Inside that envelope was a total of three thousand yuan — almost entirely brand new banknotes.

Zhu Yunque hadn’t lied to Ye Tian. This really was money Lu Rangchen had taken out from an ATM just before coming to find her.

In 2014, mobile payments hadn’t yet come into common use.

Giving a cash gift this way was actually quite a thoughtful gesture, which was why when Lu Rangchen slipped it into Zhu Yunque’s hands while Ye Tian stepped away to use the restroom, she was genuinely caught off guard.

Lu Rangchen was entirely unbothered about it, tilting his chin slightly and saying, “Just consider it a greeting gift.”

……No one gives cash as a greeting gift like that.

Zhu Yunque held the stack of bills, feeling rather helpless.

Lu Rangchen ruffled her hair, entirely unconcerned. “Think of it as buying goodwill. Besides, it’s not that much.”

To him, three thousand was indeed not much.

But in those days, that amount could cover Ye Tian’s food and living expenses for an entire semester.

Given the circumstances at the time, Ye Tian being able to go back to school at all was something to be grateful for — no one had thought about how he was going to get through the days ahead.

What Lu Rangchen had given was nothing short of a lifeline in the cold.

Zhu Yunque was not someone made of stone.

Her heart was genuinely warmed. In an uncharacteristic moment of taking the initiative, she reached out and took hold of Lu Rangchen’s hand where it rested on the table.

The temperature had dropped steadily since the start of autumn.

His hand carried a faint coolness — smooth, refined to the touch, like jade.

When those soft, delicate fingertips reached out and took the initiative to hold his own, Lu Rangchen’s mouth curved slightly. He turned his wrist over and held her hand, fingers lacing between hers.

The smooth pads of his fingers came to rest on the back of her hand, and moved in slow, tender circles.

Zhu Yunque felt a moment of drifting, as though time had blurred.

She thought of last year’s Nancheng, at roughly this same time of year.

Outside the window the evening light had been hazy and pale, and she had sat in the well-lit classroom of the top-tier Year Twelve class, working through problem after problem on her exam papers.

The classroom had been utterly quiet.

Not a single person slacking — and yet in one particularly knotty moment, her pen had suddenly stilled, and she had found herself thinking of Lu Rangchen, who was far away in the capital.

She had wondered what things were like on his end, what kind of life he was living.

Perhaps he had already started planning to study abroad.

He would probably have two or three close friends. People like them wouldn’t be grinding through university entrance examinations the way this group of ordinary high school students was. Even if they went overseas, everything would come easily — and he would probably fall into a relationship before long.

The girl would be his equal in every way — a good match in background and ability.

She would probably be his first love. The kind that left an impression you carried your whole life.

In any case, it would be nothing like her — restrained and dull, carrying a chest full of feelings while barely moving forward.

She had thought: she and Lu Rangchen would probably never see each other again.

He would quickly forget that, in Year Eleven, he had once known an unremarkable, quiet girl.

Between them, it seemed there hadn’t even been time for a proper goodbye.

That brief, helpless pang of sadness and suffocation — like a faint scar etched into youth, impossible to erase. And yet how could she have known then, that somewhere in the future, Lu Rangchen would reappear in her life — and in the form of someone who loved her?

The hand holding his tightened, almost imperceptibly.

Zhu Yunque looked at Lu Rangchen without blinking, and said quietly, “Are you perhaps too good to me?”

He hadn’t expected that after all that, this was what she came out with.

Lu Rangchen truly couldn’t help laughing. He gave a low, amused sound. “This counts as being good to you?”

“……”

“Then you must be awfully easy to please.”

The words sounded flippant, but they struck straight at the heart of what Zhu Yunque felt.

For her, from the moment of their reunion, every minute and every second had felt like a grace granted by the universe.

There was something Lu Rangchen would probably never quite understand — what it felt like for her.

To be seen. To be responded to. And then to be loved with such warmth and intensity.

Seeming to catch something in her eyes, Lu Rangchen seized the moment while Ye Tian was still in the restroom, leaned in, and pressed a light kiss to her lips.

His voice, low and slow, curled like mist. He said, smiling, “Zhu Yunque, this isn’t what it means to be good to you.”

“……”

“This is what it means to love everything about you.”

—

Perhaps those who are truly loved carry a certain ease about them.

That evening Zhu Yunque handed over the money without a trace of hesitation, and even when Ye Tian tried at first to refuse, she talked him around.

In this world, staying fed and clothed came first.

For people who had grown up in circumstances like theirs, finding a way to sustain yourself was always the first order of business — before you had the strength to do anything else.

After all, they had grown up together.

Ye Tian hesitated for a few seconds, but gradually came to understand what Zhu Yunque meant by it.

Before they parted, Zhu Yunque reminded him to call her if he ever needed anything — not to try to handle things alone.

