“Slow down?” Lumi looked puzzled, not understanding the meaning of “slow down.”

“How do I slow down? Don’t make fun of me, tell me how to slow down,” she asked.

“Slow down to make sure if I’m the one you’re looking for?”

“Slow down to let others catch up and surpass?”

“Why should I slow down? I haven’t slowed down in over twenty years, nearly thirty years,” Lumi said with a stern face. Wumeng used to tell many people to take things slow when he raised fish! Yet today, he’s taking it slow with this person for dinner, and tomorrow with that person for coffee. Isn’t this “take it slow” just a line from a scumbag?

“Just tell me, what does ‘take it slow’ mean for us now?” Lumi asked, tilting her head. Seeing Tu Ming not speaking, as if pondering, she cut in and left.

Tu Ming watched her walk away and felt that this girl was really hard to communicate with and even harder to reason with. She always spoke straightforwardly, never left a way out, she was cool and silly. Wasn’t she afraid that the people she met would only want to deceive her body and not talk about feelings?

Or maybe that’s exactly what she wanted.

She probably didn’t want anything serious.

Lumi ran back to the hotel and, seeing Wumeng hadn’t returned, she called Tang Wuyi, “Where are you drinking? Hurry up and bring him back! Can you be responsible for him in a foreign country?”

“He’s on his way back!” Tang Wuyi hung up the phone, rolled his eyes at Wumeng, “He has a bad temper, but he’s a good person. In my 24 years of limited life, meeting someone like him isn’t easy.”

“I envy you,” Wumeng said.

“What are you envious of?” Tang Wuyi asked her, then smiled, “Everyone has their own world, don’t they?”

After taking a shower and waiting for a while, Lumi saw Wumeng return, then she felt relieved and prepared to sleep. After turning off the lights, she noticed Wumeng on the adjacent bed, breathing lightly. In the darkness, she asked her, “Are you afraid of disturbing my sleep?”

“Huh?”

“Why are you so quiet? I can imagine how you are, with your hands placed on both sides, lying flat on the bed, not daring to breathe loudly. Are you afraid of disturbing my sleep?” Lumi didn’t like sharing a room with others, except for Shang Zhi Tao. Before this trip, she had requested a single room, but there weren’t enough rooms. She ended up sharing with Wumeng, who was quiet, rarely making noise.

“Because I’m afraid you won’t be able to sleep.”

“You’re overthinking it. I sleep soundly! Even if a dog barks next to me when I’m asleep, I might not even wake up. Stop overthinking, change positions, one posture is too tiring.” Lumi said to Wumeng, then opened her phone and saw that the person who said to take it slow wasn’t even there.

Is this taking it slow? This is more like standing still!

Lumi cursed Tu Ming in her heart, threw her phone aside, and fell asleep. She didn’t care, as long as she slept well, regardless of what tomorrow would bring. In the middle of the night, when she turned over, she heard something fall into the soup pool outside with a thud, and suddenly remembered Tu Ming smiling at her in the heavy snow. She woke up.

Oh, yes, she remembered that phrase: “I want to take it slow with you.”

What a joke! Lumi rolled over in bed, thinking, “Who wants to take it slow with you? If you don’t want to come, don’t come, if you want to come, just come. Why take it slow? What a load of nonsense!”

“Why are you patting my shoulder with snow? I don’t have hands?”

Why is Tu Ming so annoying!

In a rare move, Lumi got up in bed and looked outside. The snow, which had stopped for a while, seemed to have started again. She decided to put on some clothes, wrap herself in a blanket, and quietly open the door. She sat outside and watched the snow for a while. It was cold, and she soon got a runny nose. She wiped it off and went back inside.

The next day, she woke up feeling listless and didn’t bother with makeup or getting dressed up. She was still in the same clothes from the day before, waiting for everyone to gather at the hotel entrance. Seeing Tu Ming standing there looking fresh, she felt annoyed and turned away.

“Are you sulking?” Tang Wuyi asked her, “Last night, Will said he would come find us for drinks, and the guy took almost an hour to get here. Did he crawl all the way from the hotel?”

“Who knows,” Lumi said sarcastically.

“You didn’t run into him?” Tang Wuyi asked her in a low voice.

