She looked exactly like the twenty-eight-year-old Lin Shengmiao she had imagined many years ago.
Confident, beautiful, outstanding... It's obvious at a glance that she has received a good education and has good material and living conditions. No matter where she is, she can easily attract admiring glances from others.
The two looked at each other, looked away, and then looked at each other again.
They both laughed.
"Hahahaha..." Xu Xingyan couldn't help but smile, tilting her head and bursting into laughter. Her laughter lingered in the room for a long time, even the roses in the vase on the table shook their petals in annoyance.
At this moment, Xu Xingyan simply couldn't understand those couples in TV dramas who stood there dumbfounded after meeting.
Seriously? Are you kidding me? This is my absolute favorite person!
How could I not laugh when I saw her?
Xiao Tang stared dumbfounded at the two people who were laughing like idiots. In an instant, the image of Xu Xingyan as a 'dignified, rich, and beautiful woman' that she had long built up in her mind was completely shattered into pieces.
Meow~
Bubble, the orange tabby cat from the bookstore next door, strolled over for a visit. As soon as it entered the store, it was startled by the unrestrained laughter. Instantly, its eyes widened, and it froze on the spot, rubbing its paws uneasily backward. Its fat cat face displayed an anthropomorphic expression of 'Did I come to the wrong place?'
When facing Lin Shengmiao, Xu Xingyan often acted inappropriately reserved. Overwhelmed with joy, she scooped up Paopao and kissed her hard.
The orange cat's face was bright yellow. It whimpered, feeling its charm had increased and attracting the human neighbor's fascination. So it generously let the cat pet it all it wanted.
Lin Shengmiao's clear eyes curved into a smile as she leisurely looked at the girl holding the cat. "Is this your pet?"
"That's the cat the bookstore owner next door owns, named Bubble. She's a girl and often sneaks over to play... Bubble, this is Sister Miaomiao. Shall we say hello to her and ask her to get you some treats?"
Xu Xingyan held the kitten's paw and shook it, giving a semi-formal introduction to the person and the cat.
Lin Shengmiao lowered her head, grasped the little paw, and gently scratched it, saying softly, "Hello Bubble, I'm Lin Shengmiao. Nice to meet you."
Bubble meowed with deep emotion, looking at her with great anticipation.
Lin Shengmiao thought it particularly liked him, so he reached out and rubbed its chin again.
Xu Xingyan smiled and reminded him, "There's a bag of freeze-dried fruit on the shelf behind you. Take a few to feed it."
She bounced the chubby cat in her arms, looked down at the warm sunlight scattered on the ground, and said, "This little ungrateful thing always follows whoever feeds it. Once you feed it, it will remember you, and it will be close to you again next time it comes."
Lin Shengmiao paused upon hearing this, lowered her eyes and smiled. Sure enough, following the way she was holding the cat, she fed the very plump and handsome orange cat two freeze-dried pellets.
Bubble acted like a heartless woman who would sleep with someone and then run away. Once the snacks were in her stomach and her goal was achieved, she wouldn't let anyone kiss or hug her anymore. She jumped out of Xu Xingyan's arms in a flash and disappeared without a trace, demonstrating what it means to be a "little ingrate".
“I ordered dinner for six o’clock,” Xu Xingyan tilted her head and smiled, her eyes sparkling, “so I thought… you wouldn’t mind coming upstairs for a while.”
Lin Shengmiao: "Extremely happy to."
Left to watch the door at the flower shop on the first floor, Xiao Tang was completely ignored from beginning to end: "..."
As she watched the two figures going upstairs one after the other, she seemed to understand something in a daze.
...
Few outsiders go up to the second-floor lounge. Xu Xingyan always arranges and cleans it herself. As a private place for a short nap, a large and soft bed is essential. In addition, a bird's nest-style hanging chair is placed by the window, which immediately adds a touch of warmth to the slightly empty room.
A framed photo sat on the light wood bookshelf, drawing Lin Shengmiao's attention.
In the photo, Xu Xingyan is dressed in a magnificent European court dress, holding a Holy Grail, sitting on a throne, with blooming flowers, a babbling brook and golden corn piles at her feet... full of abundance and prosperity.
When Lin Shengmiao was abroad, he had met several Gypsies, so he immediately recognized that this was the image of the Queen of Cups in the Tarot.
Xu Xingyan brought over a cup of tea. "I only have tea leaves here. You know I've never liked drinking beverages."
