Shi Xueqing was shaking milk tea at a Chinese-owned bubble tea shop.
He wore a black mask, while black-rimmed glasses hid most of his face. His shoulder-length black hair was tucked beneath a beanie. He looked furtive, as though terrified someone might recognize him.
A few female international students were sitting nearby, chatting. A few of their words drifted into Shi Xueqing’s ears.
“Are there any good-looking guys in our year?”
“Edmund?”
“No foreigners. I can’t appreciate someone I can’t communicate with.”
“…The best-looking guy in our year is probably Shi Xueqing, right?”
“…”
Shi Xueqing glanced casually at his reflection in the mirror. Though he was wearing the gray, work-issued uniform, his tall, lean figure still looked striking beneath the drab apron.
But the girls’ next words nearly made him stumble.
“I heard Shi Xueqing’s been pretending to be rich. His family cut him off. Is that true or not?”
“Cut him off? You mean they reduced his allowance, or he can’t even afford tuition?”
“No way… Weren’t you saying you wanted to pursue him?” someone teased, nudging the girl in the middle with her elbow. “Perfect timing. The fallen pretty boy is on clearance.”
The girl in the middle had rhinestone-studded nails. She took a reserved sip of her milk tea.
“There’s one way to pursue rich people and another way to play with poor people. If his family really went bankrupt, do you expect me to pay his tuition? That’s a huge amount of money…”
“Speaking of the richest person in our year… Oh my God, the heiress has posted another picture.”
The phone in Shi Xueqing’s pocket buzzed. It was a notification that the user marked as “Close Friend” had posted on Instagram.
He shoved the phone deeper into his jeans. Meanwhile, the three girls leaned their heads together, whispering as they looked at the screen.
“Another limited-edition piece… The heiress buys handbags by the truckload.”
“There’s a whole crowd of sycophants in the comments, calling her a rich beauty over and over. It’s disgusting. Does the heiress even care about them?”
“I heard Xing Wei is incredibly generous. It was hilarious—last time, she chartered a private jet to take a few friends on vacation to the West Coast.”
“A private jet? What does her family do? How are they that rich?”
“I’m not sure. But I heard her family’s affairs are being managed by her older brother now. He’s a total siscon and transfers money to her without blinking…”
“Even if you can’t be her boyfriend, getting into her close circle would still let you make plenty of money…”
“A-Qing, your shift’s over.”
A Hong Kong coworker in a bubble tea shop uniform patted Shi Xueqing on the shoulder.
“Okay, I’m off.”
The moment he noticed the girls looking over, Shi Xueqing hurriedly turned away and left, doing his best to ignore the eyes following him.
Vaguely, he heard one of the girls say, “That guy selling milk tea has a pretty good figure. He looks like a model.”
“Don’t you think he looks kind of familiar?”
Shi Xueqing thought to himself: Of course I look familiar. I’m the international student you were just discussing—the one whose family cut him off.
In the changing room, he took off his work uniform and put on the clothes he had arrived in. Once he removed his glasses, a pair of almond-shaped eyes emerged, elegant and distant. When he took off his mask, a fair, handsome face was revealed.
He removed his black beanie and ran his fingers through the hair he had carefully styled to brush his collarbones.
A white shirt, a gray jacket, slim-fit jeans, a silver chain resting against his collarbone, and a silver earring in one earlobe.
He looked every inch the quintessential long-haired artistic pretty boy.
He gave his reflection a faint, ethereal smile, warmth flickering in his almond-shaped eyes. Looking at himself in the mirror, Shi Xueqing felt even more satisfied.
He was such a tease, and so good at fishing for attention. He had been born with the perfect face to live off his looks.
The sunlight outside the bubble tea shop was dazzling. Shi Xueqing emerged from the alley and walked down the street with an air of refined elegance. He was still wearing a chain bracelet from a niche brand, and looked exactly like a slightly affluent, artsy international student with an eye-catching appearance.
Being good-looking brought plenty of romantic opportunities. The moment he stopped beside the bus stop, someone came over to strike up a conversation.
“Are you a student at M University too?”
Shi Xueqing gave him a glance.
A university sweatshirt, Levi’s jeans, Skechers sneakers.
An ordinary watch. An ordinary backpack. An ordinary hairstyle.
And it was a man.
Shi Xueqing smiled gently—not enough to offend, but unmistakably a rejection. It was bad enough that the person hitting on him was a man; judging by his appearance, he also didn’t seem to have much money.
Of course, being a man was already a serious problem. Shi Xueqing was straight.
A straight man who wanted to marry a rich woman.
