The county post and telecommunications office was bustling with noise.
People dressed in all kinds of clothes crowded around the counters, handling money transfers and sending letters.
Su Qiao had just come out of the supply and marketing cooperative, carrying a newly purchased thermos and two cotton-polyester towels.
She was just about to get on her gleaming Forever bicycle and head home when a young man in a postal green uniform came running after her, panting heavily.
“Comrade Su Qiao! Comrade Su Qiao! Wait!”
Su Qiao stopped and turned to look at him.
“You have a long-distance call! It’s from the military! They told you to hurry to the post office to answer it!” the young postal worker shouted, supporting himself on his knees as he struggled to catch his breath.
A long-distance call?
The pedestrians nearby immediately cast curious and envious glances in her direction.
In this era, let alone a long-distance call—even having a telephone installed at home was a remarkable symbol of status.
And a long-distance call from the military was even rarer.
Su Qiao’s heart stirred slightly.
Judging by the timing, her “high-tech” package should have arrived by now.
Finally couldn’t sit still anymore?
The corner of her lips curled up almost imperceptibly. She thanked the young postal worker, placed the things in her bicycle basket, and leisurely pushed her bicycle toward the post office.
The post office had a small booth specially set aside for long-distance calls, with a sign reading “LONG DISTANCE” hanging on the door.
A loud-voiced female operator was shouting toward the inside, “Su Qiao! Telephone! Hurry up! It’s a long-distance call from the military—it’s expensive!”
Under everyone’s watchful eyes, Su Qiao walked into the cramped telephone booth, which carried a faint smell of mildew and sweat.
She closed the wooden door, shutting out most of the noise outside.
The black, bulky Bakelite receiver still held the warmth left behind by the previous caller.
She calmly picked it up and placed it against her ear.
“Hello?”
Her voice was soft, carrying a hint of natural huskiness. Through the electrical transmission, it became slightly distorted.
There was a brief silence on the other end.
Only the crackling static unique to long-distance telephone lines could be heard, along with the heavy breathing of someone deliberately trying to keep himself composed.
He was listening.
He was making sure it was really her.
The corners of Su Qiao’s lips slowly curved upward.
She knew that the initiative was completely in her hands now.
She did not ask anything, simply waiting patiently.
Finally, that deep, magnetic voice she had grown somewhat familiar with came through the receiver, as though it had traveled across thousands of miles.
“It’s me.”
Only two words, concise and to the point, exactly his usual style.
Su Qiao could almost picture him right now. He was probably alone in some quiet room, gripping the receiver tightly with one hand while unconsciously clenching the other, his brows furrowed and his expression as stern as though he were interrogating a criminal.
She let out a soft laugh, lowered her voice even further, leaned forward slightly against the cold wall of the booth, and spoke in an incredibly intimate, breathy tone meant only for the two of them.
“What is it, Colonel Gu? It’s only been a few days since we last saw each other, and you already miss me so badly that you had to make a long-distance call just to hear my voice?”
Her words were like a soft feather.
Silence fell over the other end once again.
This time, even the heavy breathing disappeared.
Su Qiao could almost imagine that her bold and straightforward remark had left him completely speechless, his entire body frozen in place.
Even through the telephone line, she could sense his embarrassment and helplessness.
After a full dozen seconds, Gu Changfeng’s voice finally came again, carrying a hint of awkward irritation.
“…The package.”
He completely ignored her teasing and went straight to the point.
“You received it?” Su Qiao asked knowingly, her voice filled with amusement. “Do you like the gifts I sent you? How did those bottles of ‘syrup’ taste? Much better than plain water, right?”
She deliberately emphasized the word “syrup,” her tone full of mischief.
“Su Qiao!”
Gu Changfeng’s voice suddenly rose, carrying an urgency and loss of control that even he himself had not noticed.
He practically growled the words out, but immediately afterward, as though realizing he had lost his composure, he forcibly lowered his voice.
“I’m asking you—where did those things come from?”
His voice sounded increasingly hoarse and tense because of how hard he was restraining himself.
“Oh, you mean those?” Su Qiao deliberately drew out her words, leisurely enjoying the sight of him teetering on the edge of losing control. “I wrote it in the letter, didn’t I? My uncle in Hong Kong got them from overseas. What, you don’t believe me?”
“You don’t have an uncle!”
Gu Changfeng exposed her lie without hesitation.
He had gone through her background information countless times.
All her social connections were perfectly clear. Apart from that greedy aunt’s family who had already gotten themselves into trouble, she had no other relatives in this world.
“Oh?” Su Qiao let out an exaggerated sigh, her tone filled with innocence. “How do you know I don’t? Maybe it’s some distant relative I lost contact with years ago who only recently got in touch with me. Colonel Gu, you can’t just accuse me of something without proof.”
“Comrade Su Qiao!”
Gu Changfeng felt his temples throbbing.
He realized that the calmness and self-control he was so proud of were completely useless in front of this woman.
She was like a ball of cotton. No matter how hard you struck it, she could dissolve all your force effortlessly and then turn around and wrap herself tightly around you.
He took a deep breath and decided to change tactics. He would no longer beat around the bush.
“That watch,” he said word by word, his voice carrying an unmistakable interrogative tone. “Those boots, and that medicine. Do you know how valuable they are? Do you understand how much trouble their origins could cause?”
The smile faded slightly from Su Qiao’s face.
She knew that this was what he had really wanted to ask.
When a soldier encountered technology so far beyond the era, his first reaction was not to claim it for himself, but to be wary of its origins and the risks it might bring.
That made her think even more highly of him.
“Of course I know.” Su Qiao dropped her teasing tone, and her voice became serious as well. “Their value lies in making your training safer and easier. As for trouble… As long as you don’t say anything and I don’t say anything, who would ever know?”
Her voice carried a reassuring strength.
Yet Gu Changfeng still pressed on.
“Who exactly are you?”
That was the true purpose of his call tonight.
Su Qiao fell silent.
At both ends of the telephone line, there was only the crackling static.
She looked outside the booth at the people coming and going, each one hurrying about, struggling to make a living.
Sunlight streamed through the glass window, casting tiny columns of dust-filled light into the air.
This was the peaceful life she had fought so hard to obtain.
And the man on the other end of the phone was, in this era, the only legitimate “bond” she had.
Should she tell him?
Tell him that she was a wandering soul from the apocalyptic world more than a decade in the future, occupying the body of another woman?
Would he believe her?
Or would he think she was mentally ill—or worse, an enemy agent with ulterior motives?
She could not take that risk.
“Who am I?” Su Qiao finally spoke again, her voice carrying the faintest sigh, along with a hint of sly amusement. “I’m your legal wife, Su Qiao.”
She softly, sweetly uttered two words.
“Hubby.”
“Boom—”
Gu Changfeng’s mind instantly went blank.
Those two words were soft and sweet. Traveling through the electrical current, they were like a tiny hand with a hook, scratching fiercely at the very core of his heart.
The blood throughout his body seemed to rush straight to his head.
The veins on the hand gripping the receiver bulged.
He could even hear his own heartbeat pounding like a drum.
Outside the telephone booth, the female operator had already grown impatient and began pounding hard on the door.
“Hey! Are you done in there? There are people waiting!”
Hearing the knocking, Su Qiao knew she did not have much time left.
She leaned toward the receiver and, in an almost hypnotic voice filled with deadly allure, spoke softly, one word at a time:
“As for my secrets, and where those things came from… do you want to know?”
“Then… come back.”
“If you come back, I’ll tell you all my secrets to your face.”