Lin Shengmiao turned to her and asked, "When was this photo taken?"
Xu Xingyan glanced at it and laughed, "That one? It was last summer. A photographer friend of mine wanted to take a whole set of photos featuring elements from the 100-year-old Rider-Waite Tarot. At the time, we didn't have enough models, so we had to bring in some of our friends to make up the numbers. Luo Jing was in it too. This one is the Queen of Cups, and hers is the Empress."
"Later, I heard that he won a pretty prestigious award, so he paid out of his own pocket to have our photos framed and sent to us as a souvenir."
Lin Shengmiao ran her fingers over the photo frame and suddenly realized that it was around last summer when she had already planned to return to China, but she was held back by a lot of unfinished work projects.
At a friend's gathering, one of her friends was a divination enthusiast who always carried a deck of cards in her small purse. After drinking two cocktails, she seemed to be drunk, claiming that she was guided and insisted on interpreting a set of cards for her, one of which was the Queen of Cups.
What did they say back then?
"The Queen of Cups in the order of 'Queen' is a card with very balanced energy. I can sense wise love in it. Lin, you or the person you like have always known what you want and have worked hard to get it. This is a love with awareness, clarity, rationality, and mutual fulfillment... It is a gift from the universe, my friend. Don't worry, this gift has always existed. Just accept it. Bless you."
The blonde woman winked playfully, her sky-blue eyes seeming to have foreseen everything that was to come from the mysterious place.
Lin Shengmiao didn't believe in these things and only took it as an unconventional blessing, so he ordered her another drink.
But at this moment, standing in this sun-drenched room, looking at the serene, elegant, and mature face of the Queen of Cups in the photo frame, Lin Shengmiao suddenly had an urge to make an overseas call to her.
Xu Xingyan stepped forward, took the photo frame, held it up to her face, and asked, "Does it look good? I really wanted to try the High Priestess outfit; it's especially beautiful. But Yao Yan said I'm more suited to the image of the Queen of Cups. He's the photographer, so he has to decide."
Lin Shengmiao answered very confidently, "It looks great, and it really suits you."
Xu Xingyan smiled with narrowed eyes. Neither of them spoke, and the room became quiet, as if all the prepared opening remarks had been used up. This meeting, which spanned ten years, had only just begun, and the unfamiliar and immature branches were revealed, inevitably leading to an awkward silence.
After a while, Lin Shengmiao broke the silence with a soft laugh.
"I brought you a gift." She opened her bag and took out a beautifully bound, very thick pop-up book.
Lin Shengmiao said in a low voice, "I saw it in a rather secluded spot when I went to the mall today. I thought you would like it, so I bought it."
The book is titled *The Soft Hedgehog*.
Do you remember?
Lin Shengmiao looked at Xu Xingyan, half of her face bathed in sunlight, her eyes glistening, "You gave me one before, on my eighteenth birthday."
"Of course I remember!" Xu Xingyan said with a touch of melancholy.
Although Ms. Xu's academic performance was not good when she was young, she was influenced by her maternal grandfather and mother and developed an artistic temperament. Her handicrafts and painting skills were taught by Ms. Fang Yi, so she can be considered to have learned from a master.
That year, she was just beginning to experience love, and it was also the day her beloved girl turned eighteen. Whether she was out of her mind or her inherent romantic and eccentric nature as a painter was awakened, she spent two months hand-painting all 130+ paintings in that book, then copied the text onto them, and spent a lot of money to have a workshop bind them into a book.
The young girl at the time was full of tenderness and didn't feel tired at all. When she wrote, she would always create a dreamy plot for herself.
For example, when she draws kittens, she thinks that if one day in the future, the girl she likes is feeling down and she can't be there for her, she can open this book, and the kittens she drew can tell her on her behalf—"You've done so well, everything will be alright."
But Xu Xingyan, who was seventeen at the time, did not expect that she would miss Lin Shengmiao's birthdays for a full ten years, from the age of nineteen to twenty-eight.
If fate had foreseen this, then perhaps the girl who stayed up all night sketching that day, yawning, truly poured all the passion and ingenuity she would use to prepare birthday gifts for the next ten years into that one session.
“Look at this puppy, doesn’t it look like Big Black that used to run around on the high school playground? You used to feed it all the time…” Lin Shengmiao said as she turned the page.
