"I'm telling you, this is dangerous. Zhao Ming's easygoing, but even he can't take this much drama forever."

With Zhao Ming out of the room, the bluster went right out of Zhang Ruowei.

She sighed and propped her chin on her hand. "I know I'm being awful, but… I just can't stop myself. How do I put this? The longer I'm with Zhao Ming, the more he matters to me. And the more someone matters to me, the tighter I want to hold on to them. Actually… actually, there's a reason I've been blowing up at him out of nowhere lately."

"What reason?"

Everyone turned to her, waiting for her to explain.

Zhang Ruowei hadn't meant to say anything, but now that things had gotten this far, she told them, a little embarrassed. "A while back, Zhao Ming and I had dinner with Jiaying-jie, and Jiaying-jie let something slip. She said… Zhao Ming had a girlfriend when he was studying abroad."

"And?"

Zhang Ruowei: "When Jiaying-jie let it slip, he happened to be in the bathroom. But afterward, when I asked him whether he'd ever had a girlfriend before, he said no. If he'd just told me the truth, I wouldn't have cared. It's totally normal to have dated by twenty-five or twenty-six. But he lied, and it's been bugging me ever since…"

She paused, then forced a smile. "I figured if I just came out and said it, I'd look petty. So I thought I'd wait until we had a fight and blurt it out in the heat of the moment. He'd explain, he'd make it up to me, and that would be the end of it. But no matter how unreasonable I get, he never fights back…"

"You're too obsessive," Xu Ye said before he could stop himself.

"Mm." Zhang Ruowei nodded. She didn't deny it. "I've known that for a long time. In middle school, my dad went abroad for work, and my mom was away from home for months at a time. She was worried I'd be lonely, so she bought me a puppy. His name…