Shi Ran stepped aside.
The two characters for "hubby" caught her eye, leaving her momentarily dazed.
Cheng Zimiao had changed it himself using her phone.
On their wedding night. He'd taken her phone, saying he'd long been annoyed by the three characters of "Orange Cat," and had insistently held the screen up before her, demanding she try saying it out loud.
Her ears burned as she reluctantly asked, "Say what?" He said, "Hubby." She smiled mischievously and answered, "Okay, wifey." Cheng Zimiao said she was childish. She immediately shot back that he was the childish one. The two bickered like a pair of squabbling schoolkids. In the end, Cheng Zimiao kissed her.
The kisses were soft and lingering, trailing downward.
Gentle, tender, so light they didn't seem like Cheng Zimiao at all.
She knew he loved her slender, elegant fingers best, because after every performance he would catch her hand and press a light kiss to her fingertips.
Sure enough, he finally took her fingertip into his mouth, then looked at her, murmuring in that husky, moving voice, "I love you so much, wifey."
As he spoke, his soft tongue curled slightly, and the warm sensation at her fingertip traveled like an electric current through every limb and fiber of her being.
The way he looked at her made her feel, for the first time, that those radiant, peach-blossom eyes might hold only her alone.
That was also the first time he said he loved her.
Shi Ran took off her gloves.
Her fingertips were slightly wrinkled, numb, cold, carrying the sharp smell of disinfectant.
She answered the phone calmly: "Hello."
As Shi Ran's figure receded into the distance, Shen Lizhou stopped writing and quietly lowered his gaze.
Chen Anke also set down her camera and paused the recording.
She stepped forward and struck up a conversation with Shen Lizhou: "I really didn't expect Shi Ran to become a veterinarian…" Her tone carried a hint of probing, as if she were certain he'd known all along. "Though surprisingly, it suits her perfectly, doesn't it?"
"Yes." Shen Lizhou's reply was brief, polite, distant—impossible to read any extra emotion from it.
Just like in high school. Hard to get close to.
"Everyone's changed so much. Aili, who was hopeless at math back then, is now a lawyer, helping people split up estates and fight over kids, calculating every cent with perfect precision. Oh, do you remember Bao Chenggong? His family was in the restaurant business, but he ended up becoming a journalist—completely unrelated. And me, I used to hate writing essays more than anything, and now I've somehow ended up in self-media, racking my brains over copy every single day." Chen Anke laughed. "What about you? I remember you studied finance in university? What have you been up to lately?"
Shen Lizhou's reaction was somewhat slow.
He looked up at her, as if it took him a few seconds to register what she'd said, then replied, "Nothing much… just some trivial matters."
"Trivial matters?" Chen Anke laughed. "Not the kind of trivial matters in finance that involve tens of millions, are they?"
Chen Anke was deliberately trying to uncover the background of this mysterious high school classmate.
It had been less than ten years since graduation, and the economic climate had worsened year after year—many companies had gone bankrupt, and wealthy heirs had fallen into poverty overnight. She was curious: what kind of "trivial matters" could have transformed a poor student who once couldn't afford to eat into someone who casually drove a car worth millions, and who was treated with such deference by the owner of this lavish stray cat sanctuary?
Shen Lizhou shook his head.
He answered, "Something related to art and design."
"Ah," Chen Anke said, somewhat surprised. "You're still drawing."
She looked down at the file folder in front of Shen Lizhou and noticed that not only did it contain remarkably beautiful handwriting, but beside the notes were drawn portraits of cats.
Though they were just simple cartoon sketches, each one was vivid, and she could identify at a glance which cat from Shengsheng Sanctuary it depicted.
The style of the drawings was very familiar.
It matched the style of the sketchbook she'd seen in high school.
At the end of the second semester of junior year, on the first day back to school, Chen Anke had arrived especially early. She'd played wildly all winter break and relied on that morning time to quickly copy her homework.
There were many good students, but her favorite to copy from was Shen Lizhou. The reason was simple: his handwriting was especially pleasing to the eye, making the copying enjoyable and even somewhat improving her penmanship.
Besides, he had to walk his younger brother to school, so he always arrived earliest. That morning, his backpack was in his desk, but he was nowhere to be seen. Chen Anke, impatient, went straight up to rummage through it and accidentally pulled out a strange notebook.
A clean white cover, with not a single word written on it, no name signed.
She opened it, and every drawing inside was remarkably lifelike.
A student suddenly sitting up straight in class, distracted by a bird outside the window;
Arm in arm with a friend heading to the restroom, chattering excitedly about gossip along the way;
Squinting with satisfaction after eating a delicious snack;
Flashes of a dangerous smile at some classless male classmates;
Standing coldly with arms crossed because her family, worried about her hands getting injured, had forbidden her from taking volleyball class…
All of them were the same girl.
Shen Lizhou appeared at some point, his pale, indifferent eyes glancing at her without emotion, then he took the sketchbook from her hands and carefully smoothed out the creases left by her flipping through it.
Chen Anke had inadvertently glimpsed someone else's secret, and felt the pimples on her face flush red and hot.
