Although Mi Cai called me a fool, it was a form of caring reproach. This care seemed to have driven away the severe cold I had endured for the past hour. I smiled at Mi Cai and said, “You’re quite foolish too, coming out in your pajamas. Only silly girls would go shopping or grocery shopping in such thick pajamas!”

Mi Cai looked at herself, pointed at the pattern on her clothes, and asked me, “Don’t you think this outfit is fun? There are little bears and kittens.”

“Indeed, it’s quite interesting!” I agreed.

Mi Cai smiled and said, “When I saw your message on my phone, I rushed out immediately. If you were so foolish as to stay out in the cold, I would feel guilty.”

“In fact, it turns out I am a bit foolish, but…”

“But what?”

“You rushed out not just because of the guilt you mentioned, but because you were worried about me.”

Mi Cai looked at me and was silent for a while before she said, “Alright, I admit I was worried about you. So, to ease my worry, can you go back now? Go home, drink some ginger soup, and rest. Don’t catch a cold!”

“You’re not being fair!”

Mi Cai was a bit puzzled, “How so?”

“Following the principle of ‘everyone for me, and I for everyone’, shouldn’t you be the one to make the ginger soup for me? I’ve made it for you several times.”

“But you also often infuriate me to the point of death. By that logic, shouldn’t I do the same to you?”

I smiled and didn’t respond to Mi Cai’s words. In my heart, however, I hoped that she could also infuriate me to the point of death from time to time. At least it would prove that our lives were still connected. I really didn’t want us to become strangers one day, or to leave each other’s world.

……

That night, Mi Cai eventually gave up on the idea of tit-for-tat and chose to follow the principle of ‘everyone for me, and I for everyone’. She accompanied me back to the old house, and I indeed caught a cold, lying in bed and sneezing non-stop.

After a while, Mi Cai brought me a bowl of ginger soup she had made. She sat by the bed and watched me, but I didn’t have much confidence in the soup.

“Drink it. I made it according to your method, and I added some brown sugar.”

“Oh, as long as you didn’t add poison.”

Mi Cai ignored my loose tongue and looked at the photo frame on the TV cabinet. The photo in the frame was one I had recently stolen from her office drawer.

“Zhao Yang, can you put these photos away?”

I sneezed heavily and shook my head, “No, you don’t know that Mr. Ban personally put them in the frame, do you?”

“Ah! ……”

“He said that the photos would fade if they were kept in a book, so he put them in a frame.”

“Oh, but……”

I interrupted, “Are you afraid that your pouting, cute, and peace-sign poses will disgust others? ……Actually, you’re overthinking it. Besides you and me, basically no one comes to this room.”

“I see. Keep them if you want. It’s you who will be disgusted, not me.” Mi Cai’s tone was somewhat displeased.

I added fuel to the fire, “I look at them every day, so I’m immune to the disgust. They ward off evil spirits, and I sleep soundly at night, haha……”

Mi Cai looked at me without any expression, which made me nervous. The calmer she appeared, the more likely she was brewing a plan to torment me. But I couldn’t help it, I was a bit of a masochist and loved to tease her.

As it turned out, Mi Cai didn’t hold a grudge against me. She just urged, “Zhao Yang, finish the ginger soup in one go.”

“Wouldn’t that scald my mouth?”

Mi Cai questioned, “Are you really sick? You’re not drinking the ginger soup, but you still have the energy to laugh like a ghost!”

I immediately pulled out a tissue from the bedside table, blew my nose, and handed it to Mi Cai, saying, “Look, the big snot doesn’t lie. I really have a cold!”

Mi Cai didn’t say anything, but she leaned back to keep a distance from the tissue with the big snot.

I threw the tissue into the trash can with a bit of disappointment and complained, “I’m so disgusting to you, can’t you give me some reaction?”

Mi Cai still looked at me calmly and said, “The more I deal with a lowbrow person like you, the more excited you get… You should drink the ginger soup quickly. I need to clean up and go to bed!”

I finally put away my mischievous heart, picked up the ginger soup that had cooled down a bit, and finished it in a few gulps. Then I handed the bowl to Mi Cai, who took it and prepared to leave.

“Wait…” I looked at her retreating figure and called out to her.

She turned her head but didn’t smile, “What is it?”

I found it hard to speak, and finally chose a subtle way to ask, “Don’t you feel that we’re not as close as we imagined? Like right now… even though we’re in the same room, but…”

After a moment of silence, Mi Cai looked at me and said, “We’re also not as distant as we imagined.”

I stared at her. Perhaps she was right. We were not distant, but we were like a colorful leaf falling on a humble heart. But I still plucked up the courage to say, “Come back to Xuzhou with me on New Year’s Day. It will be very lively there during the New Year.”

“You told me that last time.”

“You said you were going to spend the New Year in America…”

“Mm, but I’m back now.”

“So, you have nowhere else to go, you can only go to Xuzhou with me…”

“Yes, yes… I have nowhere else to go. Please take me in.”

I was overjoyed, and she smiled and left in my ecstasy. But I forgot to say goodnight to her.

It didn’t matter, because I never liked to say goodnight in my joy, as it would interrupt my happiness.That night, I had a dream. In the dream, a colorful butterfly landed in the palm of my hand. It was so pleasing to the eye that I greedily stared at it, yet I didn’t have to worry about rubbing off its beautiful colors due to the struggle after capture. It stayed in my palm for a long time before it fluttered its wings. I looked up and followed it with my eyes, only to suddenly see a crystal-clear city gradually merging with the colorful butterfly.

In the dream, I understood: perhaps the colorful butterfly was the woman with long hair hanging over her shoulders.

……

When I woke up the next day, it was almost noon. I habitually checked the time on my phone and found a message from Le Yao. She asked me to call her after I got up.

I immediately called her, and she quickly answered the phone. I asked, “What’s up?”

“Invite Mi Cai for lunch today. I’ll treat her and explain yesterday’s incident for you.”

I smiled and said, “No need to explain, we’re fine now.”

“Did you appease her?”

“I wouldn’t say appease, but we’re okay now.”

“How did you manage that?”

I was about to answer when Le Yao said, “I asked too much. If she really cares about you, she will definitely forgive this misunderstanding that was baseless in the first place.”

I remained silent, feeling that Le Yao made sense. At this moment, I absolutely believe that Mi Cai cares about me. But why didn’t I confess to her last night?

I still couldn’t get over that hurdle. Because a colorful leaf fell on a humble heart. The leaf temporarily found a place to rest, but the humble heart was afraid it couldn’t hold onto the colorful leaf. The leaf’s departure only needed a gust of wind, unless I had the ability to build walls on all sides to block that damn wind. But do I have that ability now?

……

After ending the call with Le Yao, I lit a cigarette and sat on the bed without washing up. Halfway through the cigarette, I suddenly thought of Le Yao again. If I took Mi Cai back to Xuzhou, what would she do?

She had specifically rushed back from Beijing to accompany me. I couldn’t just leave her alone in Suzhou, but I also couldn’t take her back to Xuzhou with Mi Cai. That would be too inappropriate!

————-

This is to make up for what I owed yesterday.