She was about to close the door when a muffled thunderclap sounded outside.
“Oh no.”
“I don’t know if Xia Xia brought an umbrella.”
Lin Hong rushed to the cabinet, grabbed a rain umbrella, and turned to head out. Fang Zeqing stepped forward quickly and stopped her. “I’ll go.”
“Hurry then. She probably headed to the main road to catch a cab. I offered to drive her, but she refused.”
Fang Zeqing stepped out of the gate. Raindrops were already splattering unevenly on the ground. The rain fell faster than he could run. The villa district had many forks in the road; he scanned left and right for a white figure, but saw nothing. As the downpour intensified, he kept moving without pause.
He walked all the way to the end of the road, saw no sign of her, and figured she must have caught a ride already. He considered turning back.
But just around the next bend, as he glanced over, Fang Zeqing froze.
The girl who had been all smiles moments ago now sat on a roadside bench, wiping away tears. She was crying hard; rainwater mixed with her tears streaming down her cheeks, soaking her hair. The bench and her white skirt darkened with sorrowful stains.
Like a rain-soaked little flower.
Had she…
Did Lin Hong bully her?
Or give her a hard time?
Fang Zeqing clenched his fist, then stepped forward and opened the umbrella, holding it out to her.
For a moment, he didn’t know what to say. He opened his mouth, then closed it.
They were too much of strangers.
Delivering the umbrella was enough.
Before she could look up, Fang Zeqing had already walked away.
That day, Li Xia had received news of her grandfather’s passing in Nanlin. She held it together until she left Lin Hong’s house before breaking down. She never saw who gave her the umbrella and always thought it was some kind passerby who took pity on her.
Later, she asked Fang Zeqing why he hadn’t spoken to her.
Fang Zeqing said, “Truth is, I stood at that corner watching you for a long time. I saw you finish crying and stand up, your skirt soaked through a huge patch. I was a bit worried inside. Then I watched you pull a shirt from your bag, tie it around your waist to cover up, wipe your face with tissues, compose yourself, and walk on with the umbrella.”
He remembered clearly the inexplicable emptiness he felt then.
“How to put it? I guess I was a bit rebellious. That period, I was pretty cold and detached. I didn’t like initiating connections. You knew my mom, and I hated the idea of being set up or monitored in dating. You know that feeling? Realizing you might want a story with someone, but struggling to take that first step, to write the story yourself. So I waited, missed the chance, and told myself it wasn’t meant to be.”
“Besides, you didn’t know me at all.”
“So later, when we started chatting, it felt easy because we had no other roles—just a direct connection.”
–
Finding Li Xia’s Instagram had been a happy accident.
Lin Hong mentioned that her book was selling well domestically, so the publisher had released an English version. She was thrilled and proud, boasting that it was now available overseas.
Fang Zeqing was skeptical.
He decided to search Instagram and ask a friend to buy a copy for support.
One utterly ordinary evening, he typed the English title of Lin Hong’s book into the search bar and hit enter. Few results popped up, most unrelated. Fang Zeqing clicked through them one by one and stumbled on a photo of Lin Hong’s English edition physical book.
In the image, the Chinese and English versions sat side by side.
The caption read: 【My biggest achievement since entering the industry. The process was tough, but I did it! From now on, I’ll repeat daily: I’m awesome!】
Fang Zeqing’s heart stirred. He tapped into the profile picture and homepage.
That instant, he knew.
It was her.
That night, Fang Zeqing scrolled through every photo and post on her page. After about three minutes of thought, he reached out and hit follow.
“Simple reason at the time,” Fang Zeqing said later. “I was afraid I wouldn’t find your ID again.”
When Li Xia found out, she teased, “You just wanted to make your presence known.”
Fang Zeqing burst out laughing and kissed her. “If you say so.”
But he never regretted taking that step.
Because it gave him the chance to meet another side of Li Xia.
A bold, uninhibited one. Cute and fun. And crucially, one interested in him.
She always wanted to see his abs, his back muscles, making bold demands.
One time, she even wanted to hear him shower.
Fang Zeqing would blush every time, unable to hide his smile.
Helpless yet amused, he thought, Guess I need to work out more.
Sometimes he wondered if this was really the same editor handling Lin Hong’s book. She seemed a bit unreliable.
The thought made him chuckle again.
