When Tao Zhi closed the bedroom door and walked back into the kitchen again, the noodles were already cooked.

The clear soup of tomato and egg drop noodles—thin, white, and soft wheat noodles—floated in the broth. The chopped scallions on top were fried to a fresh green, and a small half-cooked fried egg was laid neatly on top of the bowl.

Jiang Qihuai turned around, placed the bowl on the table, pushed it toward her, and handed her a pair of chopsticks.

Tao Zhi sat down at the long table that served as the kitchen divider and poked the fried egg with her chopsticks.

The soft yellow yolk flowed out from beneath the thin layer of egg white, spreading over the noodles below.

Tao Zhi ate two pieces of tomato and then put down her chopsticks.

Across from her, Jiang Qihuai looked up. “What’s wrong?”

Tao Zhi propped her chin on her hand against the table. “I don’t feel like eating anymore.”

Jiang Qihuai also set his chopsticks down. “It doesn’t taste good?”

“It’s not that it’s bad,” Tao Zhi said absentmindedly, looking as if she had suddenly wilted, “I just suddenly don’t want to eat anymore.”

“What do you want to eat?” Jiang Qihuai asked. “Do you want to eat chicken wings?”

Tao Zhi froze for a moment and looked up. “You have some?”

“By coincidence, yes,” Jiang Qihuai glanced at his watch. “It’ll just take a little while before it’s ready.”

Tao Zhi said nothing.

The strawberries were by coincidence, and so were the chicken wings.

Running into him at the Japanese restaurant was a coincidence. Her long-time good friend’s direct superior also happening to be him was a coincidence too.

Even that photo no one else wanted—just happened to end up in his hands.

Tao Zhi looked at him and suddenly said in a low voice, “Was it really all just coincidence?”

Jiang Qihuai had just opened the refrigerator door. From the freezer, he pulled out a bag of frozen chicken wings and held it in his hand. Hearing her, he turned around.

Tao Zhi walked over, took the bag of chicken wings from his hand, and lowered her eyes. “Why did you come back?”

Jiang Qihuai looked at her but said nothing.

“Why did you give up a great job in America and come back to China?” she asked softly. “Was it because someone offered you a higher salary?”

Jiang Qihuai lowered his gaze. “No.”

Tao Zhi took a deep breath. “That time, when we met again at the Japanese restaurant—was that a coincidence?”

“No.”

“The photo,” Tao Zhi asked again, “the one in your bedroom—when it was taken, did you really not know who the photographer was?”

Jiang Qihuai was silent for a moment before answering faintly, “I knew.”

Tao Zhi pressed her fingertips together tightly, her dark eyes fixed on him, and asked the final question.

“Do you still… like me?”

Jiang Qihuai looked at her.

His thick eyelashes lowered, and his light brown eyes, clear like glazed glass, fixed unblinkingly on her. Something fierce and suppressed surged uncontrollably to the surface. He opened his mouth, but no sound came out—only a faint exhale, like a breath caught in his throat.

After a long moment, he spoke softly. “I like you.”

His voice was hoarse and slow. Word by word, he enunciated carefully, his tone light, yet carrying a heavy weight as he repeated, “Always liked you.”

Tao Zhi didn’t speak. The fingers she had been clutching gradually relaxed and then dropped to her side.

Perhaps this—this was what she had been waiting for all along.

Sometimes Tao Zhi couldn’t help but wonder, if back then she and Jiang Qihuai hadn’t been so young, would everything have turned out differently?

She had so much she wanted to say—so many things she hadn’t had the chance to—but when she heard him say don’t come again, all her reason and patience had been shattered to pieces by that unspeakable fury of betrayal.

She had never hated him for choosing to leave. She only resented that he hadn’t chosen to believe her—or to believe in himself, even just once.

She had left then with the resolve of never meeting again, never once imagining a future between them. But she hadn’t expected that when she saw Jiang Qihuai again, her heart would, uncontrollably, quietly awaken once more.

Even she herself had underestimated how much she liked him.

An Sese had once told her she shouldn’t let him off so easily. Tao Zhi, at the time still dazed, hadn’t quite understood.

She still liked Jiang Qihuai—and really, that alone was enough. As long as she still liked him, then whether she was at a loss or gaining the upper hand, what difference did it make? Who could even say for sure?

What was there to avoid or feel uneasy about? What was there to feel wronged or to complain about? No one had truly done anything wrong. As long as two people still liked each other—as long as she liked him, and he still liked her—Tao Zhi felt there was no need to fuss over the rest.

She was a warrior who neither flinched nor retreated, a sun that moved ever forward. Since she had already sorted through the chaos in her heart, she might as well keep walking ahead.

Tao Zhi stuffed the bag of chicken wings back into his hands, leaned against the dining table with her hands behind her back, cleared her throat, and glanced at him with a serious face. “Then, do you have anything else to say, Number 3821?”

She kept her face stern, but in her dark, beautiful eyes, there was an uncontainable hint of expectation.

The shift in her mood was too fast—Jiang Qihuai was still a little caught off guard.

He lowered his head, glanced at the frozen chicken wings she had stuffed back into his hands, then looked up again. For a moment, he didn’t know what she wanted to hear, or what he could say that wouldn’t scare her away again.

She loved to eat so much—surely saying something related to food wouldn’t be wrong.

Jiang Qihuai, patient, asked tentatively, “Do you still want to eat the chicken wings?”

