After the third time she accidentally shattered a test tube in the sink, Lu Sheng finally broke down and sobbed.
It was 2:00 AM on Christmas Eve in a deserted laboratory. Her cries echoed through the empty room, sounding even more pathetic than she had imagined. Lu Sheng started with quiet whimpers that quickly escalated into full-blown wailing. At least no one was there to see her tears. She didn’t have to do what she did during the day—forcing a smile while her supervisor berated her in front of the entire group, gritting her teeth in secret, and using every ounce of strength to shove the sobs back down into her throat.
Why couldn't she get any results? Why did she choose this lab? Why hadn't she listened to her parents and stayed home to work at her university after her Master’s? Why did she have to chase some bullshit scientific ideal and come all the way to North America to study alone?
The America she had imagined was *Love Story in Harvard*, *Finding Mr. Right*, *La La Land*, and *Suits*. She hadn't known about the other side of America—the bedbugs in old apartments that could never be fully exterminated, the addicts wandering in packs through dim alleys after 9:00 PM, the shriveled fries and tasteless cold salads in the school canteen that felt like they were made of plastic, and the thick layer of limescale at the bottom of the kettle after boiling tap water. She had only been there a few days before her hair started falling out in clumps.
*I’ll quit and go back to Beijing after Christmas,* she thought fiercely through her tears. *I’m never coming back.*
She was so absorbed in her grief that she didn't hear the footsteps behind her. When a hand lightly tapped her shoulder, Lu Sheng let out a startled scream. she spun around, her cries choking in her throat. "S-Senior..."
Jiang Tong was equally startled. "Are you alright?"
"Why are you still working in the lab during the holidays?" His gaze moved past her to the broken glass in the sink. "Go home and get some sleep. If the professor asks, tell him to talk to me."
Lu Sheng forced a weak smile. "The professor didn't make me come. I just had a few things I hadn't figured out, and since I had nothing to do during the break, I thought I'd stop by."
"I just got a bit homesick and couldn't help shedding a few tears." She wiped her face roughly with the back of her hand. "Don't laugh at me, Senior."
It was a lie so clumsy it was laughable. Perhaps from eating too many burgers and fries, her brain was malnourished; she couldn't even come up with a decent excuse. Lu Sheng hated that the universe had maliciously chosen this moment—her most pathetic state—to run into him. Of all people, why did it have to be Jiang Tong?
It had to be Jiang Tong, the third-year PhD student who had already published in *Nature* and was set to speak at the ASCO podium next year. Usually, when she saw him, she was too intimidated to even breathe loudly. A few words of guidance from him would leave her feeling flattered, her heart pounding incessantly.
"It's late, Senior. Please go ahead with whatever you were doing." She turned back, pretending to clean up the shards in the sink. "I'll be heading back soon too."
Jiang Tong pressed a hand onto her arm.
"Leave the test tubes to me. Be careful not to cut yourself." Jiang Tong’s expression was gentle, his eyes devoid of any pity or judgment that might have made her feel ashamed.
"If you're free in a bit, let's go grab a drink."
Christmas Eve in America is the equivalent of New Year's Eve in China. On such a holiday, the vast campus was empty, dark, and silent; even the local hoodlums seemed to have gone home to open presents. The bars Jiang Tong and Lu Sheng usually frequented were all closed for the holiday. The two were eventually forced to accept reality: the only place still open was McDonald's.
"I originally wanted to treat you to a nice glass of red wine," Jiang Tong teased himself as he returned to the table with two milkshakes. "But Santa Claus didn't want me to spend too much money."
There are many ways to get someone to open up. Alcohol is effective, but exhaustion is a close second. At 3:00 AM, the bright lights of McDonald's made the night outside look even darker and colder. Jiang Tong was sincere, and though Lu Sheng initially intended to brush him off with trivial complaints, as she spoke, the tears began to fall again.
"In undergrad, my GPA was always in the top ten. My lab techniques were recorded by professors to be used as teaching videos. Everyone said I was the most gifted student for research." She covered her eyes with a napkin, not daring to look at Jiang Tong’s expression.
"For this paper, I've read countless literatures. Clearly, all the conditions are right, all the errors have been ruled out—I did the same experiment over a hundred times, being so careful with every single step, but the data is just never ideal."
"I don't want to do research anymore." The thought she had only dared to hide in her heart, never even telling her parents or best friends, came out naturally in front of him. "I'm just not cut out for this."
