At the start of the spring semester, Jin Zhao was on maternity leave. Added together with the summer vacation that followed, she wouldn’t officially return to work until the fall semester began in September.

Wang Nan teased her for calculating her days so well—winter break at one end, summer vacation at the other, and a proper semester-long maternity leave in between. All told, she could take nine months off. And what was even luckier was that the following fall semester she would be teaching first-year students. Freshmen had military training, and classes wouldn’t officially begin until after the National Day holiday. Add it all up, and she could rest for a full ten months. Wang Nan was so envious she couldn’t stop talking about it, saying that when she got pregnant in the future, she would definitely calculate the timing properly too.

Jin Zhao hadn’t deliberately planned it that way, but after Wang Nan put it like that, she couldn’t help feeling that her luck was indeed a little unusually good.

Luck seemed to be something that could spread. Meng Yanxi’s luck had always been good, and the little dumpling took after him in that regard. Now even she seemed to be taking after him.

But the department chair didn’t think her luck was good at all.

If she hadn’t gotten pregnant and given birth at this time, Jin Zhao would already be doing visiting research at Cambridge.

During her confinement period, the department chair came to see her. Although she respected Jin Zhao’s choice, the opportunity to do visiting research at Cambridge was rare, and when it came up in conversation, she couldn’t help expressing her regret.

“At the annual meeting, I ran into Dean Wang, who’s a bit older. He even said to me how much of a pity it was—such a good opportunity. If you’d waited two more years to get pregnant and have a child, everything would have been just right. Family, career—you could have balanced both at that time.”

Jin Zhao lowered her head and smiled, saying, “In this world, where is there ever such a perfectly just-right thing?”

The department chair was a woman herself, and could better understand how difficult the workplace was for women. She sighed, “Yes. This world has always been especially harsh on women. It wants us to be this way, and it wants us to be that way. If we sacrifice our family, they say we’re too selfish, lacking softness, and point behind our backs that our families aren’t happy. If we give up our careers, they say we’re love-brained, that we’re entrusting our fate to a man, and we’re criticized all the same. But the one who sacrifices the most is always the woman. Just like you—you’ve endured the hardship of pregnancy and childbirth. At what should have been the time for visiting research, you’d just given birth, still in confinement, and could only temporarily put a career that was gaining momentum on hold.”

Jin Zhao smiled and said, “I don’t really feel like I’m sacrificing myself for anyone. It’s just that life is always about choosing at different moments. Like when I was little and first started learning dance, then later gave it up to focus on academic studies. Back then, the teacher at the dance school told me I had real talent for dance, that if I developed in that field, I might have a very promising future. She hoped I would seriously think it over—was it really worth sacrificing dance for academics? Or could I try to have both? At the time, I told her that as long as it was my own choice, I wouldn’t call it a sacrifice, even if I didn’t do well in the exams later on. I couldn’t choose academics, enjoy the sense of security academics gave me, and then later, if things didn’t go well, turn around and blame it for making me give up dance. When you get down to it, choices themselves are what bring us the things we want. Regret and complaint afterward feel more like burning the bridge after crossing the river. If you no longer want it, then work harder and fight for another chance to choose for yourself.”

In the workplace, there were many women like Jin Zhao who temporarily set aside their careers for the sake of family—especially among teachers. Society’s stereotype of female teachers was that they had plenty of holidays, that they were naturally able, or even supposed, to take care of the family. Not just Jin Zhao—many teachers had once put their work on hold to get pregnant, give birth, and take care of children. Even the department chair herself, when she occasionally thought of opportunities she had missed in the past, couldn’t help saying something like, if only I hadn’t done this or that back then, maybe I’d be this or that now.

This was the first time she had heard such clear-sighted thinking from Jin Zhao.

She openly acknowledged the happiness her current choice brought her, yet still kept her ambition for her career in her eyes. She had simply, very calmly, made a choice at a certain moment, followed her heart toward a particular desire within herself—but that alone was far from enough to define her.

