“What did you do to yourself?” Chen Wanxin felt worried and anxious upon seeing Zhao Yuan. She took out her handkerchief to wipe the wounds for him while saying angrily, “Did the policemen beat you up? I won’t let them off! No one in this county dares to act against my will!”

Zhao Yuan turned his face away and said, “No, not them. I’m fine. Can you ask them to release Wenxi now?”

Chen Wanxin slightly frowned and complained, “I thought that you would want to say some sweet words to me first.”

Zhao Yuan said with a smile, “Thank you, Wanxin.”

Chen Wanxin smiled slightly and asked, “Why did you think of asking me for help?”

Although Zhao Yuan felt anxious, he still managed to remain calm in front of Chen Wanxin. “When I noticed that your driver is a senior military instructor, I know that you can help me out. Sometimes, money can’t solve all the problems.” Zhao Yuan guessed that Chen Wanxin’s family must be very powerful.

Chen Wanxin nodded and continued to wipe the wounds for Zhao Yuan. She felt irritated upon seeing Zhao Yuan get wounded for Lin Wenxi, so she just refused to make any promise to Zhao Yuan now.

“Please ask the police to release him now, Wanxin. It’s cold inside the room,” Zhao Yuan said eagerly.

Chen Wanxin frowned and said coldly, “No, I won’t ask them to release him. He made you get injured so badly!”

Zhao Yuan kept coaxing Chen Wanxin for a long time. He did everything she wanted him to do. He ate up the bread, drank up the milk and let her wipe all his wounds clean.

“Wanxin, what do you want me to do in exchange for you helping Wenxi?” Zhao Yuan asked somewhat grumpily.

Upon hearing that, Chen Wanxin, who was holding a spoonful of soup and blowing on it to cool it down, splattered the soup to the ground and stood up. Her eyebrows knitted tightly together. She shook her head and pointed a finger at Zhao Yuan while sobbing. “You called me at 10:00 p.m last night, asking me to help you out. I tried my best to solve the problem for you and traveled all night to come to this place to see you. How can you talk to me like this?”

Zhao Yuan was rendered speechless, as he was well aware that at this moment, he should not talk like this.

Tears slowly rolled down Chen Wanxin’s face. She smiled bleakly and pushed the door open. She pointed at another room and said, “Look with your own eyes, Zhao Yuan!” With these words, she picked up her handbag and walked away without looking back at all.

When Zhao Yuan entered that room, he saw Lin Wenxi sitting on a sofa with some blankets placed beside him. Zhao Yuan could tell that Lin Wenxi was still angry and refused to wrap himself in the blankets or eat the food here. He thought, “Lin Wenxi looks warm now. It looks like that he was released a long time ago. Chen Wanxin was just joking when she told me that she would not help him.”

With this in mind, Zhao Yuan ran out of the police station to find Chen Wanxin. When Lin Wenxi caught up with him, the two of them saw Chen Wanxin run toward a luxury SUV while weeping.

“Alas…” Zhao Yuan sighed and let steam come out of his mouth while watching the vehicle speed away. Inside the SUV, Chen Yuxin was talking with someone on the phone. She said in a deep voice, “It is time to let him know.”

Lin Wenxi felt somewhat suffocated. Last night, he had indulged himself in the warm embrace of Zhao Yuan. He had never given much thought to why Zhao Yuan had been locked in the same room together with him until now. At this moment, he realized how Zhao Yuan had managed to get into that room to accompany him. He thought ruefully, “When he was injured and needed a good rest, he hugged me and remained fixed in the position all night to keep me warm. He didn’t eat the bread as I refused to eat it.” Lin Wenxi wanted to cry, but his eyes were dry. He suppressed the urge to sob and thus made a strange noise in his throat. He felt dejected and worried upon seeing Zhao Yuan’s wounds.

“Don’t cry. It’ll be considered a sign of weakness here,” Zhao Yuan calmly said and then felt a sharp pain at the corners of his mouth. Lin Wenxi stopped sobbing and nodded.

The two of them went to find two policemen to take their ID cards, student ID cards and cellphones back before leaving the police station. The two policemen looked somewhat apologetic and kept saying that it was a misunderstanding before sending them away.

Lin Wenxi gritted his teeth and looked back at the police station where he had been detained for a night. This police station was located in a remote coner of the country.

He thought, “It was Chen Wanxin who got me out of this place. Her family must be quite powerful. And I, the only son of the deputy major of the city, had to be locked in this place for a whole night and dared not to tell anyone who I am. If they had known who I am, they would’ve treated me the way they did Chen Wanxin. That’s one of the perks of being a relative of an official. Maybe it’s wrong for my father to keep my identity a secret. I used to think that my father did this for justice, but where’s justice. It seems that it has never come up to me.”

As Zhao Yuan had asked his neighbors to help him take care of the shop in time, when they came back to the shop, everything was alright. When Lin Wenxi was about to dress Zhao Yuan’s wounds, Hong Xuan called him.

According to Hong Xuan, Lin Ziwei wanted Lin Wenxi to come back to the village to spend Chinese New Year’s Eve together as nearly all the relatives had come back this year. At Lin Ziwei’s request, Hong Xuan would send Lin Wenxi back to the village.

Lin Wenxi felt reluctant to leave Zhao Yuan but he had to obey his father’s wish. In the afternoon, when the luminous sun shone brightly over the yard, Zhao Yuan accompanied Lin Wenxi to the gate. It was exceptionally cold when the snow began to melt. Lin Wenxi could not help but shiver. He looked at the two snowmen and noticed that the thin snowman’s skirt tilted. He went to put the skirt back in place and walked back to Zhao Yuan.

“You… Just take care of yourself,” said Zhao Yuan. Lin Wenxi nodded and walked away. After a while, he looked back and said, “I’m sorry, Zhao Yuan.”

Zhao Yuan laughed and said, “Don’t say that. You’re the bravest guy I’ve ever met.” Upon hearing that, Lin Wenxi left gleefully. When he looked back at Zhao Yuan again, he could not help but touch his own lower lip, his heart racing.

Throughout the new year holiday, Lin Wenxi and Zhao Yuan had never called or texted each other.

When the new semester started, Zhao Yuan seemed to have changed.

On the first day of the semester, when Lin Wenxin woke up in the sunny morning and yawned, he saw a bowl of hot-dry noodles on this desk. He knew for sure that it was Zhao Yuan who bought it for him and Zhao Yuan only bought breakfast for him.

“Fuck! Why did he only buy breakfast for you? Did you meet each other’s parents and get engaged or something? Why are you suddenly on good terms now? Didn’t you break up last year? Tell me. What happened during the new year holiday?” Wang Xiang sprang out of his bed, planning to eat Lin Wenxi’s noodles.

Lin Wenxi hurriedly took a bite and then put the noodles down while saying, “Hehe, help yourself.” With these words, he went to wash up.

Wang Xiang felt confused.

He wondered, “Where’s Zhao Yuan now?”

When Lin Wenxi called Zhao Yuan, Zhao Yuan said, “I’m in the lecture room now. I’ve occupied seats for us in the front of the room.

When Lin Wenxi took his breakfast to the lecture room, he saw Chen Wanxin standing outside the room and calmly looking up at the blue sky. She gleefully chatted with Zhang An’an while eating her breakfast.

To his surprise, the package of her breakfast was exactly the same as the one of his breakfast.