Sunlight spilled through the window onto the pillow, and birdsong drifted in from outside now and then.
The quiet, rain-soaked street of the night before had come back to life with the morning’s noise and foot traffic.
Xu Ye stretched himself awake, washed up, then noticed the toothbrush in his dorm room had been in service for two months already — so he pocketed the hotel’s complimentary one without a second thought.
Once he was dressed, he stepped out and knocked on the door across the hall.
A few seconds later, Chen Qingqing opened it. She’d just finished washing up herself. She put on her shoes and followed him out of the hotel.
“Where are we going for breakfast?” she asked.
“The school cafeteria?”
No objections. She’d been planning to see his campus today anyway — the layout, the vending machines he’d told her about, the fruit shop. And, most importantly, to see for herself whether there really was a pretty female business partner in the picture.
The cafeteria on a weekend morning was actually quieter than usual. Most students were still in their dorms sleeping in, and a fair number had developed the unhealthy university habit of skipping breakfast entirely.
Still, the moment Xu Ye and Chen Qingqing walked in, they drew quite a few looks.
Xu Ye was only mildly well-known on campus — most people just knew he’d opened a fruit shop, and had no idea the vending machines were his operation too. The attention was mostly because of Chen Qingqing beside him. She was wearing his hoodie, which was a size too big, but the oversized fit gave it a relaxed, effortless quality all its own. A hoodie and jeans was a common enough look for this time of year, but finding someone as tall and striking as Chen Qingqing to wear it — there wasn’t a second one on this campus.
Honestly, that wasn’t surprising. Even setting Chen Qingqing aside, if Zhang Ruowei, Jiang Yu, or Shen Xinyi had walked onto the Shanghai University of Finance campus, any one of them could have placed as a faculty or class beauty without any trouble.
Scattered whispers made their way around the cafeteria:
“Who’s that girl?”
“No idea. Definitely not from our school.”
“Didn’t Xu Ye get together with Jiang Wei?”
“Rumor mill says Jiang Wei just has a stake in his fruit shop — they’re not actually dating.”
“I don’t get it. Why does this guy always have beautiful women around him? He should be ashamed of himself.”
“Genuinely criminal.”
“…”
Xu Ye brought Chen Qingqing up to the food window. A whole spread of breakfast options lined the counter — baozi, plain buns, flower rolls, fried dough sticks, shaomai… [TL: a standard spread at Chinese university cafeterias — 包子 (filled steamed buns), 馒头 (plain steamed buns), 花卷 (layered twisted rolls), 油条 (fried dough sticks), 烧麦 (open-top steamed dumplings)]
“What do you want?”
He smiled as he asked, already knowing the answer — Chen Qingqing had terrible decision paralysis when it came to choosing food. Sure enough, she shook her head. “Whatever.”
He’d seen this coming. He turned straight to the server. “Auntie, I’ll take this one, this one, and that one — two of each, and two soymilk please.”
“Twenty-two yuan — card’s fine.”
“Perfect.”
Chen Qingqing had already found them seats beside one of the pillars. Xu Ye divided everything into two portions and set one in front of her.
She put the straw in her soymilk and, before she’d even touched the food, said, “I can’t eat all this.”
“Just start. Whatever you can’t finish, I’ll take.”
That settled the matter. She ate without worrying about it.
The sun was out today, but the wind had real bite to it, and the temperature had dropped noticeably from the past few days — enough that some of the more cold-sensitive students were already in light down jackets.
Once they’d finished breakfast, Xu Ye walked Chen Qingqing through the campus, starting from the main gate.
“This is Coin Plaza — the gymnasium is over there, and that’s the admin building and library…”
“Where do you have class?”
“Six teaching buildings total. My major mostly meets in Building Five. I’ll take you over.”
“And here — this is the vending machine setup. It’s a weekend so no classes, but on school days there’s always a line here for drinks.”
“This is my classroom.”
University classrooms weren’t locked on weekends. Xu Ye walked her straight in. Chen Qingqing looked around, then asked, “Where do you sit?”
He pointed to the back row. “Right there.”
She walked over and pulled out the chair, and sat down. Xu Ye pulled out the chair beside her and did the same.
Just the two of them in an empty classroom, and somehow neither of them said anything.
After a moment, Chen Qingqing started to feel the atmosphere pressing in on her — it was too charged, too quiet, and she had a specific worry that Xu Ye was going to take advantage of the setting. Last night just holding his hand had sent electricity all the way through her. They’d already had the hug, already had the hand-holding — if he tried something more and she ended up going along with it the same way she had last night—
Her face warmed. She stood up promptly. “Where’s the fruit shop? I want to see it.”
Xu Ye smiled. “Down on the food street. I’ll take you.”
They came down from the teaching building, followed the main path through campus, and walked seven or eight minutes to the food street. When Xu Ye stopped, Chen Qingqing stopped too — because right in front of her hung the sign reading Qingqing Fruit Shop.
She’d known for a while that he’d named it after her. But knowing about it and seeing it with her own eyes were two different things.
“Come on. My roommates should all be in there — I’ll introduce you.”
Chen Qingqing quickly straightened her hoodie, then followed him inside.
The moment they walked in, everyone in the shop looked up.
Xu Wanying was at the library studying on the weekend and hadn’t come in, but Li Tongwen, Zhang Xinzhou, and Yang Fei were all there — and so was Jiang Wei.
Before Xu Ye could get through any kind of introduction, Jiang Wei spoke first, looking directly at Chen Qingqing: “How did you end up liking someone as plain-looking as him?”
Xu Ye’s expression went completely flat. “Jiang Wei. Mind your manners. My girlfriend is a hundred times better-looking than you.”
Jiang Wei rolled her eyes. “I was asking your girlfriend. Not you.”
Xu Ye stared at her.
Oh. So in this scenario, the ‘plain-looking one’ is me.
Chen Qingqing, taking in the exchange, quietly extracted two pieces of information.
The bad news: there really was a very pretty girl near Xu Ye.
The good news: this very pretty girl clearly had zero interest in Xu Ye whatsoever.
She was so busy processing this that she didn’t even notice she’d passively accepted the identity of “Xu Ye’s girlfriend” without objecting to it once.
Of everyone in the room, the most thoroughly blindsided was Yang Fei.
Because —
What in the—
The girl in Xu Ye’s phone wallpaper was actually, genuinely, in real life his girlfriend?!
What did this guy do to deserve all this in a past life?!
Xu Ye noticed Chen Qingqing had gone quiet and gave her hand a small tug. She came back to herself and smiled at the room. “Hi, everyone~”
Xu Ye held her hand, cleared his throat, and made it official. “Formal introduction — my girlfriend, Chen Qingqing.”
“This is Zhang Xinzhou. This is Li Tongwen. That one’s Yang Fei — most suspicious-looking of the bunch. And this one who just said something rude is Jiang Wei. Zhang Xinzhou and Jiang Wei are both my business partners.”
Chen Qingqing smiled and nodded at each of them in turn.
What caught Xu Ye pleasantly off guard was this: last night on the street, she’d still resisted a little when he first took her hand. But now, standing in front of a shop full of people, she didn’t pull away at all — she just quietly curled her fingers against his palm, scratching lightly.
Tingly.
Warm.
(End of Chapter 118)