That evening, after Qi Mu and his father finished washing the dishes, they returned to the living room. The family of three sat on the sofa and watched the Spring Festival Gala.
The Gala was fairly standard and nothing particularly outstanding, but they were not really watching television. What mattered was the time they were spending together for Lunar New Year.
The atmosphere was lively and festive.
The three of them chatted and laughed as they watched. Whenever a funny comedy sketch came on, Fu Yun would laugh until she ended up leaning against Qi Xiang Ming.
Although the two of them were nearly sixty, there were still times when they acted like a pair of children.
Qi Mu’s gaze softened.
His parents were getting older and could no longer stay up late. A little after ten that night, they went upstairs to rest, leaving Qi Mu alone in the enormous living room.
The television was still noisy and bustling.
Yet the suddenly empty living room seemed much quieter.
Qi Mu stared at the television in front of him.
He was a little distracted.
I wonder if Jiang Shao is home yet? He should’ve arrived a long time ago. A large family like the Jiangs probably has a lot of people at Lunar New Year’s Eve dinner. It must be much livelier than ours.
But then Qi Mu thought about Jiang Shao’s relationships with Jiang Qin and Li Xin and decided that having more people around was not necessarily a good thing.
I wonder what his relationship with his parents is like. What is he doing right now…?
Qi Mu’s thoughts drifted…
After thinking for a while, he laughed at himself.
What is wrong with me? Why am I thinking about Jiang Shao?
He stopped letting his mind wander and turned his attention back to the television.
At last, midnight arrived.
He watched the countdown on television. Five, four, three, two, one.
The last number of the countdown rang out.
On the television and outside the windows, the night sky lit up.
Fireworks burst across both skies at once.
The thunderous explosions drowned out the television and blurred all the jumbled thoughts in his mind. All Qi Mu could see was the black night sky outside, lit so brilliantly by fireworks that it seemed almost as bright as day. Jiang Shao should be seeing them too, right?
He was far away in the capital, so what he saw was probably more like the scene on television.
Would the fireworks there be even more dazzling than these?
Qi Mu closed his eyes.
He told himself over and over not to think about Jiang Shao anymore.
But after the fireworks faded and everything fell quiet, thoughts of that person returned against his will.
This stirring in my heart…
Is it the irresistible pull of fate, or simply something that comes from me?
Qi Mu thought he was beginning to lose the ability to tell.
＊
The next morning, Fu Yun and Qi Xiang Ming left. They thought C City was far too cold and always went somewhere else for their winter vacations.
If they had not wanted to spend Lunar New Year with Qi Mu, they would not have come back at all.
Qi Mu drove his parents to the airport, then headed straight back to his apartment.
The apartment did not feel as empty as the villa, but it did not feel especially lived-in either.
Xu Wei Ran’s family had gone to Australia for Lunar New Year, while Yu Yue Ning was busy dating his new girlfriend. With the company on holiday and no work to do, Qi Mu suddenly found himself with nothing to occupy him, and he was not used to it.
So he stayed home and sent Lunar New Year greeting messages.
He composed a Lunar New Year greeting, signed his name at the bottom, and sent it in bulk to company presidents and clients. Before long, a pile of similarly worded greetings came back.
It was boring, but it was an annual necessity.
His phone chimed without stopping. The constant notifications made things seem lively, but in truth they were terribly dull, more like another form of work.
Once that was done, he had nothing to do again.
Every previous year had been much the same, yet for some reason this year felt exceptionally boring. Should I just go to the company and work overtime?
But the thought survived for only a second before Qi Mu dismissed it.
He cooked himself a meal at home and went to the gym for a while. Evening arrived quickly, and he noticed snow beginning to fall outside the floor-to-ceiling windows.
Snowflakes drifted softly down.
A timely snowfall promised a prosperous year.
Qi Mu stood at the window for a while, then returned to the living room and turned on the television for background noise. He opened his phone to see whether there were any client messages he needed to answer.
As he scrolled down, he came across Jiang Shao.
Qi Mu’s hand paused.
Jiang Shao rarely messaged him. Although they had spent quite some time together, their chat history contained only a handful of lines.
Should I send Jiang Shao a Happy New Year message too?
Qi Mu’s finger hovered over the chat box. He had already typed Happy New Year. It should have been such a simple thing, yet he could not bring himself to send it…
Qi Mu was still hesitating.
Then, with a sudden swish, a new message appeared in the chat: “Come downstairs.”
Qi Mu stared at the message in astonishment. It took him quite a while to confirm that it was not an old one. The timestamp was from this very moment.