"Sorry," she said. "I didn't mean to."
Shen Lizhou straightened the sketchbook, put it back into his schoolbag, and said, "It's fine."
The young man's expression was perfectly natural, as if he had no intention of hiding anything at all. But Chen Anke only felt more at a loss.
She hesitated, opening her mouth, then pressing her lips shut without saying anything, her mind entirely occupied with thoughts of Cheng Zimiao and Shi Ran. Until Shen Lizhou spoke up himself.
"I know she likes Cheng Zimiao," Shen Lizhou said, the corners of his lips tugging upward in a faint arc. "It's fine."
So Chen Anke let out a sigh of relief.
"That's good then," she said. After speaking, she instinctively wanted to offer him some words of encouragement, but then remembered that Shi Ran would soon be going abroad to further her piano studies, and Cheng Zimiao planned to go abroad as well, and felt there was no room for maneuvering in this matter. Then, thinking of her own first love that had fizzled out without resolution, she sighed deeply and said, "Actually, when you see someone every day, it's hard to forget them. After she goes abroad, it'll be better. You'll always move on and meet someone more suitable."
Shen Lizhou said nothing, his face turning somewhat pale.
A cold wind blew the classroom window open. It was the end of winter but spring had not yet arrived; the heating had been turned off, and the chill seeped into the bones.
It was too cold. When he handed his homework to Chen Anke, the paper trembled slightly.
Later, Chen Anke had considered bringing the matter up with Shi Ran.
She remembered it clearly. She simply found an opening and said, "I think Shen Lizhou likes you…"
Before she could finish, Shi Ran cut her off.
"Don't go around thinking things like that." Shi Ran gave her a disapproving look and said gently, "If someone likes you, they will definitely confess. If they don't confess, then they don't like you. This kind of speculation is very irresponsible."
Chen Anke immediately thought of Cheng Zimiao, who loved to play hard to get, and Shi Ran, who always repaid tit for tat, and quietly shut her mouth.
Those two had never confessed to each other—did that mean they didn't like each other at all?
But Chen Anke wouldn't dare say that. If she did, she'd definitely get scolded. What bad luck.
Not far away, Shi Ran walked back after finishing her phone call.
Her expression was calm. She quickly put her gloves back on and called out to her, "Let's continue."
Before raising the camera, Chen Anke glanced once more at Shen Lizhou's registration book.
She felt that when he drew Shi Ran, it was one style, and when he drew little cats and dogs, it was another.
For some reason, she couldn't shake the feeling that she had seen it somewhere before.
"British Shorthair, six months old," Shi Ran's voice continued, "Hmm… grade one patellar luxation on the right side." Her fingers gently pushed on the patella again, feeling a slight slide. "A common congenital issue in purebred British Shorthairs. It's still mild now, doesn't affect walking…"
The young man sat upright to the side, the pen tip moving along with her words, making a soft scratching sound.
By the time the free clinic ended, the sky had dissolved into a deep blue twilight.
The streetlights in the estate lit up one by one, their warm yellow glow like melted butter falling onto the velvet-blue dusk. The kitten wove around their legs, and the wind carried the coolness of evening mixed with the damp freshness of grass.
Shi Ran tossed her gloves into the medical waste bag and stretched with a long, lazy yawn.
Chen Anke crouched on the ground fiddling with her camera, while Shen Lizhou took apart and folded the portable operating table, then packed up the ultrasound machine, disinfection box, and the remaining medications and supplies one by one.
Wang Lixiang thanked her repeatedly: "Dr. Shi, I've dealt with no fewer than ten or twenty veterinarians, and you are truly the most professional." He glanced at Shen Lizhou's retreating figure and lowered his voice, "You mentioned wanting to open an animal clinic, right? You could go look at storefronts with Mr. Shen. He's very familiar with the entire animal protection industry chain in Lian City and has plenty of experience…"
"Is that so," Shi Ran said with a smile. "Then I'll ask for his opinion when the time comes."
Xiao Yu had already become Shi Ran's die-hard fan. Like the kitten, she hovered around her, endlessly asking questions about veterinary knowledge, saying that when she grew up, she wanted to become a veterinarian just like her.
"Of course you can—you're even more patient than I am." Shi Ran smiled and patted her head, then bent down and whispered in her ear, "But to be a veterinarian, you have to get into university first. If you keep finding excuses not to go to school, you won't be able to become one."
Xiao Yu's face flushed bright red in an instant. She turned to look at Wang Lixiang, who had been hesitantly glancing over and quickly averted his gaze.
"Today is Wednesday, not winter break, not summer break either. You've been here volunteering all day—do you really need him to tattle on you?" Shi Ran laughed, looking at Xiao Yu. "Going to school means facing a lot of difficulties. Whether it's not being able to learn a subject, not getting along with friends, or even being wronged or bullied… But being a veterinarian is the same. The coursework is hard, the exams are hard, cats and dogs don't understand you, and sometimes their owners understand you even less—it's difficulty on top of difficulty. If you can't steel yourself to face difficulties now, how can you become the person you want to be in the future?"