Before coming, the department chair had worried that a man might trap Jin Zhao. At this moment, she suddenly realized that perhaps this young woman had already gone through the stage of being trapped long ago. Breaking out of the cocoon and becoming a butterfly—from now on, no one could trap her.

Not sadness, and not even happiness.

♥︎ ྀི◟ ͜ ◞♥︎ ྀི◟ ͜ ◞♥︎ ྀི

By the time the little dumpling was three months old, he had completely grown into an adorably soft glutinous rice ball—fair and chubby, looking plump and delicious. Meng Yanxi really couldn’t resist pretending to bite him several times. Of course, it was only for show. At first, the little dumpling didn’t know what he was doing and even cooperated, giggling. Later, he learned to fake-cry—whenever Meng Yanxi leaned in, he would immediately howl at the top of his lungs, with no tears, but every time it successfully summoned his mother, who would then scold his father on his behalf.

The little dumpling’s eyes were most like Meng Yanxi’s—round and lively, like black grapes. When he was just born, his eyes were clean and clear. Now, they were gradually starting to show thoughts of their own. When the little guy was harboring some tiny scheme, those eyes looked exactly like Meng Yanxi’s, as if carved from the same mold. Clearly, Meng Zhuxi’s eyes also looked very much like Meng Yanxi’s, yet the expression in them was completely different. And the little dumpling was only three months old—yet that look was actually even more like his father’s than Meng Zhuxi’s was, an adult.

Meng Huai and Meng Shixu came to see the dumpling the most, almost every other day, making a point of coming by to see the baby.

The little dumpling could recognize people at such a young age and was exceptionally good at providing emotional value to his grandpa and great-grandpa, making Meng Huai and Meng Shixu laugh heartily every time. He would even, with an almost outrageously casual air, turn his head and accidentally let his tiny mouth land a kiss on Grandpa’s or Great-Grandpa’s cheek.

A baby carried the scent of milk all over his body—fragrant and soft. Just that light little touch was enough to hook the two elderly men on the spot.

Even Jin Zhao didn’t know exactly how he managed it. At an age when he couldn’t even speak yet, he somehow made three generations of the Meng family firmly believe, each in their own way, that the baby loved them the most—so much so that they even squabbled childishly over it.

Just like his dad—already a heartbreaker from a young age.

The day Jin Zhao took the little dumpling for a routine checkup, she ran into Jin Wenhui at the hospital.

Meng Yanxi was on a business trip, so Jin Zhao brought the little dumpling by herself, with the two aunts from home accompanying her.

It was already late spring, early summer. The weather that day was warm, the sun was lovely. The hospital garden was full of people basking in the sunlight, and children in short sleeves were running around and playing.

The driver went to get the car, while she and the aunts took the little dumpling for a stroll in the garden.

On a bench in the garden sat a man. With the weather so warm and everyone else already dressed for summer, he was still wearing a thick jacket. Amid all the liveliness around him, he looked utterly out of place—hunched over, head lowered, staring at the report in his hands.

Jin Zhao hadn’t paid attention at first. Later, when the man stood up, he accidentally lost his footing and nearly fell. Jin Zhao instinctively reached out to support him.

“Careful.”

When she looked up, her eyes met Jin Wenhui’s.

Compared to the last time they met, Jin Wenhui looked even older. In fact, less than a year had passed, and he wasn’t even sixty yet, but most of the hair on his head had fallen out, and what remained had all turned white. His whole person looked utterly haggard, as if he were nearing the end of his days.

Jin Zhao didn’t know what had happened to him.

Jin Wenhui noticed the baby in her arms, froze for a moment, then asked in disbelief yet with a vague sense of realization, “You… your child?”

The little dumpling was a chatterbox, babbling away, clenching his tiny fists as he wriggled about in her arms.

Jin Zhao didn’t deny it. “Mm.”

Jin Wenhui stared straight at the lively, adorable baby. The child’s clean, clear eyes only made the murky bloodshot veins in his own eyes stand out all the more. Jin Wenhui’s expression was extremely complicated. Suddenly, he let out a sarcastic laugh. “Very good. Really very good. You’ve even had a child, and yet not a single person in the whole family knew.”