After shaking milk tea all afternoon, Shi Xueqing’s wrist ached. Sitting on the bus back to his apartment, he idly scrolled through Instagram. There were plenty of comments beneath the heiress Xing Wei’s post, but Shi Xueqing found their tactics crude and embarrassing.
He didn’t comment on Xing Wei’s post. He merely liked it, then uploaded a story of his own.
In the photo, he had captured the sunset through a shard of broken sunglasses lens.
After a while, Xing Wei commented: “Did your glasses break?”
He replied with studied restraint: “At least they let me see the last sunset on the West Coast.”
The photo had been deliberately taken by Shi Xueqing when a group of them had gone to the West Coast together some time before.
He assumed Xing Wei would reply again, but she didn’t. A little later, he got off the bus one stop early and walked toward his apartment, puzzled as he checked Xing Wei’s Instagram.
Beneath her newest post, Xing Wei was chatting with an unfamiliar account.
The account was called JensenX.
JensenX: You managed to get another new bag?
Xing Wei: How do you have time to be on Instagram?
JensenX: I finished up the work at the company. I’ve never been to your school before. I’ll come take a look next week.
Alarms went off in Shi Xueqing’s head.
Xing Wei and this JensenX seemed exceptionally close. Their tone was far beyond that of ordinary classmates. When it came to competition, Shi Xueqing acted quickly. He opened the person’s Instagram profile, hoping to investigate the rival.
But the account was private. Aside from a profile picture, Shi Xueqing could see nothing.
Even the profile picture was abstract. A figure stood with his back turned in the night, so blurred that all Shi Xueqing could tell was that it was a man.
A man!
Could he be Xing Wei’s boyfriend?!
Shi Xueqing was frantic with anxiety. As if things weren’t bad enough, the elevator in his apartment building had broken down again. A large “OUT OF SERVICE” sign was pasted across the doors. With no other choice, he took the stairs. After shaking milk tea all afternoon, he now had to climb four more flights.
He lived in a studio apartment—the cheapest type available in the building. There was no bedroom and no partition; the kitchen, living room, and bedroom were all one open space. The only feature worth praising was its enormous glass window.
Sometimes Shi Xueqing would curl up on his bed and watch the sunset slowly sink beyond the glass, dyeing the overseas city where he was studying in hazy crimson.
That was probably the only moment of peaceful happiness in his life as an international student whose family had cut off his financial support.
Of course, his studio was a complete mess too. There were some luxury goods he had bought back in high school, along with a few counterfeit shoes and clothes. Exhausted, he lay down on the bed, then clicked into that JensenX account and looked through it three more times. At last, he turned over and sat up, beginning to search the other person’s username on Google.
Nothing was going to stop him from finding himself a sugar mama!
…
“Jensen, congratulations. You’ve landed another big deal.”
In the lounge of a professional boxing studio, Chen Fan smiled at his young friend.
The young man sitting beside him wiped away his sweat with a towel. He had wheat-colored skin, a powerful, muscular build, sharp brows, deep-set eyes, and a handsome face with an intimidating edge to it. Chen Fan looked at him and sighed again. “You’ve only been out of college for two years, right? And you’re already this capable. I heard Old Xu lamenting the other day that if his useless son had even half your ability, he could die without regrets.”
The young man whose English name was Jensen and whose Chinese name was Xing Jun merely smiled. Chen Fan continued, “We’re having a get-together at the shooting club next weekend. Are you coming?”
“I’ve taken ten days off. I’m planning to visit my younger sister and see how she’s doing,” Xing Jun said. “First I was busy fighting over the family inheritance, and then I was busy with the company. Come to think of it, I haven’t seen her in almost a year. The funny thing is, I even got her major wrong before.”
“There was nothing you could do. The rest of your family can’t be relied on, and you’ve had a rough few years.” Chen Fan comforted him, then suddenly gave him a teasing wink. “Speaking of which, have you ever thought about what you’re going to do about settling down?”
Xing Jun, who was putting away his boxing gloves, paused. “Settling down?”
“Yeah. You’re twenty-four, and you’ve never even had a girlfriend. Old Xu tried to introduce you to his niece before—did you notice? He was so depressed when he realized you weren’t interested in her at all.”
Xing Jun laughed despite himself. He picked up his things, paused for a moment, and said, “It’s fine. I’m not in a hurry.”
“Not in a hurry? You don’t feel any urges at all? Or do you prefer men?”
“It’s not about gender. Well, to me, they’re more or less the same,” Xing Jun replied.
“Then what is it? Give me an example. What about that female painter you saw before?”