Jiang Tong would probably laugh at her, she thought, holding her breath in her self-imposed darkness. After all, she looked down on herself. She had made it all the way from a small-town high school to where she was today by being more diligent, calmer, and more mature than her competitors. She had learned long ago that giving up was more shameful than failing. To say she wasn't "cut out" for it now—what had she been doing for the last two years?
She just couldn't handle failing one more time.
"When I applied for my PhD, I was rejected by University B."
"What?" Lu Sheng opened her eyes in shock.
"I was completely set on doing research. When the semester started and everyone was greeting each other, even the worst students in my year had a place to go, whether it was a job or further studies. I was the only one stuck in limbo, and my family was going through a hard time then..."
He looked down and took a sip of his milkshake, hiding his eyes behind his fringe.
"I thought maybe I was just aiming too high, that I didn't have the talent for research from the start. Even if I couldn't see it, the admissions office did. Since no one thought I could be a scientist, I decided I wouldn't be one. I packed away my application materials and rushed out a resume for campus recruiting."
"I finally managed to get a few final-round interviews, but then I suddenly received an admission letter and a scholarship from University A. I thought it was a miracle from heaven and accepted it happily. That’s the only reason I’m sitting here now, treating you to a milkshake."
"To be honest, for a week or two back then, I was fully committed to becoming an office worker. I never dreamed I’d be where I am today."
He winked at Lu Sheng. "Being a scientist requires a bit of luck. You're just having a temporary run of bad luck."
"Go home and get a good night's sleep. Come to the lab tomorrow night, and we'll go over your experimental design together."
"Thank you, Senior." Lu Sheng’s eyes grew hot as she nodded vigorously.
She had laid bare her weakness and confusion before him, expecting him to either criticize her harshly or give her a lecture full of "chicken soup for the soul." She hadn't expected to be understood. He didn't ask her to choose between black and white; instead, he stood with her in that ambiguous gray border and gently told her that he had once been just like her.
The next day, Jiang Tong kept his word. He sat with Lu Sheng and re-evaluated her experimental steps starting from the initial hypotheses, and they actually found several blind spots she had overlooked. Before Lu Sheng could even thank him, he programmed his number into her phone, emphasizing repeatedly that she should contact him whenever she had a problem during the experiment.
When Lu Sheng hesitated, he waved his phone. "Don't worry about it. Our research directions are different; I have no reason to steal your authorship."
With Jiang Tong’s help, her long-stagnant research finally made progress. Lu Sheng rode the momentum and finished her paper just before the March academic conference deadline.
At dawn on the day of the deadline, as she typed the final period of the last paragraph, the heavy stone in Lu Sheng’s heart finally dropped. She let out a long sigh of relief and scrolled back to the first page to write the special acknowledgments.
Her fingers hovered over the keyboard.
She had sensed it before, but it had been a faint, vague feeling she had forcibly suppressed and ignored. The "Special Thanks" was like a password that swung open the stone doors of a deep cave; in the light of day, she could no longer hide it.
She had fallen for Jiang Tong.
"Forget it," her roommate said bluntly when she found out. "Jiang Tong is frigid."
They were eating at a Chinese restaurant. Lu Sheng had just picked up a large mouthful of Moo Shu Pork; her hand shook at the words, and a piece of pork fell out of her bowl. "You say that like you've slept with him."
"...Wait, did you?"
"Fuck," the roommate cursed in annoyance. "Jiang Tong is clearly not my type, okay!"
"You know what the situation is like in this 'village' of ours," the roommate said earnestly. "A guy who has hair, has papers, has a normal moral compass, and doesn't have a long-distance girlfriend is rarer than a three-legged toad."
"Not to mention Jiang Tong is actually quite handsome. Not just girls—several guys from other departments have tried to flirt with him, but he just deflects them all with that effortless grace of his. Not a single one succeeded!"
"In all the years since he enrolled, I’ve never heard of him going out with anyone one-on-one, except for group activities."
"If there isn't something wrong with him, why doesn't he have a girlfriend? Is he staying chaste just to wait for a plot line to trigger with you?"
Lu Sheng wasn't ready to give up. "I think he treats me differently than others."
She was being vague, not daring to mention her late-night heart-to-heart with Jiang Tong.
The roommate sneered. "And I think your PI is in love with you at first sight. He screams at you because he loves you so much it hurts; he uses harsh words to suppress his secret, lingering, forbidden love for you."
