Jiang Qihuai rarely spoke since childhood.
It was probably a habit formed by his personality and living environment. He always said very little. When he first went to kindergarten after being taken in by Grandfather Jiang, the other children in class would noisily gather in a circle, throw dolls at him, and call him mute.
He didn’t care and didn’t want to communicate with irrelevant people. As long as he had his grandfather, that was enough.
Even when he didn’t speak, Grandfather Jiang always understood him.
After meeting Tao Zhi, between the two of them, it seemed she was always the one talking.
She seemed to have endless things to say, always new stories to tell him. She was like a lush little plant growing around him, always vibrant, full of life and energy.
So when he saw her again, when she suddenly withdrew all her leaves and no longer extended tender shoots toward him, Jiang Qihuai suddenly didn’t know what to do.
He experienced helplessness for the first time.
Not knowing where to begin or how to speak, before he could organize his words, she had already turned to leave.
In his panic, he acted on instinct and grabbed her withdrawing leaves, but those leaves were thin and fragile. Jiang Qihuai didn’t know if his impulsiveness had hurt her.
He was like a large dog circling aimlessly around a rose, tail anxiously sweeping the ground, only raising dust. He wanted to reach out his paw to carefully touch her, but clumsily only left scratches on the delicate petals.
When he said those words, when tears slid from her eyes before she could even process it, Tao Zhi realized she still resented him.
Even though she clearly understood their personality differences and different ways of thinking would lead them to make completely different choices when standing at a crossroads, even though she felt he wasn’t really wrong, she couldn’t help but resent him a little.
How could she not resent him, how could she not feel wronged? It was because she still liked him that she felt resentment.
It was because she could never erase him from her heart that seeing him again still made her feel wronged.
Me too.
During the thousands of days and nights that passed, I missed you too.
Tao Zhi raised her hand and wiped her eyes with the back of it. She sniffed and said hoarsely: “I won’t forgive you.”
Jiang Qihuai’s fingertips on the table twitched, then slowly curled up. He seemed to want to touch her again but very consciously suppressed this impulse.
He gave a low “mm” in response.
“And don’t try to get close to me,” Tao Zhi continued, “I’m very shy around strangers, I don’t like unfamiliar people getting too close.”
Jiang Qihuai withdrew his hand and responded again: “I understand.”
“Also, there are many people pursuing me now. If you want to join, you’ll have to queue up and get a number. Don’t feel indignant,” Tao Zhi raised her head, pouting as she glared at him, her eyes still red as she complained pitifully, “You were the one who didn’t want me first.”
Her words were like someone taking a sharp fork and violently stirring it in his heart.
Jiang Qihuai looked at her reddened eyes, cleared his hoarse throat, his gaze cold but serious: “I never didn’t want you. No matter where you go, I’ll find you.”
Tao Zhi’s eyelashes trembled slightly. She awkwardly averted her gaze and muttered unhappily: “You won’t find me. You haven’t looked for me all these years. What if by the time you come back to find me, I already have children?”
Before Jiang Qihuai could speak, Tao Zhi continued coolly: “Then I’ll make you be my child’s godfather, and make you watch me show affection with my true soulmate every day.”
The girl’s nose was still red, her voice hoarse, but her mood was noticeably more cheerful than before, like a rose’s withered branches and vines being nourished again, slowly unfurling its leaves.
Although she hadn’t accepted him, at least she wasn’t running away anymore.
Jiang Qihuai exhaled and leaned back in his chair looking at her. His eyelashes lowered, his gaze covered by soft lashes, giving people the illusion of gentleness: “So, have I gotten my number now?”
Tao Zhi’s fingertips scratched the table edge a couple times. Her gaze wandered around and landed on the coffee cup-shaped sticky notes that the shop provided for customers to write reviews and thoughts.
She tore off a piece, took out a pencil from the small wooden box beside it, and bent down to quickly write a string of numbers on the sticky note before passing it over.
Jiang Qihuai took it and looked – it was a phone number.
She had changed to a new number.
No wonder there had been no response on WeChat and such.
Tao Zhi withdrew her hand, put the pencil back in the wooden box, then said with feigned seriousness: “Wait for notification.”
“…”
At that moment, the girl’s expression as she tried to maintain her composure was both familiar and adorable. Jiang Qihuai couldn’t help but let his lips curl up slightly as he responded earnestly: “I understand.”
Tao Zhi nodded, raised her hand to pull her baseball cap down, then stood up with an aloof expression.
She stood by the table, looking down at him: “We’ll meet again if fate allows.”
Behind her, An Sese had watched the whole scene from the second floor. Seeing Tao Zhi leave, she ran down and followed her out of the coffee shop.
Tao Zhi kept a straight face until they reached the street corner, then finally let out a breath. She turned around and asked anxiously: “How was my performance just now? He suddenly appeared and scared me to death.”
An Sese gave her a thumbs up: “Perfect, queen, very imposing.”
She directly ignored the part where Tao Zhi had cried messily with red eyes, after all, some reactions were the most direct and genuine, and the person involved probably couldn’t control it and didn’t want to replay such an embarrassing scene.
An Sese smiled at her: “But isn’t having a face-to-face chat better than keeping everything bottled up inside?”
