chapter 9

I called a friend and dragged her out for drinks.

Halfway through, with her eyes hazy from the alcohol, Zhao Zheng propped her chin on her hand and asked me:

“What’s wrong? Something bothering you lately?”

I stayed silent and just kept throwing back one drink after another like I was trying to drown myself.

“Work’s going smoothly, you’re fair-skinned and pretty, your husband is the guy you crushed on for years, and your married life is great too.”

“Xiao Jin, with specs like that, if you’re not called a winner in life, then you’re at least one of heaven’s favorites.”

“What could you possibly be upset about?”

I couldn’t say it.

Zhao Zheng didn’t press. She just stayed with me and drank in silence.

I ended up in the bathroom hugging the toilet, throwing up twice. When I was so drunk I didn’t know where or who I was,

Zhao Zheng, who knew nothing, called Zhou Mu.

When Zhou Mu arrived at the bar to pick me up, I was standing under the lamp post by the entrance like a wooden dummy.

But the second I saw him, my tears fell.

Zhou Mu froze, then dug a tissue out of his pocket.

He wiped my tears. I didn’t dodge, just stared at him blankly.

“You look a lot like the person I like.”

Zhou Mu let out a small laugh. “Yeah? What’s the name of the person you like?”

“Zhou Mu.”

His face bloomed into a smile, like a night-blooming cereus suddenly opening in the middle of the night.

I looked at him, my head dizzy and light.

The urge to spill my heart had never been stronger.

“Did you know?”

“I’ve liked him for a long time. A really, really, really, really long time.”

“…I just never dared tell him.”

“How long is ‘long’?”

“What year is it?”

Zhou Mu said a number.

I started counting on my fingers, thinking and rethinking, counting and recounting, and only after a long time did I finally get it straight.

“…Ten years.”

The light above us poured down, turning the tips of Zhou Mu’s messy hair almost transparent.

That beautiful face went blank.

“You don’t believe me?”

He shook his head.

I was annoyed and grabbed my phone to open my private album.

The alcohol was still in full effect.

I typed the password wrong several times, stumbling my way in. The security question was something I’d set years ago.

– Who’s the person I like?

Such an idiot teenage-girl question.

I entered two letters.

A younger Zhou Mu’s face appeared on the screen in front of us.

“Look at this.”

I tapped one of the photos.

“I found this on the school’s official website.”

It was a candid shot of Zhou Mu during the final sprint of a long-distance race.

I zoomed in on the photo and picked myself out of the crowded background.

“He was running long-distance, and I wanted to go give him water, but there were too many people around.”

“I couldn’t squeeze through. In the end I never got to hand him the bottle. I only saw him take a bottle from some other girl.”

“That moment was actually pretty heartbreaking.”

“But later, when I was browsing photos on the school site, I saw this one.”

“I didn’t manage to give him the water, but at least we’re in the same frame.”

I smiled, remembering how stupid I’d been that day, clutching that bottle of water all day without letting go.

Like you’d bought your favorite cake, brought it home full of joy, only to find it smashed out of shape.

You mope all day, but then the moment you see this photo on the official website, your HP bar suddenly refills-

At least, I’d been captured in the moment he won the race.

“And this one!”

“I found it in my mom’s photo albums.”

It was my tenth birthday. Zhou Mu had come to celebrate with me.

The two of us were holding hands, performing for the adults.

Zhou Mu was wearing a tiny suit, and I had on a pretty puffy dress.

Standing there side by side, we already looked like a little pair.

“Later I used this photo as my Moments cover picture.”

“My friends all said I was super cute as a kid.”

“And I kept wondering, if he ever saw it one day, what would happen?”

“Should I lie and say it’s just because the photo is really cute, or just admit it straight out: ‘Because I want you to notice,’ ‘Because I like you.'”

“But he never did.”

“He’s never noticed.”

Ten years is a very, very long time.

These little, trivial things I’ve remembered for so long are still so clear.

There was no end to them.

By the time my mouth was dry and my throat was raw,

I still hadn’t finished telling the story of my ten-year crush.

And at the very end-

The person standing in front of me suddenly pulled me into his arms.

Zhou Mu’s embrace was warm. What came through his clothes wasn’t just body heat, but his pounding heartbeat and his unsteady emotions.

He held me so, so tightly.

His hands were trembling.

“I love you.”

His breath brushed my ear, hot and tinged with a faint nasal sound:

“Xiao Jin.”

“I love you too.”

I was wrapped in Zhou Mu’s arms.

The tear tracks on my face had long since dried, and the cold night wind blew, sobering me up by more than half.

I tilted my head back and stared up at the harsh white light overhead.

For a long, long time.

Only then did I speak, my voice very soft:

“…Liar.”

Zhou Mu.

You’re such a liar.