Chapter 6

Chapter 6

Tan Xi left faster than I had expected.

There was a cocoon-shaped sofa on the balcony, the spot she usually hogged. This time, at last, no one was fighting me for it, but lying on it didn’t feel all that comfortable either.

I looked around the apartment. I couldn’t say what exactly had changed, only that it suddenly felt empty. I couldn’t quite describe what I felt… free, and hollow.

After scrolling on my phone for a while, I still failed to control myself and tapped into her Moments.

The first post was a nine-photo grid, with the caption:

“New environment, new mood.”

Then I looked at the photos-well, damn. That Tiffany-blue volleyball, that LV monogram puppy, and the few acrylic standees in the corner-weren’t they all gifts I’d given Yu Bixue?

Just as I was caught between laughing and crying, a message window popped up.

“Xiao Ruo, are you there?”

I swore at the screen.

“Why the hell are you still here?”

He sent a voice message. Maybe because he’d just been blocked once, his tone had become much gentler and lower.

“You blocked my number, but you didn’t block me on WeChat.”

Thanks for the reminder. I’ll get right on that.

As if he knew what I was about to do, he hurriedly pushed through another voice message.

“Tan Xi had nowhere to go. I could only take her in temporarily, but you have to believe in my character…”

I believed him. Of course I believed him.

I sent back a voice message too, my tone perfectly calm. “You’re so noble, aren’t you? You, Yu Bixue, are Liu Xiahui reborn. If you ever got caught up in anything, it would only be because some woman was trying to extort you, right?”

He sighed on the other end.

“Xiao Ruo, we’ve been together for two years. Don’t you know what kind of person I am?”

At that, I honestly laughed until I nearly gagged.

Those two had been hiding their little schemes so poorly that anyone could see through them, and they still thought everyone else was an idiot?

“Old Yu, a person may be as lowly as dust, but they should not twist themselves into a maggot.”

“What does that mean?”

“I wish you both happiness.”

After that, I decisively blocked him.

The nights without Tan Xi grew long.

The butter, molds, and piping tools she’d left behind from making desserts were still in the apartment, forcing me to spend ages cleaning them up that night. I carried several big boxes downstairs one after another, sweating all over from the effort.

After that, I didn’t want to go home, so I wandered aimlessly outside the residential compound. Along the base of the wall outside the perimeter was a row of low, dim stalls. The light shone over pale, bluish faces and cheap flesh-colored stockings and plastic combs spread all over the ground.

In truth, they were the real face of the city.

It made me think of that vast wasteland on the outskirts.

And the mysterious man surnamed Zhao.

He had a face strangely similar to that person’s, but their temperaments were completely different.

In my memory, that person had a pair of clear, bright foxlike eyes. When he smiled, he was like a fresh spring, with a transparency that seemed fathomable at a glance.

Especially when he wore a white shirt. He fulfilled every girl’s fantasy of the campus heartthrob in white, and wherever he went, he became the center of attention. Secretly taken photos of him spread all over the school and beyond.

Back then, everyone liked him.

Boys, girls, Tan Xi, and everyone other than Tan Xi.

I was devoted to my studies and had only seen him once or twice, but that once or twice had been enough to leave a deep impression. Later, after my mother remarried and my stepfather transferred me to a better private high school, the memory still remained as clear as yesterday.

He was like a beautiful dream, engraved on the hearts of me, Tan Xi, and countless other ordinary girls.

Ten thousand homes lit up around me, and my heart was a tangled mess.

I planned to find somewhere to have a drink, but the moment I sat in the car, I felt something under me.

It was a little booklet in a plastic cover, about the size of my palm.

A driver’s license. The owner’s portrait was just like the man himself-excellent bone structure and extremely photogenic.

Zhao Muzi.

The name was delicate, translucent, and melancholy.

Almost like a girl’s.