Lumi snorted and didn’t answer the question. What was good about running into him? He spoke unclearly, acted all wishy-washy, only showing his ruthlessness when it came to fighting.

If anything happened later, he would probably fell asleep Chongqing. Lumi thought of this scenario and suddenly burst out laughing, amusing herself.

When they got to the cable car, Lumi walked slowly behind, with Tang Wuyi beside her. They chatted about meaningless things. Occasionally, she looked up and saw Tu Ming looking at her, then turned his face forward and switched seats with him. He wasn’t happy about it, but wanting to help Lumi get together with him sooner, he pouted, went to the front of Tu Ming, and tried to create an opportunity for the old man.

Lumi didn’t pay attention. Tang Wuyi had just mentioned buying souvenirs, and she was thinking about who to buy them for. It wasn’t until they were all on the cable car and she had already sat down and then saw Tu Ming sitting across from her.

“Where’s Tang Wuyi?” Lumi asked him.

“He’s on the one in front.”

“I don’t want to be on the same cable car as you.”

“Then I won’t go either.”

Tu Ming spoke slowly, but it was quite annoying. Lumi raised her foot and kicked him. The snow on her shoes rubbed against his pants. Tu Ming dodged quickly, as if he had anticipated her rough play. Lumi’s kick missed, her eyes widened, “Who told you to dodge!”

Tu Ming didn’t answer her, and dodged her kick again, “Even if we’re close, you can’t just touch someone. Men can’t touch people, and by the same token, people can’t randomly touch men. Except for playful fighting.” Tu Ming spoke to her calmly, which only added fuel to the fire.

“Who’s close to you? Do I know you?”

“Isn’t it time you asked me what I was doing every day?”

Tu Ming took out his phone, opened their chat, scrolled forward, found the tiger words that Lumi had said when she was crazy and wanted to sleep with him, and showed it to Lumi for a moment before putting it away.

“Do you want to hear me read it?” Tu Ming asked her.

“You’re taking it seriously.”

“Are you joking?” Tu Ming put away his phone, “Were you just joking when you sent me those messages? You weren’t serious?”

“You know what flirting is?”

“I understand now.”

Tu Ming put his phone in his pocket. He probably realized that he couldn’t reason with Lumi, and he wasn’t going to try. He felt a little annoyed, but ultimately, he comforted himself, thinking that getting angry with her wasn’t worth it.

He decided to not say anything.

Lumi saw him pouting, obviously angry, and thought, “You deserve it, why didn’t you do this earlier?” She had always been stubborn, and she was even harder to handle when she grew up. In Zhang Qing’s words, “If you want to do something with Lumi, you have to do it when she’s happy, if she’s not happy, it’s all in vain! How do you make Lumi happy? Then you have to coax her. You have to coax her until she’s happy, if you coax her wrong, it won’t work.”

Right now, Lumi was in a bad mood. She was annoyed by Tu Ming, and yesterday, he suddenly changed direction, acting like he had taken the wrong medicine. The rebellious bone in her brain stuck out again, “Why should I listen to you? No!”

Tu Ming wasn’t good at coaxing people, he only knew how to reason, but he probably realized that Lumi wouldn’t listen to reason, so he didn’t say anything. When they were on the cable car, he asked her, “Don’t you like love letters?”

“?”

“What’s your favorite line from this movie?” Tu Ming thought Lumi would probably blurt out, “What’s it to you?” so he continued, “You hate that you’re afraid of being alone, yet you fall in love with a free and selfish soul.”

He looked at her deeply, then left the cable car.

Tu Ming’s love life was very simple. Although he had the label of “divorced” attached to him, he had only ever been in one serious relationship. For him, it was difficult to commit to a relationship; he was serious about life and love. In every way, Lumi didn’t seem like that person.

But many beginnings just begin. At first, he thought Lumi was just playing around, so he didn’t pay much attention to her. He once firmly believed that they wouldn’t have anything, and thought his feelings for her were very simple and straightforward. Later, seeing Lumi’s scorching heart again and again, he couldn’t help but look at her a little more.

One look, and it was something else entirely.

He also struggled on several nights, dodging and fearing her, and at one point, he also felt that they wouldn’t have a future.

Making decisions was very difficult for him, truly difficult, but once he made a decision, he wouldn’t easily change it.

