Tan Jin’s eyes were like a clear pool of water.

Lin Shilan saw her own reflection in them.

Especially timid, afraid of especially many things—herself.

Having already returned to the rainy season so many times, she still acted so meek and submissive facing her mother. She had consoled herself with “your mom is your most important person, you’ve already done very well,” but Lin Shilan had to admit that failure in one place would spread like a virus. Beyond matters with her mother, she also lacked the courage to face and handle things independently.

Lin Shilan dodged his hands.

After Tan Jin’s ear-splitting encouragement, she finally voiced the reason for her dejection.

“I followed Su Ge. I walked to the alley outside her house—it was very dark there, and I was very scared. I peeked at her house entrance and was scared away by an old person in her family. I even lost my umbrella and didn’t dare go back to get it. In this rainy season, can I really make any changes? It seems like without your help, I can’t do well at all the things I want to do.”

Even after hearing her description, Tan Jin couldn’t understand what she had done that wasn’t good enough.

“You said you didn’t do well at something—you mean tracking? But you already completed it, and you completed it very well. You even figured out where Su Ge’s house is.”

“You want to track someone with courage and not be discovered—even if I was with you, we’d still be afraid when we should be afraid, and the risk of being discovered wouldn’t be any less than you acting alone.”

Tan Jin changed his tone: “Lin Shilan, do you know what your problem is?”

His gaze probing straight into her eyes, he said word by word:

“You’re too hard on yourself.”

“You must do everything perfectly, or you won’t be satisfied—that means you’re continuing to demand of yourself by your mother’s standards. It’s as if not getting first place makes you start torturing yourself, unwilling to give yourself the slightest affirmation. You also know your mother’s approach is wrong, don’t you?”

“In fact, you’re very useful. Even when afraid, you still try your best—that’s your amazing quality.”

His eyes were telling her that his words contained no element of comfort—they were entirely from his heart.

This was like a sedative, smoothing over the panic she’d felt since escaping from Su Ge’s house.

After several deep breaths, Lin Shilan organized her emotions.

She told Tan Jin everything she had seen and heard after school.

Combining the bookstore incident with Su Ge’s actual residence, a doubt arose in Lin Shilan’s heart: Living in such a terrible environment, why did Su Ge have spare money to buy so many books? And why didn’t she take them away after buying them?

Tan Jin didn’t know the answer to the question either.

“There’s one thing I remember about her family. I don’t know if it’s related to what we want to understand…”

Lin Shilan listened attentively.

“Not long before the third mock exam, Su Ge cheated on a test. The teacher caught her and wanted to call her parents to school. But they could never contact them. The homeroom teacher even asked if any classmates in the class knew Su Ge’s family members—no one answered. When the teacher wasn’t there, Su Ge ran away and never came to school after that. She appeared again after the college entrance exam…”

She saw him hesitate slightly and guessed: “She appeared—was that when she confessed to you?”

Tan Jin nodded.

“I didn’t tell you about this before—I wasn’t deliberately hiding it from you. I just felt that Su Ge cheating had nothing to do with me, so I didn’t mention it.”

There was too little information for them to have a clear speculation about Su Ge’s family situation.

Lin Shilan’s thoughts were drawn away by the word “confession.”

The second time she returned to the rainy season, the confession scene she’d witnessed was after the college entrance exam results came out.

Tan Jin’s previous description to her and what she’d seen with her own eyes of Su Ge’s confession to him were completely different versions.

According to his account: Su Ge was unilaterally obsessed with him, and the confession was full of her misunderstanding of him.

What she saw herself: Su Ge showed courage amid shyness, and Tan Jin could be said to have… accepted her confession.

With selfish motives, she asked him one more question: “After the college entrance exam results came out, how did Su Ge ask you to meet at the school auditorium?”

“School auditorium? No.”

As if hearing this for the first time, Tan Jin’s face was full of confusion.

“She stopped me on my way home. It was on that road we must take going home—walking along the long alley without lights, going deep to where there’s a well… Also, to be precise, it was after the college entrance exam that she confessed to me. At that time, the exam results hadn’t come out yet.”

—What was going on?