Her roommate’s "earnest" advice failed to dispel Lu Sheng’s fantasies about Jiang Tong. If a crush could be given up so easily, it wouldn't be a crush.
Besides, Jiang Tong *did* treat her differently. Lu Sheng observed him with the rigorous attitude of a budding scientist and discovered that he was "warm on the outside, cold on the inside." He was polite to everyone but rarely formed deep connections. He calculated social favors clearly, ensuring the input and output balanced out perfectly—leaving a kind and generous impression without ever losing out himself.
Jiang Tong’s late-night talk with her might have been because he genuinely felt sorry for her—just a senior chatting with a junior on Christmas Eve. But the effort he put into helping her revise her paper was real. Lu Sheng knew her family background was ordinary, and among the geniuses in the department, she was unremarkable; she had no "strategic investment" value. This one instance of abnormal, generous investment from Jiang Tong kept the hope in her heart flickering like a candle in the wind—dim, but never quite extinguished.
The paper was published, and theoretically, they had no more reason to interact, but Lu Sheng found every way possible to keep their connection alive. Jiang Tong liked chamber music, so she stayed up late to snag tickets for a famous orchestra touring nearby. Jiang Tong was a good cook, so she found excuses to drag him to department potlucks. Jiang Tong’s greatest hobby was research, so she forced herself to work twice as hard just to share that midnight hour when only the two of them were left in the vast lab.
"Have I ever told you that you remind me of my sister?" One night, as they left the lab and stood in the quiet elevator, Jiang Tong suddenly spoke.
Lu Sheng’s heart skipped a beat. "Really?"
Jiang Tong pulled out his phone to show her a photo. The girl had waist-length hair and a sweet, fresh face with bright, almond-shaped eyes, smiling radiantly at the camera.
Lu Sheng thought to herself that they looked nothing alike.
"It's not the looks." Jiang Tong saw the doubt in her expression and laughed awkwardly. "My sister is bad at math, but she chose to major in finance. When she couldn't solve her calculus problems, she’d call me and cry, then go right back to the problems once she was done."
He suddenly felt it was inappropriate and clumsily tried to make amends. "I didn't mean anything else..."
Jiang Tong kept explaining, but he was only making it worse. Fortunately, the elevator chimed as it reached the ground floor. They stepped out of the building and simultaneously changed the subject, discussing a new paper recently published in *Nature*.
Back home, Lu Sheng flopped onto her bed and buried her burning cheeks in her pillow. What was Jiang Tong implying? Was it a subtle rejection, or did he actually think she was cute and was signaling her to move forward?
She didn't dare move forward, fearing she’d misread him and shatter the dream, breaking the delicate balance between them. But she didn't want to retreat. She knew Jiang Tong’s kindness was like drinking poison to quench thirst, yet greed grew in her heart; she only wanted more. Sweet torment is still torment, and Lu Sheng felt like she was going crazy.
The substantive turning point in their relationship happened that summer. A senior from their alma mater came to the US as a visiting scholar, and Jiang Tong stepped up to organize a dinner as the host. Lu Sheng and a few other biology students were invited along.
Before the senior had even stepped off the plane, his handsome WeChat profile picture had already spread through several group chats. To everyone's surprise, the real man was exceptionally tall with a striking physique and a clean, sharp sense of style—even more eye-catching than his 2D photos. From the visiting scholar's dormitory to the restaurant, the welcoming party somehow grew larger and larger. The group took up the largest round table in a Taiwanese hotpot restaurant, polished off dozens of plates of meatballs, and then boisterously moved on to a bar.
As midnight approached, the group began to thin out as people left in pairs and trios. Eventually, only Lu Sheng, Jiang Tong, and the guest of honor remained.
Everyone was a bit tipsy, but Jiang Tong was forcing himself to stay sober. "Xiao Lu, where do you live? I'll call an Uber for you."
The senior glared at him. When sober, he was a man of few words, but after a few glasses of whiskey, he became more talkative and blunt than usual.
"It's late. It's not safe for a girl to walk at night. Be a gentleman and take her home."
Jiang Tong ignored him and quietly asked Lu Sheng for her address. The senior seemed provoked by Jiang Tong’s dismissive attitude toward a drunkard and slammed his hand on the bar counter. "Jiang Tong, a person can't live in the past forever!"
