowed his azure eyes: “Winnie? Why are you here? Oh, Lee told you.” Lee was the Chinese colleague who had recommended Ah Heng to come here for treatment.

So that means…

Ah Heng twitched: “You’re Dr. Wei’s grandson, and you’re mixed-race…” Heaven and earth, how did this person look mixed-race at all?

Edward shrugged: “Winnie, be careful, your jaw’s dropping.” Then he lifted her chin, his tone ambiguous, “Who are you here to see?”

Yan Xi’s face turned green as he slapped away Edward’s hand, shouting in French: “Farmers grow wheat, hit you dead!”

Dead you, hit!

Ah Heng coughed: “Yan Xi, he was speaking English, not French.”

Yan Xi pursed his reddened lips, very arrogantly: “This proves my foreign language level is very high, responding to English in French.”

Edward was bewildered and said in Chinese: “Are you saying you want to beat me to death?”

Upon hearing him speak Chinese, Yan Xi spat and rubbed his hands, flexing his joints: “Oh, so you can speak Chinese? I’ll beat you to death, you dare touch my wife, your hands need a lesson.”

Edward laughed: “Oh my, what a beauty, where did you come from? So cute!”

Hearing this, Dr. Wei’s face turned iron-blue as he swung a broom at Edward: “You little beast, up to no good, it’s bad enough you didn’t inherit a bit of your mother’s looks, but you’ve picked up your father’s nasty habit of playing with women!”

Edward yelped: “Grandpa, enough, I came to visit you, not to get beaten!”

Dr. Wei spat: “I’m beating you, and you dare talk back!”

Edward wailed: “I wouldn’t dare, I wouldn’t dare. Oh, Grandpa, I was wrong. Ow, it hurts!”

Yan Xi crouched by the flower bed, whistling and cheering: “Hit him, keep going, keep going, good!”

Ah Heng was embarrassed.

She walked to Yan Xi’s side, her eyes smiling as she watched the grandfather and grandson, gently pulling Yan Xi up: “Let’s go, we shouldn’t get involved in others’ family matters.”

On their way back, heavy snow started falling again, and Yan Xi sneezed while on Ah Heng’s back.

He wore a hat, rubbed his hands warm, and placed them near Ah Heng’s ears to warm her.

Ah Heng’s ears tickled, and she giggled.

Yan Xi tilted his head: “Is there anything you want to eat? We saved bus fare, we can buy something else.”

Ah Heng said: “Though I don’t know why, but I want to eat bananas today.”

Yan Xi: “Oh.”

They passed by the supermarket, where the fruit was scarce and bananas were expensive. They bought two for five euros—pure robbery!

He wiped tears on Ah Heng’s back: “I’ve never been this poor before, having to buy bananas one by one.”

Ah Heng rolled her eyes, trudging forward without a word.

Poor? Poor? Poor? Are we really that poor?

Is sitting on expensive sofas drinking Louis-era wine what it means to be rich?

Yan Xi, holding two bananas on Ah Heng’s back, watched the snowflakes, then got an idea. He placed them on Ah Heng’s head, one on each side, and laughed with curved eyes: “Bunny girl.”

Ah Heng raged: “Yan Xi, if you ever go to those sketchy places again, I’ll strangle you!”

Yan Xi was embarrassed.

“Such a fierce girl, should I marry you or marry you or marry you?”

When they got home, Yi Su was helping the landlady sort vegetables in the courtyard. Seeing the bananas in Yan Xi’s hands, his eyes lit up: “Big Thief, are those for me?”

Yi Su loved bananas, and Yan Xi had promised the little one before that he would buy him bananas once he earned money.

Remembering his promise, Yan Xi teared up, looking at Ah Heng—the child finally asked for a banana after so many years, how did this little robber appear halfway?

Ah Heng looked at Yi Su, patted the little one’s head, smiling with white teeth, and said: “Yes, they’re for you.”

Yan Xi gave Ah Heng a helpless look, then smiled and handed them to Yi Su.

Yi Su was very happy, his face flushed red. He had always been a sensible child, never making any requests to adults.

Yan Xi crouched down and hugged him, teasing: “Farmers grow wheat, let me taste if it’s sweet, I’ll help you check.”

Let me taste it, and see if it’s sweet.

Yi Su was a generous little one, giggling as he peeled the yellow skin and handed it to Yan Xi.

Yan Xi took a bite, smiled, and gave it back to him, then went upstairs, very quietly.

Ah Heng followed behind him, saying: “I didn’t want to eat bananas that much, besides, I’m this old, why should I compete with a child?”

Yan Xi walked forward with his head down, ignoring her.

Ah Heng rubbed her nose, feeling somewhat uneasy. Could it be that his young master’s temperament was showing, feeling sorry for himself, thinking his current situation was miserable and embarrassing, unable to even provide for his wife?

Who knew he still had such pride…

Ah Heng cleared her throat and opened the door intending to say something, but Yan Xi locked the door, pressed her against it, lowered his head, and extended his tongue into her mouth.

A slippery tongue, with a strong banana taste.

He pushed all the banana he had been holding in his mouth into Ah Heng’s with his tongue, his eyes as dark and fluid as water, smiling as he held her lips, saying: “Is it good?”

The big thief had stolen the rations from little Holmes and then returned them to Watson’s mouth.

Ah Heng’s head spun: “The banana, cough, does it have an anesthetic in it?”

Yan Xi held her waist, keeping his head down as he concentrated on kissing her.

He said: “Baby, you’ve forcefully kissed me twice, today, I’m returning one, how about that?”

On Christmas Eve, the community church invited an American choir for an exchange visit—they were all high school students.

Among them was a Chinese child with big eyes who didn’t talk much. When he smiled, he had two little tiger teeth, and he always covered his lips with his hand, appearing very shy. He wore a red knitted hat and loved to sit in the corner watching the almost-completed mural.

Those days were the last phase of Yan Xi’s leg treatment, which was very important, so he had taken leave and hadn’t gone to the church, but had promised to complete the work on time.

After the treatment ended, Yan Xi, carrying various paintbrushes, limped to the church and saw a group of unfamiliar American children, but he didn’t pay much attention.

When he was about to start working on the mural, someone hugged him from behind: “Brother, I’m here.”