“So you’re here,” Song Xinya said, her eyes curving into an even more dazzling smile. “Honey.”
Qin Yuhe felt that little hook tugging at his heart again.
It was as if a tiny feather were constantly tickling him from the inside.
That kiss at the airport—the kiss that had lasted barely two seconds, a kiss that was better than nothing—had planted a little hook in Qin Yuhe’s heart.
Because it had left him unsatisfied, he wanted more.
He wanted to hold her in his arms and kiss her to his heart’s content.
He wanted to kiss her until every bone in her body turned soft and weak, until she obediently nestled against him, gazing at him with those alluring, misty eyes before parting her swollen lips and saying to him, “Come in.”
And then everything would fall naturally into place.
He would do exactly as she wished and go in.
Song Xinya had merely called Qin Yuhe “Honey,” yet across the ocean, Qin Yuhe had already imagined an entire passionate encounter.
Song Xinya: Honey.
Qin Yuhe: She’s telling me to come in.
Fortunately, he had only thought it. If he had said it aloud, his beloved wife would have thought he was a pervert.
Song Xinya walked toward the bedroom as she removed her clothes along the way.
She shrugged off her sharply tailored camel-colored coat, revealing the outfit beneath.
The black sweater clung tightly to her figure, making her skin look even fairer while perfectly outlining her slim waist and full, soft curves.
A ring of black lace edged the neckline, encircling her slender, delicate neck and giving her the cool, untouchable air of something meant to be admired from afar but never defiled.
That was the thing about men: the more unattainable something was, the more they wanted it. The more sacred it appeared, the more they wanted to “defile” it.
The itchy, restless feeling in Qin Yuhe’s heart spread through his blood vessels like an electric current, leaving him tingling all over.
“You went out dressed like that today?”
Song Xinya looked down at herself. “There’s nothing wrong with this outfit. I’m covered up very well.”
She was covered up, all right.
But she was also incredibly sexy.
Her generous bust looked as though it might spill out at any moment, wrapped so smoothly in the black sweater that one glance was enough to make a person imagine the way it would bounce when she walked.
It left plenty to the imagination.
Qin Yuhe said, “Wear a loose sweater tomorrow.”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Girls with a large chest like me look especially fat in loose clothes.”
“Looking fat is fine.”
“It is not fine. It’s ugly.”
“When you dress like this…” Qin Yuhe swallowed and said, “You’re especially tempting.”
Song Xinya flicked her hair back and lifted her chin. “What’s wrong with being tempting?”
She was even getting smug about it.
Qin Yuhe said, “Your husband isn’t even by your side. Who are you trying to tempt?”
“Some dickhead.”
Qin Yuhe: “…”
“I’ve only ever heard ‘bakayarō.’ I’ve never heard ‘dickhead’ used that way.”
Song Xinya put on a mock-Japanese accent. “Yoshi, you handsome flower man, desu!”
Qin Yuhe: “………………………”
His wife was so bizarre.
No.
Correction: bizarre, but adorable.
Song Xinya went to take a shower. When she came out, she was wearing a thin, clingy nightdress.
Its hem stopped just an inch below the tops of her thighs.
Her long, slender legs were completely exposed.
Perhaps it was only Qin Yuhe’s imagination, but he always felt that whenever he wasn’t by her side, she dressed especially provocatively.
When he was with her, she dressed particularly conservatively.
The beautiful image flashed through his mind. Song Xinya lifted the covers, climbed into bed, and tucked herself in securely.
She picked up her phone and sent Qin Yuhe a message:
[Show me your hand.]
Qin Yuhe replied:
[Show me your legs.]
Song Xinya buried her face in the covers and laughed helplessly before calling him on video.
“I’m not flirting with you. I’m talking about something serious. I want to see your hand.”
Qin Yuhe said, “I’m talking about something serious too. I didn’t get a good enough look just now. I want to see your legs again.”
Song Xinya hooked a finger into the neckline of her nightdress and pointed the phone camera inside. A flash of soft, snowy-white skin appeared on the screen.
“Do you still want to see my legs now?”
Qin Yuhe leaned back in his chair, the tip of his tongue slowly tracing the back of his teeth.
“Now I want to see not only your legs, but something else too.”
Song Xinya had succeeded in teasing him. Looking at the desire and helplessness on his face, she flopped onto the covers and giggled for a while.
Once she was done laughing, she got down to business. “I want to see your hand. How is it recovering?”
Qin Yuhe held his palm beneath the camera.
Song Xinya saw that his hand had recovered more than halfway.
