Chapter 18 – Back in High School, You Secretly Took a Lot of Photos of Me

Shang Li’s first instinct was to refuse, so she hastily made up an excuse. “Ah, no need. I have a shift at the restaurant later—it’s not on your way.”

Lu Tinghe half-squinted, his eyes brimming with a dark, turbulent depth.

He slung the sketch bag from the dining chair over his shoulder and shot her a half-smile, half-smirk. “Come with me, or your art supplies are mine.”

Shang Li bit her lip. Under the shocked gaze of Lu Siyu, she followed Lu Tinghe out of the luxurious flat in Hongxing City.

The two walked in silence through the residential neighborhood. It was late summer, and the plane trees in the neighborhood were still lush with leaves. Streetlamps filtered through the thick canopy, casting a dazzling, flickering light.

Trailing behind that tall, lean figure, Shang Li felt a fleeting daze—like she was once again in her final year of high school, watching that spirited and unrestrained young man in his white school uniform shirt.

Suddenly, Lu Tinghe turned around. Under his tousled hair, his eyes shimmered like scattered starlight.

“Shang Li, I know you were fired from the restaurant.”

Shang Li stopped in her tracks. Her long lashes cast a faint shadow over her eyes, giving her a pitiful appearance.

“How did you find out?”

Could it be… the person she’d offended was Lu Tinghe? Was he the one who got her fired?

Lu Tinghe took another step forward and leaned down toward her. That strikingly handsome face was suddenly just inches away.

His voice, unusually serious, carried an unfamiliar weight. “Don’t worry about how I know. I’m just telling you—don’t talk nonsense in front of me again. It puts me in a bad mood.”

Shang Li lifted her gaze, eyes glistening.

Of course she didn’t dare argue with Lu Tinghe. She didn’t even have the right to. But she truly didn’t know what she’d done to offend him. She’d tried her best to stay away from him.

Was it still because of her foolishness back in high school?

Looking at Shang Li’s increasingly aggrieved face, Lu Tinghe could practically read the flurry of thoughts running through her head.

He couldn’t help but feel both exasperated and amused.

He reached out and gave her hair a rough tousle, instantly turning the smooth strands into a messy bird’s nest.

“Dummy. The restaurant owner will call you personally tonight. You can go back to work tomorrow.”

The word “dummy” came out sounding unusually tender. Shang Li jerked her head up, blinking in confusion. A few strands of hair clung to her nose, making her look so adorably helpless it stirred a wicked impulse to bully her.

“What do you mean? I can go back to work? Didn’t you tell the owner to fire me?”

“Shang Li, what kind of grudge would I have against you to go that far?”

Shang Li tilted her head, thinking. True, there wasn’t really any deep grudge—unless he still held on to resentment from high school when she used to pester him constantly… and those ninety-eight egg pancakes.

She was just about to respond when suddenly, Lu Tinghe reached out and pulled her into his arms.

Shang Li was so startled she nearly screamed. Just then, Lu Tinghe gently covered her mouth. “Shh.”

Shang Li’s frightened eyes darted to the distance—and froze.

Just a few steps away, Gu Wanying had her arms wrapped around Chu Yan’s waist, her chin resting on his chest as she cooed, “Senior, I really like you. Are you sure you’re not staying over at my place tonight?”

Chu Yan held the back of her head and coaxed gently, “Not tonight, I’ve got things to do. Next time.”

Gu Wanying whispered something else, then tiptoed up and pressed her red lips against his.

Chu Yan didn’t resist. The two of them kissed more and more passionately by the flower bed.

In an instant, Shang Li recalled Tan Weiwei’s tear-streaked face from lunch, saying how she wanted to give her first time to Chu Yan.

In Shang Li’s heart, Chu Yan had always been handsome, smart, upright, and dependable—a perfect man.

But the scene before her now hit her like a bolt from the blue, shattering everything she thought she knew and completely overturning her worldview.inches away.

At that moment, she truly couldn’t hold it in any longer and cried out in shock.

“Ah!!!”

Chu Yan and Gu Wanying, locked in a heated kiss, immediately separated upon hearing the shout. Their eyes turned simultaneously toward the direction of Shang Li and Lu Tinghe.

At that critical moment, Lu Tinghe pushed Shang Li against the nearby wall, his broad frame casting a shadow that enveloped her completely.

The distance between them was so close, they could feel each other’s warm breath.

“Don’t say a word.”

Tilting his head slightly, the heat of his breath brushed against the side of her neck, carrying the scent of cold pine. The warm exhale in her ear, lightly grazing her earlobe with his lips, sent a shiver down her spine, like a current of electricity shooting from her feet straight up to the crown of her head.

Their posture was incredibly intimate and suggestive. From behind, it looked like a couple reluctant to part, wrapped in a passionate, lingering embrace.

Chu Yan and Gu Wanying appeared to glance in their direction, but then the sound of their footsteps slowly faded away.

Shang Li kept biting her lip tightly, not daring to make a sound. But her pounding heartbeat had already betrayed her.

That rush of emotion was like a torrential summer rain—sudden, overwhelming, and impossible to stop.

After what felt like an eternity, Shang Li asked in a soft, timid voice, “Are they… gone?”

Lu Tinghe held her in his arms and turned his head, grinning with a cocky air. “Nope. Maybe they don’t plan to leave.”

Shang Li didn’t believe him. After kissing for that long, their lips were probably swollen.

So she stood on tiptoe and peeked over Lu Tinghe’s shoulder in the direction they had come from—only to find that Chu Yan and Gu Wanying were long gone.

She shoved Lu Tinghe away. “You! Don’t bully me!”

Lu Tinghe hadn’t expected that despite Shang Li’s slender frame, she actually had a surprising amount of strength. Caught off guard, he stumbled a step backward.

But he wasn’t the least bit annoyed. Instead, he retreated two steps, hands in his pockets, a smile playing beneath his lips.

“Shang Li, do I really have no charm at all? You’re in such a hurry to push me away?”

At this point, Shang Li wasn’t in the mood to reflect on the heart-pounding closeness with the boy she liked. She quickly pulled out her phone to message Tan Weiwei, casually tossing back, “There are plenty of girls who think you’re charming. You don’t need me.”

Lu Tinghe laughed aloud. “Is that so? Have you changed phones in the past few years?”

Shang Li stopped typing and looked up. “No, I haven’t. Why do you ask?”

Each phone costs thousands—there’s no way she could afford to change them constantly. The one in her hand had been with her for five or six years now.

Lu Tinghe reached out his hand. “Let me see your phone.”

“What for?”

“Didn’t you just say I wasn’t charming? Let me take a look.” Lu Tinghe curved his lips into a smile. “Shang Li, don’t think I don’t know—back in high school, during lunch break, whenever I napped at my desk, you were always secretly snapping photos of me with your phone.”

The moment those words fell, Shang Li’s heart suddenly skipped a beat.

She instinctively placed a hand over her chest, trying to calm the sudden spike in her heartbeat. At the same time, a rush of heat rose from the depths of her body, surging through her like wildfire, making her whole face flush.

Without even thinking, she shoved her phone into her pocket and bolted.

“I didn’t! You’re imagining things!”

Behind her, Lu Tinghe called out, “If you run again, I’m throwing out your sketch bag.”

Still running, Shang Li yelled without turning back, “Go ahead and toss it—I don’t want it anymore!”

Lu Tinghe: “…”