Mother Ji was furious that Ji Zhaoxi had asked her classmate to help her trim the trees. In her words:
“How embarrassing!”
Who would ask a first-time guest to trim trees?
“Woof, woof, woof!” Ji Xinxin was delighted to see Ji Zhaoxi getting scolded and kept running circles around Mother Ji.
Wearing a sun hat and holding a huge pair of shears, Ji Zhaoxi stood under the blazing sun and argued righteously, “He agreed to it himself!”
Lu Huainan, who was also wearing a sun hat, said with a serious expression, “Auntie, I’m the one who wanted to trim the trees. I want to be a gardener when I grow up.”
Ji Zhaoxi gave Lu Huainan an approving look.
She hadn’t expected him to react so quickly this time.
Lu Huainan’s ears turned red. He looked away and fell silent.
Mother Ji: “…”
Father Ji stood in the shade, drinking tea in great gulps. Why was everyone else standing under the sun? It was so hot.
In the end, Lu Huainan didn’t go home until after he had tired himself out playing with the Golden Retriever. By the time he left, the dog was lying on the ground, completely exhausted. It fell asleep shortly afterward without even eating dinner.
After dinner, Ji Zhaoxi once again began patrolling her Weibo fan community.
She wanted to see who had been bad-mouthing her. She searched through the posts and found that most of them were praising her, with a few comments mixed in that she couldn’t quite understand.
“J.C.X. is actually pretty fun… I never used to be into her type. I always thought her voice was too soft, like a fly buzzing, but now I think the way she talks has its own charm too. [stroking chin]”
Ji Zhaoxi was so happy when she saw the comment that she immediately liked it with her alternate account.
“This Xixi is just going to keep melting my heart, isn’t she?”
Like!
“This woman’s singing is so awful. Can her fans stop blindly praising her? My ears are the ones suffering here!”
Ji Zhaoxi’s face flushed when she saw that Weibo post. This person had to be an anti-fan, right? But when she clicked into the account, the person really was one of her fans. She silently swiped past it.
“Sanzi really punished this woman in their chat. I didn’t expect her to fight back too. What a good girl.”
Ji Zhaoxi silently liked the post.
There were occasionally people in the fan community being sarcastic about her. Just as she was about to click in and fight them, she discovered that L had already started tearing into them.
“L: Is bullying honest people really that fun? You’re all taking advantage of the fact that she doesn’t know how to curse people out and dumping garbage all over her, aren’t you? [eye roll] [eye roll]”
“L: If you haven’t spent any money, then shut up. [confused] [confused]”
A passerby angrily threw out a screenshot. Who said he had never sent Ji Zhaoxi any gifts?
“L: Ten-something yuan? Anyone who didn’t know better would think you’d sent her several million. [confused] [confused]”
Whether or not the other person had spent money, L could always find an angle from which to mock them.
Ji Zhaoxi’s fans cursed at the anti-fans while cursing at L as well. L remained focused on attacking the anti-fans and didn’t even bother looking at the insults from Ji Zhaoxi’s fans.
After years of fighting online, he had long since gotten used to it.
“Um… who are you, handsome? Do you really need to speak up for Ji Zhaoxi? Just stay away from her, okay? [confused]”
“You pathetic loser! You’re even more annoying than those anti-fans.”
“Can you stop trying to get attention?”
As Ji Zhaoxi watched L get cursed at, she grew happier and happier. She liked the posts so quickly that sparks were practically flying from her fingertips.
Just then, a private message suddenly came through.
“L: You’re still awake?”
Ji Zhaoxi stared at his message and hesitated before replying.
“Ji Chaoxi’s Biggest Fan: What do you want?”
The reply came almost immediately.
“L: Oh, nothing. I was just asking. It’s late now, so you should go to sleep.”
Ji Zhaoxi’s brows drew tightly together.
“Ji Chaoxi’s Biggest Fan: I’ll sleep whenever I want. Don’t tell me what to do!”
This time, the reply came very slowly. Ji Zhaoxi felt that she had given L the wrong impression—that she was too easygoing.
