Lin Zhexia hadn’t yet reacted.

Chi Yao had already used his other hand to reach for hers.

The rain-soaked, wet hand of the young man applied a bit of force, and since Chi Yao was sitting, Lin Zhexia almost fell directly into his arms—

With a “thud” sound.

The umbrella dropped to the ground.

Without shelter, the rain fell directly, cool and icy on their heads, but that coolness was quickly disrupted by the body heat transmitted from the other person.

Lin Zhexia had one hand braced against the edge of the bench, completely dazed. Besides the sound of falling rain, she could hear the faint heartbeat of someone.

It might be hers.

Or it might be Chi Yao’s.

She didn’t know what this “hug” meant.

Normally, she should understand it as Chi Yao having trouble at home, feeling vulnerable, and needing a friend.

But his timing, right after making a wish.

It was as if…

Letting him have a hug was his birthday wish for this year.

Their current distance was a bit too close.

Although they had always been familiar with each other, hugging wasn’t an overly intimate gesture.

A friendly hug between friends… was quite normal.

Lin Zhexia didn’t dare think too much.

“You…” After a while, Lin Zhexia said, “How long are you going to hug me?”

Chi Yao’s head was bowed, his thin chin buried in her neck, his hair and nose tip occasionally brushing against her neck as he spoke somewhat unclearly: “Just a bit longer.”

A bit longer—how much longer was that?

Lin Zhexia’s heart was racing.

Due to her shyness, she hoped this embrace would end quickly, but she also hoped that this embrace could last a little longer.

After a while.

“Has it been a bit longer yet?” she asked.

“Not yet,” Chi Yao answered.

“…”

The end time of this hug was finally at twelve fourteen. The reason Lin Zhexia could remember so precisely was because Lin He called her at that time.

“Xiaxia, what time is it? Is the birthday celebration over?”

“Come home quickly, it’s raining so hard outside,” Lin He said on the other end of the phone, and then couldn’t help but be suspicious, “Why is your rain sound so loud? Are you at Chi Yao’s house?”

“Ah, yes, I’m coming back right away.”

Lin Zhexia picked up the umbrella and said frantically, “Coming back right away.”

Due to Lin He’s urging, Lin Zhexia couldn’t accompany him back home to cut the cake, so before parting at the entrance of the building, she specifically emphasized: “Make sure you eat the cake when you get back, this cake is… I spent a lot of money on it.”

Chi Yao said, “I know.”

After saying that, he added, “You’re caught in the rain, go inside quickly.”

Chi Yao held up his umbrella, watched her enter the building, and then returned home. The first thing he did wasn’t to go to the bathroom to change his soaking wet clothes, but to turn on the lights and walk toward the living room. In the center of the living room, on the coffee table, sat a cake box.

He untied the ribbon and could tell at a glance that the “expensive” cake Lin Zhexia mentioned was made with her own hands.

Where in the market could you find an “expensive” cake with the words “Happy Birthday” written so crookedly?

He carefully cut a slice of cake, then sat on the floor and ate it bite by bite.

Occasionally, rainwater gathered at his jaw, flowing slowly along his jawline and disappearing into his collar.

As he ate, he looked at the card beside it.

Lin Zhexia’s handwriting hadn’t changed since middle school.

The font was round, neat, and delicate—

*Wishing you success in all you desire, and happiness every day. I hope that in the future, whatever you do, you always have inexhaustible courage.*

He remembered once when He Yang mocked her, saying it was “kindergarten” handwriting, which angered her so much that she ordered a set of cursive calligraphy copybooks overnight, saying she wanted to make her writing wild and unrestrained, to show He Yang what maturity meant.

In the end, because she lost five points on her midterm exam for her handwriting, the plan was abandoned.

…

Chi Yao thought about this, reading these lines over and over again.

As if he wanted to very solemnly, properly place these two lines in the deepest part of his memory.

After finishing the entire cake, he slid open his phone and sent a message to Chi Hanshan: I’m coming over tomorrow—

Because too many things happened last night, staying up until midnight, and getting caught in the rain, Lin Zhexia overslept the next day.

By the time she crawled out of bed to check the time, it was already eleven-thirty in the morning.

She slid open her phone and saw a few messages from a certain Chi.

One was:—

The cake wasn’t bad

The other two:—

I’m not here today—

If you want to come to my place, just open the door yourself

Looking at the line “I’m not here today,” Lin Zhexia guessed that Chi Yao had probably gone to see his parents.

“Mom,” during lunch, Lin Zhexia asked, “Which city is Uncle Chi’s company in again?”

Lin He asked while serving rice: “In… I think it’s in Jing City. Why are you suddenly asking about this?”

Lin Zhexia was poor at geography, and had heard it once when she was young, but hadn’t paid attention: “Just asking.”

But even with her poor geography, she knew that Jing City was very, very far from here, even farther than going to Haidu City.

A round trip would take two days.

And because of the terrain, there were more resources available for development, which was also more beneficial for factory growth.

It was precisely for this reason that Chi Yao’s parents rarely came back.