“We barely talked about anything, just exchanged a few words.” Tao Zhi muttered softly. She suddenly turned her head and looked at her suspiciously, “Did you deliberately bring him to this coffee shop?”
An Sese raised both hands innocently: “It really was a coincidence, he brought me here. If I had known he would come to this coffee shop, I definitely wouldn’t have let you wait for me here.”
Tao Zhi reluctantly believed her: “Fine then.”
After sending a text message to Tao Zhi’s new number and adding her new WeChat, Jiang Qihuai waited all evening but received no further message from the object of his pursuit.
It wasn’t until the next morning that the interviewer finally accepted his friend request and haughtily replied with two characters: [Name?]
Jiang Qihuai very cooperatively typed: [Jiang Qihuai.]
Ten minutes later.
The interviewer said: [You are number three thousand eight hundred and twenty-one.]
For some reason, she didn’t use Arabic numerals for this number, but specifically wrote it out in Chinese characters.
Perhaps to make it look like more.
Jiang Qihuai draped the towel over his still-dripping head, walking barefoot on the floor with his phone: [Your queue is longer than the one at First Hotpot City downstairs from my place.]
Interviewer: [?]
Interviewer: [You’ve been eliminated, you may take your leave.]
Jiang Qihuai: [?]
Jiang Qihuai’s fingers paused: [I want to see the princess sooner.]
Interviewer: [In your dreams.]
Tao Zhi threw her phone onto the bed with a “plop,” the silver device sinking into the soft blanket. She puffed up her cheeks and stared at it angrily for a while.
He even complained her queue was too long!!
When she pursued him back then, she didn’t complain even with their huge grade difference!
Even until she arrived at the studio, Tao Zhi’s mood was still low.
An Sese was unusually sitting at her own desk today. Seeing her come in, she waved: “You’re here? I looked at those retake photos for your ex-boyfriend earlier, come see if the tones need any adjustments to look more natural.”
“Not looking,” Tao Zhi said irritably.
An Sese turned her head and exchanged a glance with Xu Suinian beside her.
Tao Zhi sat down at her desk and took out her phone again, looking at the contact saved as [Number 3821].
She didn’t reply anymore.
An Sese’s head suddenly appeared from behind: “Number 3821, what’s that? A prison number?”
Tao Zhi was startled and almost dropped her phone. She said seriously: “This is one of my suitors.”
“…”
An Sese didn’t understand why these ex-couples all liked to play such fancy games, maybe this was just relationship dynamics she didn’t understand.
An Sese nodded and asked knowingly: “Do you have a total of 3821 suitors, or is this just one suitor who’s number 3821?”
Tao Zhi ignored her and put down her phone, turning to go to the studio’s back courtyard.
The studio was divided into front and back courtyards. The front was mainly for receiving clients and daily work, while the back had been converted into a small garden with two independent small houses built side by side – one was a darkroom, the other a temporary rest room.
Tao Zhi tied up her hair, checked the time, and walked into the darkroom.
Inside were two rooms, one digital darkroom and one for film. Most photos now used the digital darkroom for post-processing, but Tao Zhi actually preferred the old-style film more.
She had no other work to handle, so during her free time she looked through all the photos she had taken recently, working on things that interested her, and checking if she had captured anything satisfying.
After staying inside for a while, it was already past noon when she came out. Tao Zhi left the darkroom and washed her hands, returning to the workroom. As soon as she stepped in, An Sese and Xu Suinian turned their heads to look at her in unison.
Tao Zhi felt unnerved by their stares. Before she could ask “what,” her gaze swept past the reception area’s sofa and was pulled back by the person sitting there.
Jiang Qihuai sat on the dark brown leather sofa, head lowered, playing with his phone, looking focused and not glancing inside.
“He came before noon, been waiting for you for a long time,” An Sese came over and said softly.
Tao Zhi: “…Then why didn’t you call me?”
“Who dares to call you when you’re in the darkroom? I’m afraid you’ll say I’m disturbing your work and splash developer solution on me,” An Sese said, “Besides, I told him you were busy, and he said there was no need to call you, he’d just wait a while.”
Their voices inside were very quiet, with a wooden sliding door between them, but Jiang Qihuai seemed to hear something. He suddenly raised his eyes and looked inside through the floor-to-ceiling glass partition.
Tao Zhi’s eyes met his and she quickly shut up. She wrinkled her nose and walked over: “Why are you here?”
Jiang Qihuai looked at his watch: “Came to have lunch with you.”
“You need to refer to yourself as number 3821,” Tao Zhi interrupted. She frowned, saying not very satisfactorily: “State who you are, and you need to cordially invite me. Have some awareness as a suitor.”
“…”
Jiang Qihuai lowered his eyes, and almost imperceptible cracks seemed to appear on his calm, indifferent face: “…Zhizhi.”
Tao Zhi blinked at him, not speaking, her dark eyes bright, as if waiting for something.
Based on Tao Zhi’s understanding of him, under normal circumstances, when she deliberately picked on him like this, Jiang Qihuai should start being harsh with her.
But he didn’t.
Jiang Qihuai just sighed.
After a while.
“I, number 3821,” Tao Zhi heard him say expressionlessly, “cordially invite the princess to honor me with her presence for a meal.”
“…”
Tao Zhi tried hard to hold back her laughter, pressed her palms together, and closed her eyes with a satisfied expression.
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