Over the past month, she had looked at his hand every day.
The scar in the center of his palm was fading a little more each day.
It was such a wonderful thing to see.
Every time she saw him getting better, Song Xinya’s heart leaped with joy. Nothing made her happier.
The man she loved was getting better day by day.
Song Xinya wasn’t someone who liked to indulge in melancholy, but whenever she saw his hand continuing to heal, a moist sheen would rise in her eyes.
She rubbed her eyes against the covers, not wanting Qin Yuhe to notice.
He noticed every time.
And every time, Qin Yuhe pretended not to see.
Song Xinya lifted her head from the covers and gazed at that beautiful, almost dazzling face on the screen. “At this rate, you’ll probably be able to come home from the United States in another month or two.”
Qin Yuhe asked her, “Do you miss me?”
“Yes.”
Qin Yuhe said seriously, “I’ll finish my treatment as quickly as I can and come back to see you.”
Illness was harder to deal with than a ghost.
It wasn’t something a person could simply decide to cure.
Song Xinya understood that, but of course she wasn’t going to say anything discouraging.
She gave him a sweet, radiant smile. “I’ll wait for you.”
…
In the blink of an eye, another half month passed.
The weather gradually turned colder. Along both sides of the roads, the maple trees changed from emerald green to red.
Layer upon layer of red maple leaves burned across the branches. When the autumn wind swept through them, they rose and fell like waves, stretching into an endless red sea.
Song Xinya was walking along a street lined with maple trees when a group of schoolgirls in uniforms ran toward her from the opposite direction.
“Look! These maple leaves are so beautiful. Just looking at them feels romantic.”
“Trust me, if you want to see maple leaves, you have to come to this Maple Leaf Street.”
“Flowers have meanings, just like maple leaves. Do you know what red maple leaves symbolize?”
“I know! Red maple leaves symbolize passion that never fades and love that lasts forever.”
“They say that if you preserve red maple leaves and give them to someone you like, you’ll receive their undying passion and eternal love.”
Song Xinya came to an abrupt stop.
At dusk, around sunset, when the temperature suddenly dropped and everyone was hurrying home, Song Xinya crouched by the roadside and picked up maple leaves.
She gathered countless red maple leaves—so many that they filled her bag, then stuffed the pockets of her coat, and finally filled fifty plastic bags.
When she got home, she began making red maple-leaf specimens.
It was her first time making specimens, and her hands were clumsy.
It didn’t matter. You were bound to get better with practice.
Late into the night, while everyone else slept, she lay over the table beneath the lamplight, making specimens.
She made five hundred specimens.
Five hundred specimens of red maple leaves, to be exact.
Her hands blistered and bled, bright red blood giving way to festering pus. She wrapped them in gauze and continued making the specimens.
That was how the five hundred red maple leaf specimens came to be.
From the five hundred, Song Xinya selected the most beautiful one and carefully placed it in the safe, intending to give it to Qin Yuhe when they met.
She had made the specimens in the room next door, without letting Qin Yuhe know.
It was a surprise she had prepared for him.
She would tell him when they met.
Another week passed.
Song Xinya received a call from Old Madam Qin asking her to return to the family home for dinner.
At the table, Old Madam Qin said to her kindly, “Little He’s birthday is coming up.”
Song Xinya was very surprised because Qin Yuhe had never mentioned his birthday to her.
Old Madam Qin explained why. “Little He doesn’t like celebrating his birthday because his parents divorced on that day. He was very young at the time, and it left him with a deep psychological scar. Every time his birthday came around, he would remember his parents’ divorce. Over time, he grew to dread his birthday.”
“A birthday is such a unique occasion. The Lantern Festival, the Mid-Autumn Festival, National Day—those holidays belong to everyone. But a birthday is the one holiday that belongs solely to you.”
“When Little He was young, before his parents divorced, he used to love celebrating his birthday. But their divorce cast a shadow over the day, and he never liked celebrating it again.”
Old Madam Qin took Song Xinya’s hand and said earnestly, “The reason Little He refuses to celebrate his birthday is that it reminds him of unpleasant things. But if something joyful happens on his birthday—something that can outweigh those unhappy memories—then perhaps he’ll come to love his birthday again.”
Song Xinya glanced at the calendar and circled Qin Yuhe’s birthday in red.
The day he left the country, she had promised to wait faithfully for him to return.
But now, she had made a new decision.
She didn’t necessarily have to wait for him to come back.
Because she could go to him.
She was going to New York to find Qin Yuhe!
She was going to give him a happy birthday!