Tao Zhi: “……”

Tao Zhi was so angry she saw black spots before her eyes. She closed her eyes, slipped on her slippers, and went to sit on the living room sofa.

Jiang Qihuai tossed the rock-hard frozen chicken wings into the sink. The wings hit the metal with a dull thud. He ignored it, rinsed his hands, and walked over.

Hearing him approach, Tao Zhi grabbed a pillow and hugged it to her chest, burying her face deep inside, not wanting to pay him any attention.

How could someone in this world be so dense!

Was her hint not obvious enough?!

She buried her face in the pillow for a long time and still didn’t hear a single sound beside her.

Tao Zhi’s fingertips pinched at the soft fabric of the pillow. Her head slowly peeked out from behind it, revealing a pair of bright, clear eyes.

Jiang Qihuai was sitting right beside her, his upper body leaning slightly forward, one arm resting on his knee as he turned his head to look at her.

When their gazes met, he suddenly spoke.

“The photo wasn’t just because you were the photographer,” he said. “You took it beautifully.”

Tao Zhi was stunned for a moment, resting her chin on the soft pillow as she looked at him.

After leaving Experimental No.1 High School, Jiang Qihuai hadn’t kept in touch with anyone from there—except Ji Fan.

It was rather strange, really. Jiang Qihuai had always thought the two of them were the type who couldn’t see eye to eye. Ji Fan had never bothered to hide his annoyance at having him as his deskmate. Yet, in private conversations, there was an unexpected ease between them, as if everything just flowed naturally.

Most of the time, Ji Fan was the one talking more. He would occasionally ask a question, and he would tell him all sorts of things—

Like how she had dropped a hundred points on her latest exam, how she was studying harder than ever, barely resting at all; how she had, for the first time, scored 700 points and practically wanted to fly around the house with excitement.

She had finally found a school that admitted students based purely on academic grades—one where she could study what she truly wanted. She had her first piece selected for an exhibition, and for the first time, submitted a photograph to an international competition—and won an award.

That photograph was taken at Tao Zhi’s first time participating in an exhibition. It had been a small, privately organized charity auction by a photography enthusiast, with all the participants being unknown amateur photographers.

He had stood from a distance, watching her crouch under her photo frame, hands holding her cheeks, carefully and patiently looking after her “child.” She waited for a long time, but no one stopped in front of it.

She waited there the entire afternoon—from the bright midday sun to the setting evening light. Jiang Qihuai had seen her finally stand up, rubbing her numb legs, her lashes lowered, looking like that little cat curled up by the old alley wall back home—lonely and dejected.

That photo, because it wasn’t taken by a famous photographer and no one bid higher, wasn’t expensive. But it still cost Jiang Qihuai every bit of spare money he had at the time.

He had watched as the staff carefully wrapped the photo layer by layer. In it, the warm red sunset dyed a wide stretch of sea crimson, yet the girl’s feet and calves refused to be drowned by the rich color—just like her, bright and vivid, warm and alive.

Just as always. Just as she was now.

Jiang Qihuai tilted his head, looking at the girl staring blankly at him, still seemingly processing everything, and continued, “I came back to China for you too. I went to that Japanese restaurant because I knew you’d be there. As for the chicken wings—that really is just habit,” Jiang Qihuai said helplessly, “because you always used to show up at my place without a word.”

He spoke one line after another, and by the time he reached the last, Tao Zhi’s ears were already burning. When she heard that final sentence, she couldn’t help but mutter a small protest:

“I didn’t always show up at your place without a word. I only went because I thought your illness was serious.”

But what truly made her unable to sit still was Fu Xiling’s earlier line—‘The top student, alone.’

She slowly digested all of Jiang Qihuai’s messy, straight-to-the-point words, one after another, her fingers twisting at the little tassels of the pillow. Then she asked, “So?”

She looked at him again, expectant for the second time.

“So,” Jiang Qihuai took a deep breath and continued, “it wasn’t a passing whim. From the day I left, I’d already decided to come back. I knew you probably couldn’t accept it yet—”

Before he could finish, Tao Zhi lifted her hand high, palm facing him.

Eyes closed, she said calmly, “Shut up. If you keep talking, I swear I’ll slap you right in the face out of sheer frustration.”

Tao Zhi was so exasperated she nearly wanted to jump up and bite him.

Why on earth did a man like this exist—someone so utterly, hopelessly oblivious to romance?!

Was she still not being obvious enough?

But Tao Zhi also rather enjoyed the way he was now—proactively attentive, almost like a big dog trying to please its owner. If she were the one to take the initiative, what if this “dog” Jiang turned back into that sharp-tongued, irritating wolf from before?

Her thoughts were a jumble, drifting between sense and nonsense, when suddenly the fingertips she had raised in front of him were caught.

Tao Zhi froze, eyes opening.

The man’s fingers were slightly cool. He pinched her fingertips gently, pulled them a little closer, and then folded them into his palm, enclosing them in a light grasp.

Their fingers intertwined, and Tao Zhi’s heart gave a hard, sudden thump.

Jiang Qihuai leaned in slightly, closing the distance between them. He tugged the pillow in her arms upward, placing it between them. The two were now so close that only the soft pillow seemed to separate them.

Jiang Qihuai rested his chin on the pillow; even the weight of half his body seemed to press down with it.

“Zhizhi, I’ve always liked you,” he said, pressing his forehead lightly forward. His brows and eyes softened as he looked at her—his gaze deep and lingering, his voice low and muffled. “I want to be with you again.”