On the other side of the screen, Lu Huainan stared helplessly at the chat window. He hadn’t been trying to control her; he had only been making a suggestion. Was she angry?
Lu Huainan lowered his eyes. She still didn’t know who he was, but paper could never wrap up a fire. Sooner or later, she would find out…
During this period, he had been having the same dream over and over again. In it, she discovered that L was him, and then never spoke to him again.
The two of them returned to the way they had been in high school—or rather, things became even worse than they had been back then.
Lu Huainan’s face went deathly pale.
“L: I’m sorry. I wasn’t trying to control you…”
Lu Huainan typed in a daze.
On the other side, Ji Zhaoxi was testing him again.
“Ji Chaoxi’s Biggest Fan: So that’s how it is. Thanks for your concern. I think you’re actually a pretty nice person. Are you also at A University? What department are you in, what year are you, and what’s your name?”
Lu Huainan had never seen anyone probe for information so directly.
This was his last chance—the last chance he would have to come clean. If he missed it, he didn’t know how long his conscience would torment him.
Lu Huainan felt as though it was becoming difficult to breathe. Cold sweat broke out all over his body, and the pale blue light from the screen shone across his bloodless face. His fingers trembled as he typed.
He typed, deleted, deleted, and typed again. Finally, he gritted his teeth and sent it.
“L: I’m sorry. I’m Lu Huainan…”
Her alternate account didn’t reply. He waited for a long time—so long that he began to think she had already fallen asleep and hadn’t seen his message.
Just then, his WeChat suddenly rang. She had sent him a message, along with a screenshot.
“Ji Zhaoxi: Hahaha, Lu Huainan, this person says he’s you.”
Lu Huainan’s heart stopped when he saw the WeChat message. He trembled.
“Lu Huainan: I’m sorry. It really is me.”
He frantically began typing in his notes app. He typed about his regret and the reason he had done it in the first place. His hands were shaking so badly that he almost thought he had Parkinson’s disease.
He typed for a long time. He wanted to copy the apology from his notes into the chat window, but the window said the message was too long. He deleted and edited it repeatedly, preparing to send it in more than a dozen separate messages.
But would she find so many words exhausting to read? She had said before that she didn’t like long-winded essays.
Just as he finally sent the condensed version of his apology, a red exclamation mark appeared.
“Ji Zhaoxi has enabled friend verification. You are not her friend. Please send a friend request first. You can chat once the other person has verified you.”
Outside the window, the night roiled in darkness. The cicadas chirped incessantly, while the wind gently stirred the leaves. The shadows of the trees swayed ceaselessly across the ground.
A knock suddenly broke the silence. The door opened, letting in a sliver of light.
“Brother, about that bear you got last time…” His younger brother opened Lu Huainan’s bedroom door with a worried frown.
When he saw the scene before him, his face turned pale with fright.
The room was extremely dark. The curtains had been left open, and Lu Huainan lay fully dressed on the carpet. The cold moonlight shining through the window illuminated his face. He held his phone in one hand and was crying silently, his expression icy.
His younger brother sucked in a sharp breath.
His brother looked like a ghost. It was terrifying.
He asked cautiously, “Brother, about that giant bear…”
Lu Huainan stared blankly at the ceiling. His tears had soaked the carpet beneath him.
In a soft voice, he said, “She’s never going to forgive me…”
His younger brother faltered, then continued, “My wife wants one of those bears too. How did you get in touch with them back then?”
Lu Huainan’s tears streamed down his face like noodles as he choked out, “She blocked me.”
His younger brother looked at Lu Huainan lying on the floor, at a loss for words. Wasn’t it perfectly normal for her to block him? His brother’s mouth was just too sharp.
“Bro, you should take care of that bear first—”
Lu Huainan closed his eyes coldly, letting his tears run freely down his face.
“I’ll atone with my life.”
His younger brother scratched the back of his head. “It’s really not that serious, bro.”
Though, even dying to atone might not earn her forgiveness. Wouldn’t that make dying pointless?
Not that he even knew what his brother had done wrong.
