The thick darkness of night was driven away as dawn broke. Rosy clouds gathered at the horizon, and the pale white of early morning bloomed into magnificent orange-red, until brilliant white spread across the entire sky.
The sun rose, its light shining bright.
The man sitting at the bedside held the young girl’s fingers, silent as a statue, maintaining the same posture he had kept all night without moving.
Only when daylight fully arrived, after the doctors and nurses had come by several times, and the last trace of dawn filled the corners of the hospital room, completely dispelling the darkness, did he let out an almost imperceptible sigh of relief.
His childhood sweetheart hadn’t disappeared.
She hadn’t vanished like in countless hazy nights, when she would nestle in his arms only to dissolve into nothing the moment dawn appeared, leaving not a trace behind.
She was sleeping here, alive and real.
Pei Yuli gently stroked her cheek.
His phone screen lit up with a familiar number. He rose quietly, but didn’t leave the hospital room.
He stepped into the reception room of the suite and answered the call.
An excited voice, thick with gossip, burst through, clearly determined to get to the bottom of things:
“What’s going on? I heard you injured some young girl last night and rushed her to the hospital overnight!”
“Holy crap—did the old bachelor finally clear out his inventory, or was this assault? Is she okay?”
In the reception room, the man’s well-defined fingers gripped the phone, his expression indifferent:
“Don’t talk nonsense and ruin someone’s reputation.”
The person on the other end chuckled:
“Just tell me—are you at the hospital?”
There was a brief pause in the breathing on the line. The man standing in the reception room, his phoenix eyes half-lowered, turned his sharply chiseled face in another direction, gazing through the glass at the small figure on the hospital bed.
His voice was soft, his breathing deliberately slowed, as if afraid of waking the person on the other side:
“My Suisui is back.”
The excited male voice on the phone cut off abruptly. It took a while before he recovered:
“Who did you say? Wen Sui?”
Pei Yuli answered with an “Mm.”
The man on the phone cried out in shock:
“Seriously? Where has she been? It’s really Suisui? Holy crap!! This is huge news—why didn’t you tell me in advance!”
“Tell Suisui her Youxi-ge will be right there! Oh, and which hospital—”
The blanket on the hospital bed shifted, and a slender hand emerged into the sunlight.
Pei Yuli’s brows lifted slightly: “Hanging up.”
He strode toward the door and pulled it open.
The young girl on the hospital bed sat up.
The loose blanket pooled at her waist, and the hospital gown hung somewhat too loosely on her, making her look all the more delicate.
She scanned her surroundings, then, hearing the movement, looked in his direction, and their eyes met.
The two stared at each other.
Pei Yuli’s throat bobbed as he swallowed, feeling a bit nervous, and was just about to speak.
Then the girl on the bed patted her own head, muttering something about “such a long storyline,” before smoothly lying back down and pulling the blanket over her head.
The nurse nearby was stunned.
Pei Yuli’s thin lips curved slightly. With long strides, he walked over and lowered his voice:
“Suisui.”
A few slender fingers emerged from under the blanket, pressing down on the soft edge, denting it slightly.
Half of a pretty little face peeked out—exquisite features, round almond eyes, thick lashes curving gently upward, forming a natural arc with the shape of her eyes.
She blinked at him, her voice coming from inside the blanket, slightly muffled:
“Pei Yuli?”
Pei Yuli answered with an “Mm,” coaxing her:
“Wake up? Are you hungry? Do you want something to eat? I had someone buy your favorite breakfast—crab roe soup dumplings from Sixi Bridge, phoenix claw spring rolls from Guangwen Road, Sister Zhou’s black sesame paste, and those corn and pork wontons from that place that’s been open for years…”
Such familiar words.
Her parents had been busy with work and entrusted her to the Pei family. She and Pei Yuli had grown up together since they were in diapers.
Pei Yuli had always spoiled her.
Her slender fingers, gripping the blanket, slowly tightened, bit by bit, pulling the blanket down until her entire young, radiant face was revealed.
She looked at him, her slender fingers reaching out to gently touch his face.
“Am I dreaming? Pei Yuli, you look a little different…”
Her voice was slow and drowsy, her fingertips warmed from being tucked under the blanket landing on the man’s slightly cool face, like the gently fluttering wings of a butterfly.
The man’s eyes were half-lowered. He raised a hand and caught her fingertips.
“Not the same as when you were nineteen, right?”
His deep voice was remarkably calm, and his sharp, angular eyes curved slightly.
“I know you must have a lot of questions, Suisui. Let’s eat something first, and then we can talk slowly. All right?”
The morning light spilled through the glass onto the floor, slowly shifting angles as the sun rose.
It crept over the corner of the table, flowed across the freshly cut pale-yellow freesias in the vase, and finally turned into glittering honey, shimmering at the edge of the girl’s trembling lashes.
“So this is seven years later? That night I came out of the library, and then I disappeared for seven whole years?”
“I don’t know what happened… Yesterday—”
She paused, then corrected herself.
“—that day, I had been studying too hard and was a little hungry, so I went out to get something to eat. The next thing I knew, someone was forcing drugs on me. I don’t know who it was… and then I was pushed into your room.”