Xiao Yu bit her lip and said nothing.
Shi Ran patted her head again and said, "When you grow up, you'll become me. If one day you want to talk to your future self, Brother Lixiang has my phone number."
As she finished speaking, she felt a gaze from beside her. Turning her head, she met Shen Lizhou's eyes.
The man's light-colored pupils were softened further by the night, clear and translucent, with the lamplight reflected in them like scattered starlight. The starlight blinked, and he said softly, "Let's go."
They said goodbye to Wang Lixiang and walked out of Shengsheng Manor together.
"I really admire you, Shi Ran." Chen Anke finally had the leisure to ask, utterly bewildered. "How on earth did you become a veterinarian?"
"I'd been thinking about it since high school, but I never took that step," Shi Ran said. "Then I went abroad, made up my mind to stop playing piano, and gave my mom a heart attack from anger… In the end, they finally agreed."
Chen Anke's scalp tingled just thinking about Shi Ran's mother. "But veterinary school abroad isn't easy to get into, is it?"
"Veterinary medicine in the US is a doctoral program. You need to finish four years of undergraduate prerequisites first, with a GPA close to perfect, plus over a thousand hours of clinical animal experience, and the acceptance rate is under 10%." Shi Ran smiled. "I had nothing back then, so I could only go to community college to make up biology, chemistry, anatomy, and those courses. I attended classes during the day and worked part-time as an assistant at a pet hospital at night—washing cages, cleaning up, feeding animals their medicine… I did everything."
"Funny thing is," she said, "I really liked venting online back then, and I often consulted people for information. There was a netizen, probably an upperclassman or something, also Chinese… They privately messaged me saying that a clinical veterinary medicine professor at Washington State University might be recruiting recently, and told me to give it a try. They also gave me an email address. So I organized all my materials and sent them over. To my surprise, they actually gave me an interview opportunity."
"There really are good people on the internet. Back then people weren't so hostile, not like now…" Chen Anke sighed. "What happened after? Are you still in touch with that kind netizen?"
"We were at first." Shi Ran kicked at the dandelions by the roadside, white fluff drifting up with the wind. "The day I got my acceptance letter, he was the first person I told. But he seemed to have gone back to China later, and my studies got busier and busier—I was in the lab and animal hospital every day, so we chatted less. Eventually, we slowly lost touch."
"Whether it's love or friendship, nothing can withstand time and distance." Chen Anke sighed. Her phone rang, and her eyes lit up. "My crush is here to pick me up. I'm off!" Even as she ran, she didn't forget to remind Shi Ran, "Out with the old, in with the new—trust me, babe, there will always be new love and new friendship!"
Shi Ran responded with an amused sound, watching Chen Anke's light, brisk figure.
The night breeze blew. She took out her phone and, on a whim, searched for that chat log and scrolled up, seeing herself from a few years ago.
Naive, impulsive, carrying a stubborn foolishness that refused to admit defeat, and an endless appetite for sharing her life. Sometimes complaining that organic chemistry wasn't something humans were meant to study, sometimes showing off how she'd stayed up all night saving a little puppy that had been hit by a car…
Perhaps because it was a netizen, she could chat without any baggage. Some of her wild ambitions from back then, and some quite chuunibyou, nonsensical silly talk, made even her current self cringe a little.
【I want every little animal to have the right to live.】She had just euthanized a batch of unadopted elderly stray cats at the time and was feeling very low. 【But I know I can't do it. For the first time, I so clearly realize that I simply can't do the thing I want to do.】
That kind netizen had a strange sharpness—across the screen and the vast distance between them, they could always accurately sense her emotions.
Their replies were also always timely, carrying a reassuring steadiness.
【There are many people in this world.】The kind netizen said, 【In places you can't see, there will be others working alongside you to fulfill your dream.】
And the last few messages were several photos she'd sent with Cheng Zimiao on the eve of deciding to get married.
She said she was getting married, this was her fiancé—wasn't he handsome?
The other side seemed busy, silent for a long time before replying.
【Congratulations. I wish you eternal happiness, eternal joy.】
Shi Ran replied: 【Thank you! I wish you eternal happiness and eternal joy too!】
The conversation ended there.
Pat.
A drop of rain landed on the screen.
Shi Ran snapped back to the present and looked up. The light dimmed in that instant. A wide umbrella canopy covered the top of her head, blocking the streetlamp and the rain that had begun to fall in a fine drizzle.
"It's raining."
Shen Lizhou's voice was very soft.
The night wind blew urgently, and the young man precisely stepped half a pace forward, standing in the direction the wind came from. And so, beneath the small umbrella, there was no wind, no rain—a world of their own.
So close now, Shi Ran for the first time truly registered how tall he was.
He seemed about the same height as Cheng Zimiao, or even slightly taller, requiring her to tilt her head up a little, or pull him down, to get a clear look at his face.
But he naturally lowered his head to look at her, those amber eyes soaked clear by the rain and mist, perfectly reflecting her image.
After a pause, he asked.
"You're in a bad mood?"