He stood frozen for a moment.
Then he abruptly got to his feet, grabbed his coat, hurried out the door, and stepped into the elevator.
The floor numbers dropped rapidly.
When Qi Mu reached the entrance of the apartment building, the automatic glass doors slid open to either side. Before he even stepped outside, he saw the familiar figure ahead.
Jiang Shao stood in the snow in a long black coat. Snowflakes landed on his black hair and shoulders. Some melted, but fresh flakes immediately took their place, falling endlessly as though they meant to dissolve even the black into the same white as the world around him.
Qi Mu suddenly felt his heartbeat speed up.
He walked toward him one step at a time.
Hearing him approach, Jiang Shao turned around. An unruly smile hung on his face as he raised a brow at Qi Mu, but his eyes were gentle.
Jiang Shao said, “I came to bring you a Lunar New Year gift.”
The man’s low, husky voice, tinged with laughter, seemed to drift into Qi Mu’s ears together with the snowflakes, making his heart tremble.
Qi Mu barely managed to keep himself calm. His gaze swept over Jiang Shao. Both hands were clearly empty, and he had not brought anything. His clothes were simple, clean, and neat, with nowhere obvious to hide a gift…
This guy isn’t teasing me again, is he…?
Suddenly, Jiang Shao caught both of Qi Mu’s hands and brought them up to the sides of his face.
Qi Mu’s palms touched Jiang Shao’s cheeks and immediately felt how icy they were. Why is he so cold? How long has he been standing outside?
Jiang Shao covered the backs of Qi Mu’s hands with his own, cradling his face between them as his black eyes gazed deeply at Qi Mu. “I’m giving you a handsome boyfriend who’s 190 centimeters tall and has eight-pack abs.”
Qi Mu: “…”
His first reaction was that he had never met anyone so shameless.
His second was, What the hell is Jiang Shao doing?!
Being this smooth-tongued on the first day of Lunar New Year…
Jiang Shao, however, did not seem to think his words were unbearably cheesy in the slightest. He merely looked at Qi Mu expectantly, his expression practically asking, Surprised? Unexpected?
Qi Mu’s face slowly turned red. He awkwardly pulled his hands back and coughed lightly. “Forget it. I can’t afford to keep you.”
This is a Long Aotian we’re talking about.
If someone gives you one, would you even dare take him?
Jiang Shao stared at him in disbelief, looking faintly wounded. “You’re this rich and you can’t afford me? You haven’t even heard what I want yet.”
Qi Mu said, “…Then tell me what you want.”
Jiang Shao answered without the slightest hesitation, clearly having thought it through long ago. “A monthly salary of three thousand, plus food and lodging. That’s all. Pretty good deal, right?”
Qi Mu: “…”
Qi Mu hesitated for a long time before saying with a complicated expression, “Have you forgotten you’re already earning more than three thousand a month? Do you want a pay cut?”
He was not stingy enough to pay an employee only three thousand a month.
Jiang Shao smiled as though it were perfectly obvious. “That’s why I said food and lodging are included too. Let’s go eat dinner. I’m hungry.”
Traffic was jammed everywhere for the Spring Festival, and he had driven for a full day and night to get back.
He had come straight to Qi Mu.
He had not even eaten yet.
Qi Mu looked helpless. “Wait here. I’ll go get my car keys.”
He had rushed downstairs so quickly that he had forgotten to bring them.
But Jiang Shao said, “No need. Let’s walk.”
He naturally took Qi Mu’s hand and interlaced their fingers, walking through the softly falling snow like any ordinary couple.
Jiang Shao’s hand was cold too, but after being clasped with Qi Mu’s, it quickly warmed. Before long, it was even warmer than Qi Mu’s own.
And just like that, Qi Mu let Jiang Shao lead him along.
Only after they had walked more than ten meters did Qi Mu suddenly realize, How did I just walk off with Jiang Shao like this? And we’re even holding hands!
What if someone sees us?
Qi Mu instinctively wanted to pull his hand free, but when his gaze passed over Jiang Shao’s profile, he hesitated.
Today is the first day of Lunar New Year. Why didn’t he stay home? Why did he come all the way here to see me? A family like the Jiangs must have all kinds of rules. Is it really fine for him not to be home today?
Was he wronged somehow at home?
Qi Mu froze at the thought, then hurriedly threw the ridiculous idea out of his head. He must have lost his mind to think a Long Aotian could be wronged.
It would already be something if the Long Aotian wasn’t the one making everyone else suffer.