What they were talking about seemed like two different things. Except for the theme of “confession,” nothing else matched up at all.

Setting aside this tangled mess for now, Lin Shilan thought: After she learned more about Su Ge, perhaps she would know the answer.

It was getting late—Lin Shilan had to go home.

At this moment, Tan Jin remembered something: “Your home’s lights have never been on.”

“Really? My mom got off work ages ago—she should be home.” Hearing him say this, she became somewhat worried.

Earlier, Lin Shilan had sent her mother a text saying she would be home late.

Her mother never replied.

Tan Jin accompanied Lin Shilan upstairs together.

The dishes and chopsticks left from breakfast were still in her home’s sink. Only the sleeping little dog Jing Jing was home. It felt like Lu Xiaorong hadn’t been back at all since going to work in the morning.

—Could it be her old illness acting up again? Could she have encountered bad people on her way home from work?

Some frightening images flashed through Lin Shilan’s mind. Without even taking off her shoes, she hurriedly grabbed her phone to call her mother.

The phone rang several times before being hung up on the other end. She called several times in succession, each time being hung up on faster than the last.

“Beep beep beep beep beep.”

Hearing this hang-up sound, Tan Jin had a suspicion: “It doesn’t seem like encountering criminals. If she ran into bad people, with you calling in so many times, they’d definitely turn off the phone. Is she deliberately hanging up on you?”

“I don’t know.” Lin Shilan, worried something had happened to her mother, persistently kept calling: “A few more calls. If she still doesn’t answer, I’ll call their elementary school to ask.”

As soon as she finished speaking, the phone was answered.

When Lu Xiaorong picked up the phone, her first words were…

“Stop calling me. I’m not your mother anymore! You’re so capable now—do whatever you want, no one’s managing you.”

Then, without waiting for Lin Shilan to speak, she hung up directly.

Tan Jin had guessed correctly.

The disconnected calls were Lu Xiaorong deliberately hanging up.

Lin Shilan didn’t call again either. She told Tan Jin: “I heard the sound of mahjong playing on the other end. My mom isn’t in danger—she’s at Uncle Tang’s house.”

He wondered: “After that incident last time, your mom didn’t take the opportunity to cut off contact with Uncle Tang? She’s still going to see him? Won’t that bastard Uncle Tang make things difficult for her?”

“Don’t know—I can’t control it.”

She put down her phone, went to the sink to wash her hands, then got dog food for Jing Jing to eat.

Tan Jin savored Lu Xiaorong’s forceful harsh words from earlier and found it somewhat funny: “Sometimes I feel like your mom isn’t your mother—you’re her mother. Hahaha, why does she love taking out her temper on you so much? Does she need you to coax her all the time?”

Watching his grinning face, Lin Shilan felt exhausted.

“If she were your mother, would you still be laughing?”

Putting himself in that position, his smile instantly collapsed.

Lin Shilan changed her clothes and came out to eat the McDonald’s he’d bought with Tan Jin.

As he ate, he asked: “Want to watch TV?”

She agreed and went to get the TV remote.

Her own family’s TV—how long had it been since Lin Shilan had watched it?

She randomly pressed a channel—inside they were broadcasting the 86 version of Journey to the West that had been replayed countless times.

Eating cold hamburgers and fries, they watched TV with great interest.

With Lu Xiaorong not home, even the air became freer.

“I’m not doing practice problems today—I’m watching TV.” The good girl announced her shocking rebellious declaration.

“After watching TV, patting my full stomach, I’m going to lie directly on my bed and sleep.” After exchanging glances with Tan Jin, she confidently learned from him to cross her legs.

“Sure,” he teased her: “Whoever secretly does homework after saying they won’t is a little dog.”

“Mm!” She readily agreed.

After a while, Lin Shilan casually asked: “Did you do your homework today?”

Tan Jin wasn’t on guard against her: “I already did it at school…” Halfway through his words, he realized he’d fallen into a trap.

Lin Shilan pointed her index finger at his nose and called out to him lightly and happily:

“Little dog.”

So now she was being open about it, was she?

Huffing angrily, Tan Jin puffed up his easily-bullied bun face, wishing he could claw at the wall to vent his frustration.