It was also the first time Fang Zeqing realized that chatting with Li Xia turned his awkward tongue fluent in flirtation.
He would pace his room anxiously, racking his brain for witty replies to keep things lively.
After a few days back and forth, he realized that bold, straightforward words worked best on Li Xia—no beating around the bush.
She had him wrapped around her finger all day.
But Fang Zeqing was happy to be.
When his friends noticed, they warned, “A girl who jumps straight to asking for abs pics? She’s just playing around, having a fling on a whim. It won’t last—don’t take it too seriously.”
Fang Zeqing wasn’t listening. He only asked, “Then how can I make sure it’s not just a whim on her part?”
His friend looked at him, utterly speechless, his mind filled with the thought, Are you some lovesick fool?
In the end, the friend just said, “Good luck.”
Fang Zeqing nodded.
Outsiders might not understand, but Fang Zeqing knew better than anyone.
It was like sinking into a profound stillness, descending deeper and deeper until you reached a silent madness.
And then, someone knocked at the door from the outside.
She tossed pebbles, one by one, into the lake of your soul, stirring ripples you couldn’t ignore. Even the echo of her voice turned the world’s silence into a roar.
Fang Zeqing opened the door of his own accord.
In his quieter moments, he admitted to himself that he was selfish. He didn’t want to become a lifeless mountain, so he clung greedily to the single spark Li Xia had tossed his way. He fed it fuel, coaxed it into a blaze. He feared its extinction above all else—especially in those times when his projects dragged on, keeping him from returning home early.
There was no word on his Cannes entry, and he stopped waiting.
The longer he talked with Li Xia, the more he realized there were far more important things to do.
He didn’t want to wait for Godot.
He wanted to seize every chance, no matter how slim, to see her.
On the day he headed to the temple, Fang Zeqing had just finished his meeting with his business partners. It was already past noon. At eleven that morning, Li Xia had sent him a photo of her drawing lots at the God of Wealth Temple. It wasn’t one of her business trip days, and he desperately wanted to join her on this little adventure.
He checked her step counter on his phone. She was still moving. Guessing she hadn’t left the scenic area yet, he set off without a second thought.
He’d left in such a rush that by the time he realized his phone was about to die, he was already speeding along the elevated highway.
Fang Zeqing pressed the accelerator, feeling a touch of madness in himself.
Who showed up unannounced like this, without even a heads-up?
Yet deep down, he felt a quiet thrill—and a knot of nerves.
He had a plan: once he reached the site, he’d find a power bank, charge his phone, and call Li Xia right away.
If she wanted to see him, he’d be there in an instant.
He wouldn’t waste a single second.
He had never felt a city so alive with meaning before—or been quite so desperate to move through it.
Umbrella in hand, Fang Zeqing climbed the mountain path alongside other tourists. Minutes ticked by, and he slowly realized he probably wouldn’t catch sight of Li Xia today. But the temple was just ahead now, so he pressed on.
Then he saw them: throngs of pilgrims milling about, umbrellas bumping against one another in a chaotic sea.
Finding anyone in that crowd would be impossible—faces were all but hidden beneath the domes of fabric.
Fang Zeqing sighed inwardly.
His ideas really had been a bit foolish.
He decided to contact Li Xia first. By now, he had to be very close to her.
The rain in Jiangnan showed no signs of letting up. Fang Zeqing tilted his head to the sky, where a murky gray blanketed everything.
It wouldn’t stop anytime soon, he thought.
He wondered if she had an umbrella.
Skirting the most crowded path, Fang Zeqing finally reached the temple gate. He scanned the area for a shop where he could charge his phone, his steps faltering slightly. But a quick look around turned up nothing. With no other choice, he ventured further inside.
A crowd had gathered under the eaves, no doubt sheltering from the downpour. Fang Zeqing planned to circle around them.
That was when, lifting his eyes through the misty rain, he caught a glimpse of a slender figure.
He thought he’d imagined it.
Steadying himself, Fang Zeqing looked again.
The rain pattered steadily against his umbrella.
All around, the red dust of the mortal world churned amid the endless throng.
He stood rooted to the spot, watching as Li Xia gazed up at the rain from beneath the eaves. She reached out a hand to catch the clear droplets.
In that instant, Fang Zeqing understood.
It was fate.