Even so, Qi Mu ultimately did not shake off Jiang Shao’s hand.
In truth, he simply wanted to indulge himself for one day.
Many restaurants were closed on the first day of Lunar New Year.
There were not many people on the streets either.
They wandered without any particular destination until they finally found a small restaurant that was open.
Jiang Shao turned back and smiled at Qi Mu. “Let’s eat here.”
They walked inside.
The owners were a middle-aged couple. The husband cooked in the back kitchen while the wife served customers out front.
The woman greeted them with a smile. “The menu’s on the table. Just tell me what you’d like.”
The little restaurant served only ordinary home-style dishes.
Jiang Shao did not mind in the least. He ordered stir-fried shredded potatoes, blanched choy sum, red-braised pork, and a plate of fried rice noodles.
Then he pushed the menu toward Qi Mu and asked, “What do you want?”
Qi Mu casually chose two more dishes and gave the order to the proprietress.
Before long, steaming-hot food was brought to the table.
Qi Mu had eaten lunch late and was not very hungry, but Jiang Shao seemed famished and ate quickly. Qi Mu could not help laughing. “How many days has it been since you ate?”
Jiang Shao answered without thinking, “Only about a day.”
Qi Mu froze.
He couldn’t seriously have gone an entire day without eating, could he?
Did he really drive for a whole day?
It is pretty far from the capital…
Qi Mu lowered his eyes somewhat awkwardly. He stopped talking and quietly ate his own food.
Jiang Shao finished more than half the dishes on the table.
Qi Mu promptly picked up the bill. The little restaurant was inexpensive, and the entire meal cost only a little over a hundred yuan. Seen this way, a Long Aotian was actually pretty easy to keep.
Really not expensive at all.
After eating, they slowly walked back. By then the snow had stopped, and a thick white layer covered the ground, burying the footprints they had left on the way there.
Not the slightest trace remained.
But as they walked all the way back, then turned to look behind them again, two clear rows of footprints had appeared across the snow-covered ground.
They twisted and staggered along, but one thing never changed: the two trails always kept roughly the same distance apart.
They never separated.
Just like the points where their lives intersected in this world.
They could easily be covered by a single snowfall.
But new ones would continue to appear, one after another, endlessly.
They could never be completely erased.
Suddenly, Qi Mu heard Jiang Shao say to him, “Happy New Year.”
Qi Mu turned toward him, slightly dazed, and looked at the man beside him. Actually, he had been the one who wanted to say it to Jiang Shao…
But in the end, Jiang Shao had said it first.
Seeing Qi Mu staring blankly, Jiang Shao’s lips curved. He reached out and rubbed Qi Mu’s cheek, looking immensely pleased with himself. “Am I the first person to wish you a Happy New Year?”
Qi Mu felt a faint heat behind his eyes. After a moment, he turned his head away and pretended not to care. “Of course not.”
Not counting all those polite social greetings from business contacts and casual acquaintances…
Qi Mu thought for a moment. “You’re fifth.”
Jiang Shao’s face immediately darkened. He was only fifth?
Had he arrived too late?
Qi Mu counted on his fingers. “My parents wished me a Happy New Year this morning. Yu Yue Ning, Xu Wei Ran… They sent me messages as soon as midnight passed.”
Jiang Shao’s expression grew even uglier.
Fine, Qi Mu’s parents don’t count. I can’t compete with them anyway. But why should that idiot Yu Yue Ning and Xu Wei Ran, his white moonlight, both rank ahead of me?
If I’d known, I would’ve sent it by phone first.
But he had wanted to see Qi Mu, to say it to him in person, to give him a surprise…
Jiang Shao turned away sulkily and started walking, only for his hand to be tugged back. Qi Mu was still standing where he had been.
Jiang Shao turned around.
Qi Mu was smiling, his eyes curved and seemingly filled with starlight. He cupped Jiang Shao’s face in both hands and said with a smile, “But among the people who said it to me face-to-face, other than my parents… you’re the first.”
As he spoke, he tipped his head up and kissed Jiang Shao on the lips.
Jiang Shao stood there in a daze. Unlike usual, he did not immediately seize the initiative and fiercely take over the kiss. He looked as though his soul had been stolen away.
Even after Qi Mu released him, he still had not come back to himself.
Then Jiang Shao heard a gentle voice beside his ear, settling straight into his heart. “Happy New Year.”
Qi Mu looked at Jiang Shao with a bright smile.
Then does that mean…
I’m the first person to wish you a Happy New Year?