Lin Zhexia’s memory of these few days felt fuzzy, perhaps because Chi Yao wasn’t around. The next day was Monday, time to go to school, but Chi Yao couldn’t make it back and took two more days off.

The days without Chi Yao passed with particularly few memorable moments.

After school, He Yang specifically sent her a message.

Da Zhuang: Brother Xia, I’ll come over two stops to meet you after school today.

Lin Zhexia:?

Lin Zhexia: Are you that free?

Da Zhuang: …

Da Zhuang: Brother Yao said so

Da Zhuang: I don’t want to come either

Lin Zhexia was stunned for a moment.

This person, Chi Yao, when he wasn’t being annoying, was quite thoughtful.

The next time she saw Chi Yao was after school the following day. She was walking with He Yang, who was chattering about things at his school, occasionally mentioning Chi Yao: “So annoying, the last sports meet, they did some combined competition, some friendship match.”

“Now I, He Yang, have lost my identity at Experimental Affiliated School and have become ‘the friend of that very handsome guy from the neighboring school.'”

Lin Zhexia: “Oh.”

He Yang: “Don’t just say ‘oh,’ your tone makes me think of Brother Yao every minute.”

Speaking of this, He Yang sighed again: “Have you noticed that you two are sometimes surprisingly similar? Not just you, sometimes when Brother Yao speaks, it’s very much your style, like when he makes jokes with a straight face.”

Lin Zhexia hadn’t realized this: “…Really?”

She was chatting with He Yang, a bit lost in thought, when from a distance, she saw Chi Yao getting out of a taxi that had stopped at the entrance of the residential area.

Chi Yao was carrying a black bag, wearing a mask, his back perfectly straight, his legs long and straight.

“Chi Yao,” she left He Yang behind and ran over, “you’re back.”

Chi Yao made an “mm” sound through his mask.

Just from that one sound, she sensed that Chi Yao’s mood didn’t seem very good.

She followed behind Chi Yao, wanting to go into his house.

When they reached the door, Chi Yao took out his key to open it, but instead of pushing the door open to enter first, he turned around to look at her: “Want to come in for water again?”

Lin Zhexia: “I am a bit thirsty.”

After a while, she asked: “Did you… See Uncle and Auntie?”

Chi Yao rarely wore a mask, probably because the air in the car had been too stuffy.

With the mask on, his eyebrows and eyes stood out even more, and even though the lower half of his face was hidden behind the mask, one could still vaguely make out the contours of his nose bridge and chin.

He raised his hand to hook the edge of the black mask and said: “I did.”

Chi Yao couldn’t remember how long it had been since he’d seen Chi Hanshan and Bai Qin.

Though one was his father and one was his mother, meeting them felt even less familiar than meeting strangers.

Two days ago, when he appeared in Jing City, Chi Hanshan came to pick him up and asked: “Why did you suddenly come here?”

Chi Yao was wearing a mask, standing in the bustling train station.

It wasn’t until they met that Chi Hanshan’s image became clear in his mind again. They looked somewhat similar, but wrinkles had already crept onto the corners of the man’s eyes. Chi Hanshan wore a grayish-white shirt, holding a briefcase, with undisguised exhaustion in his eyes.

Chi Yao looked at him and spoke very slowly: “How are you and Mom doing recently?”

Not surprisingly, Chi Hanshan gave a dry laugh and said, “Pretty good.”

“Pretty good.” Chi Yao lowered his eyes and repeated his answer.

When he looked up again, he said: “So, you’re planning to keep hiding it from me.”

Chi Hanshan was stunned.

Then, he quickly realized how Chi Yao knew: “They contacted you?”

Chi Yao didn’t confirm or deny.

Chi Hanshan was speechless: “Clearly promised me they wouldn’t—”

Chi Yao asked again: “Where’s Mom?”

Chi Hanshan hesitated, stammered a bit, but finally told him: “In the hospital.”

Chi Yao’s heart sank bit by bit.

The moment Bai Qin didn’t appear at the train station, he vaguely sensed that their problems might be more serious than he had imagined.

Then he saw Bai Qin in a hospital bed at Jing First People’s Hospital.

The woman was wearing a hospital gown, her face very pale.

She lay there quietly, no longer resembling her usually stern image.

This woman, who had treated work as her whole world, had collapsed for the first time. Mental anxiety had led to a series of problems; when illness strikes, it strikes like a mountain falling. After so many years of being busy, she had suddenly broken down.

“Just gave her a sedative,” the doctor said while taking notes, “her mental state is very poor, try not to let her be exposed to work-related matters. Also, the patient is currently in the progressive stage of stomach cancer, but there are still risks with surgical treatment; you need to be psychologically prepared for this.”

The doctor flipped through the files in his hand and couldn’t help saying: “You people nowadays—your health is the most important thing, how can you ignore your body when you’re busy? Irregular meals, eating whenever you get a chance.”

The hospital was very noisy that day.

Besides the sounds of people coming and going, there were the doctor’s voice and Chi Hanshan’s voice.