Jin Zhao said calmly, “It wasn’t intentional concealment. It’s just that you never asked.”

Just like all these years—never asking, never caring.

Perhaps the only difference was that, in all those past years of indifference, everyone had grown used to imagining her as fallen on hard times, while they themselves lived happily on. This chance encounter, however, abruptly made them realize that she was actually living far better than they had imagined.

She had even obtained the son that Jin Wenhui had sought for so many years and never managed to have.

A biological son.

Lively and good-looking, clever and adorable.

During the brief encounter between Jin Zhao and Jin Wenhui, the little dumpling babbled nonstop in Jin Zhao’s arms—whether he was urging his mother to leave quickly or proudly showing off his plump, soft flesh, no one could say.

Naturally, that day Jin Wenhui and Jin Zhao exchanged no extra words. A chance meeting, and soon they went their separate ways.

Jin Wenhui had a strong sense of pride deep in his bones, and he especially couldn’t bear to run into the daughter he had once abandoned at his own most miserable moment. More than Jin Zhao, he was the one who wanted to leave as quickly as possible.

Not long after, Jin Zhao received a message from Jin Wenyi.

Toward Jin Wenyi, Jin Zhao had always felt gratitude in her heart.

Back then, it was thanks to Jin Wenyi that she had managed to carve out a bright path for herself. Later, when she was in the UK, it was also Jin Wenyi who repeatedly came to her aid in times of need.

It was clear that Meng Yanxi held Jin Wenyi’s attempt to balance both sides in contempt, but Jin Zhao felt that being able to do even this much was already very good. Even so, it was worth a sincere return from her.

Because the kindness she had received was real and tangible.

During the Spring Festival and Jin Wenyi’s birthday, Jin Zhao sent her a gift. She had hesitated over whether to mention the pregnancy, but when the words came to her lips, it always felt abrupt—especially after what had happened the last time they met.

Jin Wenyi probably hadn’t expected it to happen so soon either.

Jin Wenyi made a voice call. Over the phone, her tone was brisk and cheerful, as if she had completely forgotten all the unpleasantness of the previous year. She asked Jin Zhao to show her the baby, and asked how her confinement period had been.

Jin Zhao answered each question.

Only the little dumpling was being naughty, blowing bubbles at the camera. Jin Zhao pretended to put on a stern face and scold him. The little one, young as he was but full of little schemes, immediately started fake-crying again.

At that moment, Meng Yanxi came back. As soon as he entered, he heard the little dumpling crying.

If it had been Meng Shixu or Meng Huai, they might have been fooled, but Meng Yanxi and his son were cut from the same cloth—green tea recognizes green tea. From far away, he laughed mockingly, “This brat’s crying again? Let me see if any tears came out. If not, I’ll beat some out.”

His dad was actually picking a fight with a baby, but the little dumpling was magnanimous. The moment he heard his father’s voice—even though it came with a threat to beat him—he generously stopped the dry howling, waving his little hands and babbling happily in greeting.

Jin Zhao placed the little dumpling into his arms, then got up and continued the call with Jin Wenyi.

Jin Wenyi brought up Jin Wenhui’s recent situation.

Jin Wenhui and Lin Yao had divorced. In order to fight for custody of the child, Jin Wenhui had given Lin Yao a large sum of money. Over these years, Lin Yao had already drained his family assets dry. In the end, Jin Wenhui had borrowed from loan sharks to pay her.

Yet after he exhausted every scheme and finally managed to secure custody, he discovered that the child was not his biological child.

In the end, the child was taken away by Lin Yao as well.

Jin Wenhui lost both his money and his child, while the loan sharks, on the other hand, clung to him relentlessly.

“Lingling, although I know I shouldn’t ask this of you, he is, after all, your father. At the end of the day, he did raise you until you were seventeen. If you have any spare capacity now, could you help him just once—just this once?”