As for Lumi, she made decisions very quickly, changed decisions very quickly, and raced down a completely different path from Tu Ming.

Of course, Lumi liked “Love Letter.” Among all the people she knew, only Zhang Qing didn’t like it. Following Tu Ming to meet everyone, it seemed like there wouldn’t be heavy snow today. Everyone wanted to play a little longer on the mountain, everything was going well, except for the cold.

In order to take stunning photos, they endured the cold, walking all over the mountain, and finally made it to the evening. The city on the mountain lit up, and Daisy was the first to find the best scenic spot, tilting her head and closing her eyes, saying, “Quick, take the picture!”

A photo on the edge of the cliff.

Lumi and Tang Wuyi were freezing, standing on the side, huddling their shoulders and stomping their feet. Lumi said, “It’s all your fault, forcing me to socialize. What’s there to socialize about?”

“Since we’re here, you should go too!”

“I’m not going!”

“Go!”

Tang Wuyi hugged Lumi’s waist, ignoring her struggles and everyone’s laughter, and placed her in the best scenic spot. “Quick! Smile, we’ll go home after the photo!”

Lumi jumped up to hit him, causing the photo to blur. Then, Tang Wuyi held her down and managed to take a picture.

“Hurry, ancestors, or the mountain will turn into popsicles!” Lumi pointed at Serena, “Look at your lips, they’re turning purple! Beautiful!”

Everyone laughed at Lumi’s antics. “Let’s go, let’s go for a drink to warm up.”

Tu Ming had been watching Tang Wuyi and Lumi playing around, they truly seemed like souls connected.

While on the mountain, Tang Wuyi whispered to Lumi, “Why do you two act like old lovers meeting, intentionally not looking at each other, something’s not right!”

“Just go!”

Until the end of the trip, Lumi didn’t pay attention to Tu Ming. When they landed in Beijing, she went to her parents’ place to drop off some things, had a meal, and by the time she was heading home, it was almost midnight. Unexpectedly, she received a call from Tu Ming. He asked her, “Are you at home? I have something for you.”

“What is it?”

“It’s a martial arts comic book, I found some more.”

Lumi’s mischievous side emerged, “I’m not home, it’s too cold. Just leave it at the company for me, or… can you bring it up?”

Tu Ming was quiet on the phone, then said, “Okay. I’ll bring it up.”

After hanging up, Lumi suddenly felt elated. She rushed into the bedroom and pulled out the new combat suit she had bought. It had a lace-up front and a deep V design at the back, extending down to the waistline. She undressed in three seconds, and putting on the nightgown took just as long. Her body moved swiftly, and even through the silk nightdress, you could imagine her body was a grand feast.

A touch of perfume behind her ears, a rosy tint on her lips, her hair messily tied up, showcasing her flawless skin. She was bold and unabashed!

There was a knock at the door. How could it be so quick!

“Wait!” Lumi kicked off her fuzzy slippers, ran to the door barefoot, and opened it. She saw a brown paper bag on the floor outside the door, but the person was gone.

“Damn it!” Lumi felt like she was going crazy from Tu Ming’s antics. She picked up her phone and called him, “Where are you? What do you mean? Get your ass up here right now!”

“It’s not convenient.”

“What’s convenient? Are you crazy? Am I looking for convenience? I just want to sleep alone tonight! It doesn’t matter if it’s you or someone else! If you’re not up here in five minutes, you don’t need to come back! Did you hear that? Put away your slow-and-steady scumbag theory, either get it done quickly, or take it slow with someone else!”

Lumi scolded Tu Ming over the phone, feeling refreshed and invigorated. She hung up the phone and really started the countdown.

At the beginning of the countdown, she thought Tu Ming would come up. He was taking it slow, and coming up to do whatever with her wouldn’t affect that.

Four minutes left on the countdown, this son of a gun was probably already on the elevator, the old, broken elevator was slow.

Three minutes left on the countdown, the elevator still hadn’t arrived. Could it be broken?

Two minutes left on the countdown, Lumi ran to the door, pressed her ear against it to listen for any sound, but there was nothing.

One minute left on the countdown, Lumi went back to the sofa and threw her phone aside.

The countdown ended.

There was a knock at the door.

“Get lost!” she shouted at the door.