Ye Tian was not as fortunate as she was.

She had Feng Yanlai as a foothold to climb out from where she was. Ye Tian didn’t have that.

After parting ways with Zhu Yunque, Ye Tian took a taxi and left.

Zhu Yunque and Lu Rangchen watched the taxi go until it disappeared completely from sight, and only then got into the car.

The car was not the one from the capital.

But it looked even more expensive — probably one of the family’s cars. Zhu Yunque didn’t ask. She wasn’t the type to pry into other people’s circumstances.

Lu Rangchen, however, was the one who asked questions the moment they were on the road — wanting to know about her and Ye Tian: half-siblings from the same father, or the same mother?

As it turned out, neither.

Lu Rangchen’s expression visibly stilled for a moment. The sidelong look he gave her carried a particularly pointed significance.

Zhu Yunque looked genuinely puzzled. “What?”

Lu Rangchen said with mild displeasure, “If there’s no blood relation, you could have mentioned that earlier.”

Zhu Yunque said, “Does it make a difference?”

Lu Rangchen raised an eyebrow. “If I had a younger sister I wasn’t related to by blood, and I doted on her constantly — wouldn’t that bother you?”

“……”

Zhu Yunque finally understood what he was implying.

The corner of her mouth gave an involuntary flicker. She said, “In that case, I’ll go get the money back.”

Lu Rangchen gave a quiet scoff. “You do know exactly how to get to me.”

As they talked, he kept his eyes on the road and reached out his right hand toward her in an idle, offhand way. “Hold on.”

Zhu Yunque paused for just a moment, then placed her left hand in his palm. Their fingers interlaced.

It was a strange thing.

They hadn’t officially been together for very long, yet the feeling between them was as though they had loved each other for years.

A soft smile settled at the corner of her mouth. She looked out at the streetscape rushing past the window and said, “Lu Rangchen, you can be pretty childish sometimes.”

Lu Rangchen merely glanced at her from the corner of his eye, unbothered, and said lightly, “Depends on who I’m with.”

Zhu Yunque smiled without a sound.

Outside the car windows the night was hazy and deep.

It was the first romantic and private night she and he had spent together in Nancheng — in her capacity as his girlfriend.

That evening, Lu Rangchen took her to a jazz bar.

It was the same one Xu Linda had taken her to all those years ago — though the owner had changed since then, two years on.

Lu Rangchen wasn’t close with the new owner, and wouldn’t take the stage to perform this time. He’d simply asked Li Tie and Zhou Jin to come out and meet Zhu Yunque.

Compared to two years ago, Zhu Yunque’s former youthful, unpolished quality had transformed considerably.

She had made an effort with her appearance before going out.

Her long hair fell softly over her shoulders, and her light fringe gave her a gentle, innocent look. Her features had opened up and become more beautiful than before, with a rare quality of translucent clarity to them.

Li Tie was the kind of person born to work a room. The moment he laid eyes on her he launched enthusiastically into introductions.

Zhou Jin was wonderful too.

She had a short, clean haircut that gave her a cool edge, and her personality was warm and outgoing.

The four of them settled at the reserved table.

A slightly heavyset male singer had taken the stage and was performing Shirley Kwan’s “Suzhou River.”

Lu Rangchen had ordered drinks and snacks, which arrived quickly and soon covered the entire table. Of the four of them, Zhou Jin could hold her liquor best, followed by Li Tie.

For some reason, though she had only ever been to this kind of venue that one other time, Zhu Yunque felt relaxed from the inside out.

Lu Rangchen, for his part, worried she’d be pressured into drinking by the other two, so from the start he ordered her cocktails with a very low alcohol content — an Alexander and a White Russian.

Both were creamy, dessert-like cocktails with a milky sweetness to them.

Even a full glass wouldn’t be cause for concern.

Of course, more importantly, he sat right next to her, and — worried she might not be sitting steadily — had casually draped one arm over the back of her chair.

Zhou Jin was deeply envious. She teased him, “Lu Rangchen, I honestly never imagined this is what you’d be like once you actually started dating someone.”

Li Tie seized the opportunity to poke at her in turn. “What did you think — that he’d be like your ex? All ego and work, no space for anyone else?”

Zhou Jin had only recently broken up with someone and hadn’t quite bounced back yet. She was annoyed enough to give him a kick under the table.

Li Tie wasn’t bothered in the least, just laughed it off heartily.

When the laughter settled, he called over another round of drinks for Zhou Jin.

Lu Rangchen got up to head to the bar to order something else, and before he left he asked Zhu Yunque what she wanted.

Zhu Yunque had just finished her White Russian, and whether from the slight buzz beginning to set in or not, she propped her face in her hand, tilted her head, and said, “I feel like having cake.”

There was no cake in a bar.

Lu Rangchen laughed.

But he couldn’t stand the thought of her wanting something and not getting it.