Lu Sheng’s head had been foggy, but the senior’s thunderous slam jolted her three-quarters sober. She sat carefully between the two men, looking down at her nose and pretending she didn't exist. Jiang Tong, however, remained remarkably calm. "Pei Jing, you've had too much to drink."
He looked as calm as a still pond, but his nostrils flared slightly and his lips were pressed into a thin line, showing he was exerting extreme effort to suppress his emotions.
Pei Jing didn't get angry; instead, he laughed. "The state you're in today is entirely your own doing."
Lu Sheng kept her head down. From her angle, she could see one of Jiang Tong’s hands hidden under the table, clenched into a tight fist, the veins on the back of his hand bulging. After dozens of seconds—or perhaps minutes—the hand relaxed. He reached into his jacket, pulled out a few bills, and placed them on the bar.
"Something came up at the lab. You two stay; I'm heading out."
"I've called an Uber for you; the driver will call in a bit." He nodded to Lu Sheng as a gesture of farewell, then strode through the noisy crowd and left the bar.
Whether Pei Jing was drunk or not was debatable, but Jiang Tong was definitely rattled.
Lu Sheng and Pei Jing’s eyes simultaneously landed on the bar counter. On the shiny marble surface sat several glass cups in disarray, water and alcohol stains mixing to reflect the bar's multicolored lights. In the middle sat a bulging black leather wallet... it was quite conspicuous.
He had actually forgotten his wallet at the bar.
Pei Jing suddenly smiled at Lu Sheng. "Aren't you going to open it and look?"
There had been many people at dinner, so Lu Sheng and Pei Jing hadn't said more than two words to each other all night. But Pei Jing’s tone was familiar, carrying a hint of well-meaning, insightful teasing.
When had he noticed?
"That wouldn't be appropriate..." Lu Sheng lowered her head to avoid his gaze, murmuring, "Senior probably hasn't gone far. Maybe... maybe I should call him now."
She reached for her phone to dial, but Pei Jing leaned forward and pressed his hand over her arm.
"What's the rush?"
The man laughed deeply. "Jiang Tong has been single all these years in America, right? Don't you want to know why? Open the wallet and see if there's a photo of an old flame inside."
"If there's anything you want to know, you can ask me directly. Of all the people you know, no one understands Jiang Tong better than I do."
"An opportunity this good won't come again."
Lu Sheng’s face turned bright red in the darkness. She quietly pulled her arm out of Pei Jing’s grip. She opened her mouth several times but couldn't find the words.
Pei Jing saw her struggle clearly. "Fine, I'll be the good guy today and see this through to the end."
He reached out nimbly and grabbed the wallet from the bar. Lu Sheng tried to stop him, but it happened too fast. She watched as Pei Jing flipped open the leather wallet, his gaze focusing on a single point as he made a "just as I thought" expression.
He turned the wallet around and held it right in front of Lu Sheng’s eyes. "This is the answer."
Lu Sheng instinctively tried to turn away, but before she could move, the image she both anticipated and feared leaped into her sight. The picture seemed to have its own magnetic field, its own gravity; Lu Sheng’s gaze was locked onto it, unable to pull away.
In the transparent slot of the wallet was a photograph.
A photograph of a boy.
Pei Jing’s voice was low, floating with a seductive quality. "Jiang Tong isn't a 'natural' gay man. It's time for him to move on. You like him a lot, and you're a good fit for him. I can help you."
"Who is this person? What was his relationship with Jiang Tong? How can you make Jiang Tong forget him? How can you attract Jiang Tong? I can tell you everything."
"I don't want to know!"
Pei Jing’s expression froze.
Lu Sheng’s stomach was churning. She clenched her hands tightly under the table, suppressing the tremor in her voice.
"If Senior wanted to tell me... he would say it himself. This is... this is his privacy. I don't want to know."
Her phone suddenly vibrated. The Uber driver was calling to say the car was at the door and ready to go. Lu Sheng jumped off her stool, grabbed her bag, and rushed out of the bar without even looking at Pei Jing. It wasn't until the car had driven out of the bar district, leaving the deafening music and neon lights far behind, that her heartbeat finally began to settle.
The West Coast is sparsely populated. Outside the limited reach of streetlights and headlights, the darkness was full of shadows. The driver drove in silence but played upbeat Indian music. Lu Sheng leaned her forehead against the car window, watching the giant billboards flash by. The music became a hypnotic white noise. Her thoughts grew muddled, but she couldn't sleep.