The man’s sharp eyes darkened for a moment, a chilling flash of murderous intent passing through them, though his tone remained gentle.
“All right. I’ll take care of this.”
His voice was calm, the corners of his lips still curved upward, but the assistant behind him bowed his head even lower, thinking to himself that someone was about to be in serious trouble.
The girl looked at him, spooning up a wonton but not eating it.
Her gaze drifted evasively away from his face as she asked, feigning nonchalance:
“All these years, have you often had situations like this? Girls being sent to your room?”
“No.”
The man’s jet-black eyes fixed on her without evasion, looking straight at her, his tone grave:
“Wen Sui, I have never touched anyone else.”
The girl, who had been listening with all her ears, coughed lightly, and fragments of the previous night involuntarily surfaced in her mind again.
Pei Yuli calling himself her husband, pinning her into a corner, his gaze practically licking over her, almost brazenly inhaling the scent of her hair.
Her childhood friend was cool and reserved, gentle and refined.
Wen Sui had never seen this side of Pei Yuli.
Her ears grew a little hot, and her hand holding the spoon went weak as she nodded vaguely.
Pei Yuli felt inexplicably nervous, like a husband doubted by his wife. His fingers tightened, his voice hurried:
“Suisui, I haven’t dated anyone all these years, I—”
“Wen Sui!”
A hearty male voice cut him off, accompanied by hurried footsteps. A man in a silver-gray suit came in carrying flowers, his astonishment barely concealed:
“It really is you!”
The girl raised her lashes, looking at that face far more mature than the one in her memory, and called out his name with perfect accuracy:
“Long time no see, Shen Youxi.”
Shen Youxi circled around her, clucking in admiration:
“Forever young, huh, Wen Sui? How are you exactly the same as before—not a single change?”
“Compared to you, even you, Master Youxi, in the prime of your life, look like an old man now.”
Shen Youxi made himself at home, finding a seat and sitting down:
“By the way, where have you been all these years? Yuli has been searching for you—he’s nearly gone mad looking! You have no idea, just last month there was a possible sighting of you at Fang Mountain, and Yuli rushed over overnight, only to be—”
“Youxi—”
Pei Yuli cut him off:
“Suisui just woke up and she’s still a bit dazed. Let’s talk about our friends instead.”
The girl sitting beside him seemed to sense something. She blinked her dewy eyes over at him and asked nervously:
“Were you hurt?”
“Was it anything that serious?”
The man’s phoenix eyes curved slightly, his tone calm as he stroked her head.
“I was deceived. Came back empty-handed, all alone.”
Shen Youxi glanced at him, seemingly unable to bear it, and nodded helplessly, changing the subject on his behalf:
“You have no idea how much has happened these seven years. Everyone from our batch—graduating, PhDs, going abroad, starting businesses, getting engaged, cheating, second marriages—you name it, they’ve done it. The old PE rep just held his baby’s one-month banquet last month. I even went to drink at the celebration…”
Shen Youxi chattered on and on.
The jaw-dropping wealthy-family gossip made Wen Sui more and more astonished as she listened, her eyes growing wider and wider, and every now and then she’d lean in to ask a question or two.
Rarely having such an eager audience, Shen Youxi grew more and more animated, talking until his throat was parched:
“…The third time I got dumped, my ex-girlfriend found herself a little wolf pup—oh right, he goes to the same university you did!”
Wen Sui let out a drawn-out, sympathetic “ahhh.”
A glass of water was handed to him, interrupting their conversation.
With slender, well-defined knuckles, even the gesture of holding the glass looked exceptionally elegant.
Shen Youxi rolled his eyes and poured himself a glass:
“Your Yuli-ge is so considerate. I’ve been talking till I’m foaming at the mouth, and he’s over there striking poses!”
Having known each other for years and bickered countless times, Wen Sui was used to it, only pressing her lips together in a smile.
Shen Youxi took a sip of water, watching his old friend Pei Yuli’s gaze stay glued to Wen Sui’s face, and his own drinking slowed.
All these years, that man had risked his life searching for her, diving headfirst into obvious traps, narrowly escaping death several times—all for fear of missing even the tiniest chance of finding Wen Sui.
Now that she was here, he was playing the composed gentleman again.
Shen Youxi gritted his teeth, exasperated at the man’s misfortune and infuriated by his lack of fight, and abruptly changed the subject:
“Anyway, Suisui, now that you’re back, you’ll be going to school, right? So when are you going to take responsibility for our President Pei?”
Before Wen Sui could even figure out who President Pei was, she saw Shen Youxi grinning wickedly:
“Suisui is still young and beautiful. Soon you’ll be surrounded by handsome young guys.”
“But our President Pei has wasted away his years, waited bitterly for seven whole years—waiting from black of night to white of day—practically turned into the rock of a wife-awaiting husband.”
He went further and further, his tone playful and drawling:
“Wen Sui, you have to take responsibility.”
“Pei Yuli followed you from a young age—carrying your bag, hauling your water, doing your duty shifts, cooking your meals, bringing you clothes when the wind blew, picking you up in the rain, waking you up, tutoring you in your homework… he’s been like your little child-husband, from childhood to now, without missing a single beat.”
“Suisui, you can’t dislike him just because he’s older and throw him away.”