“There was nothing wrong with any of them. The problem is me—I’m overly suspicious. I’m always worried that people are after something when they get close to me. You know what my family was like before. Things only just stabilized after all that trouble, and I can’t afford another upheaval.” As he spoke, Xing Jun’s handsome face darkened. “I’m not planning to consider an intimate relationship for the next few years. For now, I’ll focus on making sure my sister has a good life.”
“All right, but being too suspicious isn’t good for you either,” Chen Fan said. “Speaking of which, your sister is eighteen now, right? She’s a beautiful young woman. You should pay more attention to her when you have the time. Don’t let some ill-intentioned person sweep her away. I hear international students are especially starved for affection, especially at that age.”
Xing Jun drove home from the boxing studio. He placed a high premium on privacy and lived in a villa halfway up a mountain, surrounded by the highest-grade security system money could buy. After returning home, he logged into his long-unused Instagram account and left a comment on one of his sister’s posts. Then he received a call from Xing Wei.
“Bro, are you really coming to my school?” Xing Wei asked. “Are you finally done with work?”
Xing Jun smiled. “Are you happy?”
“Happy—I guess! We haven’t seen each other in almost a year, after all!” Xing Wei said excitedly. “What are you coming for, anyway? I won’t have time to show you around all day.”
“To see how you’re living and who you have around you.” As Xing Jun scrolled through his sister’s Moments and Instagram, he remembered what Chen Fan had asked him. “By the way, is there a guy you like?”
Xing Wei posted constantly on Instagram, sometimes uploading more than a dozen posts a day. At first, he looked through them patiently, but after a while he no longer had the energy to examine each one. When he came across several vacation photos, he was about to swipe past them, but his finger stopped on one.
It was a group photo taken on a beach. A tall, beautiful young man stood beside Xing Wei, his face slightly turned away from the camera. Even in the blurry light, it was obvious that his skin was very fair.
He was looking at Xing Wei, smiling at her with a gentle expression.
“You know, at my age, my top priority is stanning celebrities—did you see my Moments cover? I’m so obsessed with him lately. He’s practically a princess…”
Xing Jun opened Xing Wei’s Moments cover. It showed a fair, beautiful boy-band idol holding a microphone, his eyes closed and his expression as fragile as an angel’s.
He switched back to Instagram and looked through the vacation photos again. To his surprise, Xing Wei had a separate photo with that same young man. The boy was helping Xing Wei straighten her scarf while smiling at the camera. His smile was delicate and seemingly innocent.
A little too much like green tea, a little too affected.
Years of fighting over the family inheritance made Xing Jun’s instincts sound an alarm: This person is trouble.
The smile faded from Xing Jun’s face until he became expressionless. “So this is your type.”
His fingertip tapped against the young man’s face, while he tuned out Xing Wei’s excited rambling about how she wanted to find him several husbands.
“Bro, when are you coming?” Xing Wei asked again. “The Dragon Boat Festival is this weekend, and I’m throwing a party. If you come, I’ll have to arrange to pick you up from the airport…”
“This weekend. Don’t worry about me.” Xing Jun’s eyes were still fixed on the young man’s face. “A Dragon Boat Festival party sounds great. Invite more people. Better yet, invite all your friends.”
“Oh, sure. Big bro, you’ve gotten so extroverted since you started working.” Xing Wei giggled. “I’ll introduce you to everyone when you get here. Maybe I’ll even be able to find you a sister-in-law.”
The call ended. Xing Jun was still staring at that photo. Suddenly, he let out a cold laugh.
Then he began spotting that same young man in the gaps between the other photos.
His smiles and styling were deliberate, carrying an affected artistic quality and an unmistakably dramatic air. Xing Jun scrolled back and forth, then started going through the accounts that had liked Xing Wei’s posts. He checked them one by one, and finally found the person’s account.
Cyan_S.
Cyan—what an obscure English name. The S was probably his surname.
Cyan_S was a private account, so Xing Jun could only see his profile picture: an artistically composed side profile of the young man wearing a shirt, his neck and collarbone exposed, his long hair falling around them. He looked even more beautiful than he had in the group photos. Xing Jun thought the picture was stunning, while at the same time feeling that everything was exactly as expected.
It was probably edited, he thought. Otherwise, how could anyone look this good?
Wasn’t his sister studying in some backwater town? Where could a beauty like this have come from?
Just then, Instagram—an app he hadn’t used in a long time—sent him a notification. Xing Jun frowned when he saw it, somewhat surprised.
The notification read: “Cyan_S followed you.”