Xu Xingyan looked at her profile and, for some reason, suddenly remembered a question she had seen on a Q&A app the night before when she couldn't sleep—
Q: What should I be careful about when meeting up with my first love whom I haven't contacted in years? (P.S.: I'm hoping to get back together!)
The most upvoted reply below is—
[Answer: Thank you for the invitation. Normally, in this situation, you shouldn't bring up getting back together right away. After not seeing each other for many years, you might not still be the same person the other remembers. You need to be especially careful at this time. It's best to get to know each other again step by step. If it's the first meeting after a long separation, you can talk about some things from the past. This can not only relive old times but also shorten the distance between you...]
Xu Xingyan, resting her chin on her hand, suddenly asked, "Miaomiao, did you bring your driver's license?"
Lin Shengmiao paused, subconsciously touched her bag, and then nodded, saying, "I brought it. Why?"
Xu Xingyan leaned back and said softly, "I don't want to drive today. How about you be the driver when we go to the restaurant later?"
“Okay,” he blurted out, then added somewhat hesitantly, “but I’m not familiar with the roads here, so I might need navigation.”
"Don't worry, I'm here," Xu Xingyan smiled. "I definitely won't let you go the wrong way."
Author's Note:
We finally meet!
Chapter 13 Embrace
Six o'clock in the afternoon, at Fuya Garden.
"The owner here is my friend. She has been interested in food since she was a child and dreamed of opening her own small restaurant, only cooking the dishes she loves. She did not change her ambition after growing up. After finishing her business studies as required by her parents, she opened this restaurant. In two years, it has become quite successful."
Xu Xingyan didn't book a private room, but instead chose a seat by the window. She has never liked enclosed places, and the seat was surrounded by plants, so the privacy was quite good. In addition, there were several guqin ladies performing in the hall, which made the atmosphere even better.
“Your friend has a very strong personality and ideas,” Lin Shengmiao said with a smile as he took the menu.
"How about a roast goose?" Xu Xingyan asked.
Lin Shengmiao was taken aback for a moment, and was about to say: Luo Jing said you can't eat too much oily food lately.
Then I heard her negate herself, saying, "Oh no, you have a bad stomach, you should eat less barbecue."
Lin Shengmiao: "..."
I was completely overwhelmed by the sweetness.
Xu Xingyan flipped through the menu: "Stuffed tofu, baked lobster, steamed mandarin fish, water bamboo and wood ear fungus, and a vegetable soup, hmm... is there anything else you'd like to order?"
Lin Shengmiao curled her lips and said, "I'll do whatever you say."
"What about the drinks?"
"I'll just have tea with you."
Xu Xingyan looked up at her and smiled, then handed the menu to the waiter. "That's all then, plus a serving of fruit for dessert, and please bring the food quickly."
"Okay, please wait a moment."
"Are you getting used to things after returning to China?" Xu Xingyan asked, holding her teacup and warming her hands, which had just been chilled by the wind.
"Fortunately, given the nature of my job, there's no issue of getting used to it. I also had to take some time recently to get some domestic certifications, so I was too busy to worry about these things."
Xu Xingyan took a sip of tea. "Are you taking the CATTI exam?"
"No, I already took that exam," Lin Shengmiao said nonchalantly. "Because I had a Master of Laws degree abroad, I wanted to take the domestic lawyer qualification exam so I would be more confident when I work as a court interpreter in the future. But as you know, there are big differences between domestic and foreign laws. I studied almost everything from scratch and barely passed with a low score."
"..." Xu Xingyan lowered her head, her face covered in steam rising from the teacup. "That was no easy feat."
“I saw on your WeChat Moments that you went on a desert trek two years ago, covering more than 100 kilometers over six days and five nights. Just reading about it made me shudder. But judging from the photos you posted later, the trip was quite meaningful, at least the scenery was truly magnificent.”
Lin Shengmiao raised an eyebrow. "You mean that time? Actually, it was alright. It just looked dangerous. The team leader was very experienced, the route was well-developed, the supplies at the supply points were plentiful, and there were buses following along the main road. If we really couldn't continue, we could get on the bus to rest in time. The most important thing was that it tested our willpower."
Xu Xingyan looked at her and said, "You must have done it all by yourself, right?"
Lin Shengmiao modestly said, "The scenery at the finish line is indeed very beautiful."
Xu Xingyan laughed again. She laughed more than usual today. She had never told anyone before that what she particularly liked about Lin Shengmiao was his effortless and nonchalant manner, despite his best efforts.