He was a very beautiful boy. Even in the dim light of the bar, even through the plastic slot, even with the low resolution, he was the kind of person one would remember at a glance and never forget. His handsome features were secondary; there was something indescribable in his smile that made one feel he was noble, aloof, and extraordinary.
She had run away from Pei Jing, using a high-sounding excuse to hide her fear. She couldn't compete with that boy; Lu Sheng had known that the moment she saw him.
She was staring out into the darkness when she suddenly received a call from Jiang Tong.
"Did you see my wallet?" As soon as the line connected, before Lu Sheng could even say hello, Jiang Tong’s question came fast and sharp. "A black leather wallet, about half the size of a palm when folded—did I leave it at the bar?"
Since she had known him, no matter what happened, Jiang Tong had always been calm and composed. This was the second time he had lost his composure in front of her—the first being when he impulsively left the bar tonight.
Lu Sheng briefly explained what happened. Upon learning the wallet was with Pei Jing, Jiang Tong hung up hurriedly. She was suddenly grateful the Uber driver had the music so loud; the festive Bollywood songs were boisterous, the same melody repeating over and over, masking the sound of her gasping for air.
The lights inside the car were off. The glow from her phone reflected on the window, and she saw her own blurred reflection—a face covered in tears.
Her crush had ended just like that.
***
Jiang Tong rushed to Pei Jing’s place the next morning to get his wallet. He rang the doorbell so loudly it could wake the dead until Pei Jing finally opened the door, looking lazy and barefoot. "You're up early."
Jiang Tong didn't want to waste words. "Give me the wallet."
Pei Jing turned back into the room. "Come in for a glass of water."
With the "hostage" in the other man's hands, Jiang Tong had no choice but to take off his shoes and enter. Pei Jing had only just arrived, yet the room was already organized and tidy, clean but lived-in. Jiang Tong sat on the very edge of the sofa, watching as Pei Jing actually poured two glasses of water and placed them on the small coffee table.
"Drink."
Jiang Tong was impatient. "The wallet."
Pei Jing took a sip of water, looking at Jiang Tong over the rim of his glass. "Let's talk."
"You didn't used to be this talkative."
Pei Jing looked down and smiled. "Some things happened recently."
"Oh?"
"I'll tell you later." Pei Jing set the glass down with a *clack*. "I think you should move on. There's no point in continuing this self-punishment."
Jiang Tong shifted irritably. "This has nothing to do with you—give me the wallet."
"That girl last night was very good. Pretty, smart, gentle, and visibly attracted to you. I think you two would be a good match."
"Don't think I won't punch you just because you're my senior."
"You two won't see each other again in this lifetime. I think you should be more generous to yourself. Besides, from a third-party perspective, your situation back then was truly desperate. Making that choice was perfectly reason—"
Jiang Tong interrupted Pei Jing’s flow. "Last summer, I spoke with his grandmother on the phone."
Pei Jing raised an eyebrow.
"...The money was paid in three installments. The last one was last summer. I felt... a bit sentimental, so I gave her a call."
"Do you know?" he said softly, very softly. "It turns out that back then, she didn't do anything."
"All these years, I thought it was her... I thought she was the one who made all my applications fail."
Madam Xiao’s voice seemed to echo in his ears once more.
*“Teacher Jiang overestimates me, and he overestimates himself.”*
*“I am just an old woman. How could I have the power to reach across the Pacific and act as an all-powerful hand in American universities?”*
*“Even if I did, why would I waste such god-like means on someone like Teacher Jiang?”*
A single check was enough.
His silence seemed to make Madam Xiao happy—so happy she laughed out loud. *“I thank you from the bottom of my heart. Teacher Jiang, you are much easier to deal with than Kenneth’s father.”*
Pei Jing had no words. He sat in silence with Jiang Tong for a moment, then got up and brought the wallet from the room. Jiang Tong opened it and carefully inspected it from top to bottom, finally letting out a sigh of relief.
"Stop looking, I didn't do anything to it," Pei Jing said gruffly. "It's just a piece of paper. It's meaningless to anyone but you."
Jiang Tong gave a bitter smile. "But other than this piece of paper, I have nothing left."
***
Lu Sheng’s feelings for Jiang Tong faded. Because she no longer had any expectations, their relationship actually seemed to become closer. Even her roommate grew suspicious. "Are you two actually a thing?"