He nodded. “Alright,” he said, giving the back of her head an affectionate pat. “Be good and wait for me.”

And with that, he left.

Zhu Yunque sat sipping her Alexander while listening to the music from the stage.

Before long, Li Tie came back carrying fresh snacks and fruit, and he and Zhou Jin naturally fell into easy conversation with Zhu Yunque.

The more they talked, the more comfortable it became. Li Tie said with a grin, “Lu Rangchen was in a pretty rough mood the other day — but somehow the two of you ended up together so quickly.”

Zhou Jin chimed in eagerly. “Yes, exactly — how did you get together? Tell us everything.”

Getting it out of Lu Rangchen was practically impossible.

That guy couldn’t string together a coherent account of anything even if you tried.

Zhu Yunque didn’t disappoint them either.

She’d had a little to drink, and alcohol had a way of making her a touch more uninhibited. She rested her cheek in her hand, her gaze slightly hazy and utterly earnest. “He said he liked me, that he was pursuing me.”

Zhou Jin’s eyes went wide. “Oh wow, bold and direct — and then what?”

Li Tie cut in, “And then they got together, obviously. Look at how fast these two moved.”

Zhu Yunque pressed her lips together and smiled.

Both her cheeks were faintly flushed, giving her all the girlish, shy charm of someone very young and very much in the thick of it.

Li Tie said, “I’m not just saying this to defend my friend — but this guy has genuinely never been with anyone before. It was always other girls chasing after him. For him to come out and actually say ‘I like you, I’m pursuing you’ — he has to be seriously into you.”

Zhou Jin agreed enthusiastically. “Honestly, I had assumed you were the one who chased him.”

Zhu Yunque smiled to herself and said nothing.

Zhou Jin took the opportunity to slide a drink toward her. “Have some of this — it’s fine, he’ll be back soon.”

Zhu Yunque glanced down at the glass, then reached out and took it, saying thanks.

Just then, Lu Rangchen came back carrying a cake.

A modest six-inch cream cake was set on the table — and in the next second, he simply reached over and took the glass right out of Zhu Yunque’s hand.

Her lips hadn’t even touched it yet. She froze at the sudden removal.

She’d had enough to drink that her eyes were different from usual — that cool, measured sharpness she normally carried had softened. Right now she looked a little hazy and vague, and very easy to manipulate.

Lu Rangchen glanced down at her with an amused tilt. “What’s this — the moment I turn my back, you’ll drink anything?”

Then he looked at Zhou Jin. “You gave her this?”

Zhou Jin immediately shut her mouth and cut a glance at Li Tie beside her, saying, “He’s the one who ordered it.”

Li Tie was indignant. “You’re the one who told me to order it!”

Zhou Jin stood up at once and said she needed to use the restroom, then made a swift exit.

Li Tie wasn’t stupid either — seeing Zhou Jin disappear, he quickly found an excuse about needing to make a phone call and was gone too.

Lu Rangchen ground his back teeth watching the two of them go, then pulled out his chair and sat down, turning to fix his gaze squarely on Zhu Yunque.

Up close, she really was remarkably pretty — skin fair and smooth, features delicate and refined, striking in the way that held your attention, and a gaze so direct and pure it was like it reached inside you and kindled something.

She was the kind of pretty that made you want to drag her somewhere with no one else around and kiss her senseless.

His throat moved. Lu Rangchen held that urge in check, and pointed his chin toward the untouched Long Island Iced Tea on the table. “You’d reach for that without even knowing what it is?”

Zhu Yunque followed his gaze to the cocktail, which did bear a resemblance to a cola. Her lips pressed together.

Lu Rangchen simply took the glass and poured it into Li Tie’s cup. He exhaled lightly. “A Long Island Iced Tea, of all things.”

Zhu Yunque’s brow furrowed slightly. She still didn’t quite understand.

She said, “What’s wrong with a Long Island Iced Tea?”

That question was enough to crack Lu Rangchen up entirely.

He looked at her with a slightly exasperated amusement, stared at her for two seconds, then reached out and hooked the leg of her chair, pulling it toward him.

Zhu Yunque was light — she was pulled right over almost instantly.

Lu Rangchen was much closer to her now.

He braced one hand on the back of her chair, the posture half-enclosing her in his arm, and looked at her with a gaze whose warmth climbed steadily toward something scorching.

Their eyes met for a few seconds.

Lu Rangchen finally couldn’t hold himself back. He bent his head and pressed a lingering, reluctant-to-part kiss to her lips.

Zhu Yunque closed her eyes instinctively.

His lips were soft. They tasted sweet.

When she opened her eyes again, Lu Rangchen’s gaze held the look of someone holding something back.

His throat moved. His voice was low and rough and full of something coaxing. “If you’d drunk that, you’d have belonged to me tonight.”