[Meng: What? What now?]
[LJY: I picked it up.]
[Meng: With your bare hands? Aren’t you a germaphobe?]
[LJY: Gao Ming gave me a pair of chopsticks.]
[Meng: Thanks to Nurse Gao for extending a helping hand to my boyfriend.]
[LJY: Oh. Treat him to a meal, at Dai Ji.]
[Meng: Baby, you’re so cute. Want to kiss you.]
[LJY: …Cut it out.]
At that moment, Ye Meng’s social media was buzzing with Qingdao’s cherry blossom street. She casually forwarded it to Li Jin Yi, [Meng: Let’s go see cherry blossoms in Qingdao in April. I’ll find someone to take care of Grandma. Just three days, okay? I want to kiss you under the cherry blossoms.]
[LJY: Mm.]
[Meng: Miss me?]
[LJY: …Don’t you need to work?]
[Meng: Nobody’s willing to let me take over anyway, so I’m playing with my phone with a clear conscience. Ah, someone on my feed posted about the pink dolphins at Khanom. I want to take the baby to Khanom, want the baby to see the pink dolphins. They say when you see pink dolphins, good luck will come.]
Khanom was a small fishing village in southern Thailand, facing Samui Island across the sea. One year during the New Year, Li Ling Bai rented a holiday hotel in Thailand, and they went to Khanom to see pink dolphins. It was quite ordinary. Perhaps because he was a man, he didn’t feel much about these things, but maybe Ye Meng would like it.
[LJY: Do you have a passport?]
[Meng: No, I’ve never been abroad. I’ll go apply for one in a few days. You have one, right?]
[LJY: Yes.] Almost filled two volumes, though now they were just gathering dust.
[Meng: Do you miss me? Li Jin Yi, I won’t be coming back for a whole week, you know.]
[LJY: Where will you stay?]
[Meng: The company has temporary dormitories. I’ll look for a place on the weekend. To be precise, you might not see me until next weekend.]
The person who said she wouldn’t return for an entire week appeared at Li Jin Yi’s doorstep that evening. The urgent knocking made Li Jin Yi think there was a fire. He had just finished showering, his hair still wet—he hadn’t even had time to dry it and could only wipe it with a towel as he went to open the door.
Ye Meng wore a fitted suit. The tattoo on her collarbone was covered by her shirt, revealing slender, clean calves. She was slim, stunning, mature yet full of earthly charm, like a delicate flower in spring rain, covered in wind and rain, standing travel-worn at his door. She was like a cluster of flowers sent down by the gods, accidentally landing outside his door, as if she had come specifically for him, to share joy.
She smiled and threw herself into his arms, their young, passionate bodies pressed tightly together.
The door wasn’t even closed, left wide open for all to see. Li Jin Yi leaned his back against the doorframe, looking down at the spoiled, radiant woman in his arms. “Didn’t you say next week?”
Hugging him made Ye Meng feel much more secure. She looked up, resting her sharp, thin chin on his strong chest, as if infused with spring rain, gazing at him with wet eyes, harboring her innate pride, yet speaking the world’s softest and most sincere words of love: “I missed you. What can I do? Just one day at work, and I already want to quit. Is it because I haven’t dated for too long? Why are you so attractive to me?”
Li Jin Yi smiled noncommittally, towel hanging around his neck, lazily leaning against the wall, hands in his pockets as he looked down at her for a long while, listening to her passionate longing. Then his left hand came out of his pocket and pinched her chin, shaking it teasingly from side to side: “What about work tomorrow? Hmm?”
Ye Meng’s lips were pursed by his pinching. She let him pinch as she mumbled softly, “I just need to get up an hour earlier, at six, and I can clock in by eight. Can I sleep here? I promise I won’t do anything else.”