Lu Sheng just smiled and didn't confirm or deny it. Time flowed like water. Jiang Tong graduated and taught for a few years before leaving academia for the industry, gradually losing touch with his friends at the university. Lu Sheng stayed in the lab, diligently publishing papers. Whether it was because hard work pays off or because she hadn't wasted her incense offerings to the local deities in Chinatown, she did two years of postdoc after graduation and actually landed a position at her alma mater as an Assistant Professor.
Before getting tenure, an Assistant Professor is essentially no different from a lecturer, a technician, or even a TA—they are all part of the exploited class, working day and night with no job security. Lu Sheng worked from dawn till dusk, and finally, she produced a heavyweight paper that was accepted for presentation at the ASCO annual meeting.
She was so nervous before going on stage that she didn't eat all day. When she stood at the podium to adjust the microphone, her legs were still shaking. Fortunately, the presentation went off without a hitch, and she handled the questions from her peers smoothly. She left the lecture hall clutching a thick stack of materials, feeling weak all over and her stomach empty. She wanted to find a cafe, get something to drink, and ideally, a sandwich.
Just as she stepped out, she collided head-on with a pedestrian.
Her materials scattered all over the floor. Lu Sheng hurriedly apologized, but the moment her eyes met the other person's, she was frozen in place.
It was that boy.
He had grown up. His tailored suit was crisp and wrinkle-free, his cufflinks were gleaming, and his short hair was neatly styled. He was a handsome, dashing young talent who radiated the scent of wealth. The young man kindly helped her pick up the papers and handed them back with a smile. "Are you alright, miss?"
Lu Sheng’s eyes widened. "You... you..."
In her panic, she actually spoke in Chinese.
The young man raised an eyebrow. "Is something wrong with me?"
He smoothly switched to Chinese to question her, his tone lazy and innocent. He wore a look of confusion, but a hint of a smile lingered in his eyes. That earnest yet ambiguous gaze made Lu Sheng’s face flush instantly.
It felt like she was being flirted with.
She looked down as she took the materials, knowing her face and even her neck must be red. "I'm sorry, I... I mistook you for someone else."
Seeing her embarrassment, the young man laughed as if he found it very amusing. "Oh, I see."
He turned to leave. Lu Sheng’s mind was a mess, but a sudden spark of intuition made her step forward. "Wait... wait a moment!"
The young man turned back, and this time his confusion was genuine. "Yes?"
A thousand words were stuck in her throat, but she didn't know where to start. The beautiful boy from before, the handsome young man now. Did he know his photo was being cherished and carried every day in someone's wallet? If he knew, would he want to see that person again?
Jiang Tong had been unable to forget him for so many years—why had they separated?
For the first time, she regretted her stern refusal of Pei Jing and her flight from the bar all those years ago.
The way she hesitated to speak was interpreted differently by Xiao Fengtai.
"My name is Kenneth. I work in pharmaceutical investment back home. I'm here at the conference to keep up with industry trends and check on some companies." He skillfully pulled a business card from his jacket and placed it on top of the stack of papers in Lu Sheng’s arms.
"I'm staying at the Ritz—" He glanced down at the name on Lu Sheng’s paper and smiled suggestively. "If Professor Lu is interested in commercializing her results, we could find a time to grab a coffee and chat."
As for what they would chat about, when, and where—that was left unsaid.
Lu Sheng was flying back to school the next day. That evening, after dinner with some local friends, she took a walk alone along the coast. As she walked, she realized she had stopped and was clutching the business card she had received that day in her pocket.
She leaned against the railing, pulled out the card, and examined it carefully under the moonlight.
*Kenneth Xiao, Xiao Fengtai.* An old-fashioned, almost archaic name.
Back in school, she never would have imagined that one day she would be flirting with her crush’s old flame.
On a sudden whim, Lu Sheng took out her phone and sent a message to Jiang Tong, whom she hadn't contacted in a long time.
"Senior, have you ever done anything you regret?"
She waited quietly for a while. Jiang Tong messaged back: "What's wrong?"
Lu Sheng held the phone but didn't reply. The device grew warm, and her palm broke out in a thin sweat.
"I have no regrets," Jiang Tong finally replied. "I've done wrong things, but I have no regrets. Looking back now, every decision I made was the best choice I could have made at the time."
*I see.*
Lu Sheng smiled. She let go, and the small white card fluttered in the wind, falling into the dark undercurrents of the sea.
***