“It’s like this, didn’t the factory get a batch of new parts before? At that time, the purchase method was a loan. We originally wanted to expand a new production line, but the progress wasn’t as expected. Now the market has cooled down, business is difficult, and there are problems with the capital chain…”

Although Chi Hanshan spoke vaguely, Chi Yao understood clearly what problems with the capital chain meant.

This was almost a threat to their livelihood.

The group of people who came to find him weren’t from the bank; they looked like private lending organizations. Chi Hanshan couldn’t repay the loan, and to extend the buffer time, he could only borrow more to repay the previous loans. In the end, like a snowball, it rolled into a hole that couldn’t be filled.

…

“I was too greedy.”

Chi Hanshan slowly closed his eyes: “I didn’t tell you because I was afraid you’d worry.”

Finally, Chi Yao heard his voice.

“Afraid I’d worry.”

He lightly tugged at the corner of his mouth, saying these words with self-mockery.

“Perhaps, but more likely it’s because you felt it wasn’t necessary.”

He expressed all the emotions he had accumulated over many years: “Not necessary to tell me.”

This was the part that made him feel most powerless and ridiculous.

“—Then what exactly is necessary?”

By the end, he was almost losing his composure: “We’re supposed to be family, but many times, I feel like I’m just someone unnecessary. Not necessary to exist, not necessary to appear, so also not necessary to inform.”

Eighteen years old.

What kind of age is that exactly?

Finally, Chi Yao sat on a resting chair in the hospital corridor, breathing heavily through his mask.

He raised his hand, hooked the mask, and pulled it down a bit.

Then he smelled a strong scent of disinfectant.

Bai Qin was lying just on the other side of the wall from him.

And he was also at the point of crossing over from seventeen, walking toward the other side, just one line away.

It was as if he had stepped into an unknown new world, where the whole world could be overturned in an instant.

When he stood up again, he had already returned to how he was at the train station, asking: “How much more is needed?”

Chi Hanshan didn’t react immediately: “What?”

“Money.”

Before Chi Hanshan could answer, Chi Yao continued: “Selling the house in Lianyun should ease things for a while. Don’t worry about me.”

“As for here…” he said, looking at Bai Qin on the hospital bed. Although it was a brief moment, it felt like a long time had passed, and finally he said, “I’ll stay.”

Chi Hanshan: “You want to stay? But what about your school…”

Chi Yao looked at him: “With so many things happening, can you handle everything alone?”

Chi Hanshan was silent.

Chi Yao: “I’ll stay to take care of her. Anyway, I’ve already studied most of the high school senior year content in advance, so it won’t affect my college entrance exam preparation. Once the house matter is settled, after a while, I’ll go handle the school transfer procedures.”

Chi Hanshan was speechless for a long time.

Before Chi Yao suddenly came, he and Bai Qin had been struggling in this predicament for a long time.

What broke Bai Qin wasn’t the illness.

It was the sudden near-collapse of the business she had painstakingly built for many years; she couldn’t accept it all at once.

“Hanshan, do you remember,” one night, Bai Qin sat blankly in the living room, looking at the balcony, and said, “when we first started the factory, you had a friend surnamed Liu. We all called him Boss Liu, but later his business failed, and he jumped from the building. I couldn’t understand it before, but now, if jumping from here would help right now, I really wouldn’t hesitate for a moment…”

They had devoted themselves wholeheartedly to this work.

They even cared more about the employees under them than about their son far away in Lianyun City.

They weren’t qualified parents.

But they really couldn’t manage both; the work at hand, the many workers under them, and too many things beyond their control kept pushing the distance between them further and further.

From the first time Chi Yao got sick and they couldn’t go back, all the subsequent absences. Absent from parent-teacher meetings, absent on birthdays.

Even returning for the New Year became increasingly rare.

In a blink, more than ten years had passed, and that sickly little boy who often fell ill had grown up in places they hadn’t noticed.

Chi Yao’s attitude appeared more resolute than his.

Although he didn’t say it directly, he expressed one message: no matter what happened, he would face it with them.

This realization kept him dazed for a long time.

When he finally came to his senses, Chi Hanshan’s eyes were warm with tears.

He had been caring for Bai Qin alone, while also dealing with financial issues, gritting his teeth to hang on. He actually didn’t know when he would also collapse like Bai Qin. That day, he wanted to tell Chi Yao about the family situation, but immediately took it back in the next second.

But at this very moment, he was invisibly pulled up by the son he had neglected for many years.

“However, give me a little time,” Chi Yao finally said, “I need to… wait until after June to leave.”

“Because in June, there’s a day that’s very important to me.”

…

Thinking of this, Chi Yao lowered his eyes to look at the girl in front of him.

Lin Zhexia was wearing her school uniform and carrying a backpack. She seemed a bit nervous, afraid that he had encountered something bad during this trip, her words carrying caution and testing.

Chi Yao took off his mask: “Hey, Miss Lin.”

Lin Zhexia responded as if her name had been called in class: “Present.”

“June twelfth, keep your birthday free for me,” he said, moving closer to her, raising one hand and gently pressing his palm on top of her head, “I’ll take you somewhere.”