Chapter 10

Three months ago, the day Ji Shu left Nancheng, he had lost contact with her.

He had thought she was sulking. Thought that if he appeared at graduation three months later, she would soften and take him back.

But she had left three months ago.

Her breakup message hadn't been a tantrum.

She had meant it.

His eyes reddening, Jiang Zhixu seized the professor's arm.

“Do you have her contact details? I've called so many times, sent so many messages. She hasn't answered any of them.”

“I'm afraid I can't help.”

The professor declined tactfully.

“Would you mind stepping aside? We still have photographs to take.”

“Then can you tell me which country she's studying in?”

“Britain.”

As the professor walked away, Jiang Zhixu couldn't even summon the courage to follow.

He stood motionless for a long time. Only when the photographs were finished and everyone had left did he seem to wake from a dream.

His knees gave way.

At last, he understood. He had lost the person who mattered most.

Whatever it took, he had to get her back.

London, England.

After a day of classes, Ji Shu shouldered her backpack and walked toward her apartment.

The sky here was always overcast, as though rain might fall at any moment. She felt the cold easily. Since arriving, she had found the weather both chilly and oppressive. Every day after class, she went home alone and ate alone. It was hard.

Before, she would have had plenty of people to turn to.

Jiang Zhixu. Wen Ran. Lin Yanan.

All three had betrayed her at once.

When she first arrived, she had switched on her phone and seen Jiang Zhixu's messages. She had seen the photograph Lin Yanan sent, too.

She hadn't replied. She had thrown away her old SIM card and stopped using that WeChat account.

A new SIM. A new account.

She meant to start over.

In her third month here, her old roommates contacted her.

A new message appeared in their dorm sisters' group chat. Someone tagged her.

[Shushu! Big news! That scumbag came to campus looking for you today!]

[Asked if we knew where you were. None of us told him.]

[But I think the professor told him you're in Britain. Think he'll come after you?]

[The nerve of him. Cheats with your best friend, ignores you for three months, then has the gall to show up at your university?]

[Exactly! Did he think all he had to do was turn up and you'd be his girlfriend again? Shameless.]

She hadn't given her new details to her old school friends, but she had given them to her university roommates. Four years together had made them close. They chatted in the group often.

Watching the messages about Jiang Zhixu appear, she felt nothing in particular.

She typed a casual reply.

[He didn't cause you any trouble, did he?]

## Chapter 14

[Definitely not. We gave him a telling-off for you!]

[If he does come to Britain, don't go soft on him, Shushu!]

[Does your back still hurt? Remember your pain-relief patches.]

A simple question brought tears to her eyes.

[Thank you. Much better now. It doesn't get in the way.]

She put down her phone and looked at the leaves outside the window. Emptiness slowly settled in her heart.

Once, she had had so much. Now, apart from her studies, she seemed to have nothing.

Perhaps that was all right. She could devote herself to medicine.

For the next two months, she went to class, came home, browsed the shops, took walks.

She thought she would never see Jiang Zhixu again.

Then one day, returning to her apartment, she found a familiar figure waiting outside.

She would have known that silhouette anywhere.

Jiang Zhixu.

He really had found her.

A fine rain fell over London that day. The air was close and heavy, and her back still ached faintly.

Seeing him felt like a hand closing around her throat. Even breathing became difficult.

She turned to leave, but he had spotted her.

“Shushu!”

He rushed over and pulled her into his arms.

“I've finally found you. Do you know how hard I've been looking?”

Burying his face in her shoulder, he cried, his voice breaking.

Once, seeing him cry like that would have broken her heart.

Today, she felt nothing.

She pushed him away and looked at his reddened eyes.

“What do you want, Jiang Zhixu?”

Her distant indifference startled him.

“Do you have to be so cold to me?”

“What else did you expect?”