2018 flew by, and it was already the end of December.

During the day, Ms. Zhu was busy kneading dough in the kitchen, and Zhu Yiyi was cleaning the living room. They still had an old-fashioned calendar at home, where you tear off a page every day. They had already torn to the last page.

She silently counted, after her birthday next year, she would be 27.

Probably every girl in school fantasized about what she would be like at 30. Zhu Yiyi did too. She majored in Network and New Media, and she fantasized about being a successful media person, a hotshot reporter for major newspapers.

Time flew by, and she was still as ordinary as ever.

“Zhu Yiyi, are you deaf? Come in and wrap dumplings!” Ms. Zhu put down her rolling pin and chopped the meat filling with a grunt.

“Coming, coming.” Zhu Yiyi tied on a brown apron and went into the kitchen.

“What are you thinking about? I called you a few times and you didn’t answer.” Ms. Zhu glanced at her belly, “Did your ears degenerate after you got pregnant?”

Ever since Zhu Yiyi admitted that she didn’t want to get married, Ms. Zhu’s attitude had been up and down. Zhu Yiyi didn’t want to cause any unpleasantness on New Year’s Eve, so she took the initiative to change the subject, “Mom, I have a surprise for you.”

Ms. Zhu looked at her sideways, “What?”

Zhu Yiyi took a gift box out of her bag. It was beautifully packaged, “I bought it when I was on a business trip. I deliberately kept it until today. It’s a New Year’s gift for my dear mother.”

“You child, you spend money recklessly when you have some!” Ms. Zhu scolded, but her mood improved a bit. She washed her hands and ran over to look. As soon as she opened it, she saw a silk scarf with a smooth texture. Her lips curved into a deeper smile, “It’s beautiful, really beautiful! How much did it cost, daughter?”

“It’s not expensive, as long as you like it.”

Zhu Yiyi helped Ms. Zhu put it on and brought over a small mirror. Ms. Zhu looked at herself in the mirror, smiling so hard that her mouth wouldn’t close, “This scarf is great. I’ll wear it out one day and let them envy me.”

That’s just her personality. She likes to show off. Zhu Yiyi was used to it and smiled.

Smiling, she thought of something else.

The curve of her lips stiffened and then flattened.

“Mom, the other day when I was on a business trip…”

Zhu Yiyi hesitated to say the words.

Lin Haifu was Ms. Zhu’s trigger point. Even mentioning his name would lead to a huge fight.

Zhu Yiyi remembered the last time she mentioned his name. It was when she graduated from high school.

That day, she got her acceptance letter. She pushed open the door, and Ms. Zhu was stewing chicken in the kitchen, humming a little tune, and asked her if she was hungry or wanted a bowl.

Zhu Yiyi sat silently on the sofa.

On the way back, she ran into those classmates who had bullied her before. They mocked her again with words like “a wild child with a mother but no father.”

Eighteen years of bullying, and Zhu Yiyi suddenly couldn’t bear it anymore.

She looked at Ms. Zhu, who was facing away from her, and asked softly, “Mom, where’s my dad?”

Ms. Zhu stopped singing, her hand holding the bowl froze. It only took a few seconds for her mood to shift from pleasant to furious. The bowl filled with hot soup was slammed heavily on the floor.

The porcelain shattered into pieces, and the hot soup splashed onto Zhu Yiyi along with the shards, leaving a long, bloody mark on her fair skin.

Ms. Zhu’s hair was disheveled, her face hidden in the darkness, and her voice was hoarse, “Your dad is dead.”

She repeated it like a machine, not sure if she was hypnotizing herself or others, “He’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead!!!”

Zhu Yiyi stubbornly said with red eyes, “He’s not dead, I know his name is Lin—”

A heavy slap came across her face.

Half of Zhu Yiyi’s face swelled up. The pain spread from her cheek to her heart, like needles pricking her.

This was the first time Ms. Zhu had ever hit her.

From then on, Zhu Yiyi knew that the unspoken name was a taboo between them.

She never mentioned it again.

Ms. Zhu was still admiring the scarf around her neck in the mirror. Seeing that Zhu Yiyi only said half a sentence, she asked, “Go on, what happened on your business trip?”

Zhu Yiyi’s words rolled around in her throat and she swallowed them back down.

She smiled, “Nothing.”

The old residential area in the south of the city was quiet and desolate all year round. Only on New Year’s Eve was there a bit more festive atmosphere. Every house was lit up, and there was a clattering of pots and pans.

The TV in Zhu Yiyi’s house finally wasn’t playing “The Temptation of a Homecoming.” It was playing the New Year’s Eve concert, and Fei Yuqing was singing “A Thousand Miles Away.”

The mother and daughter watched TV and ate dumplings, a rare night of joy and peace.

After finishing the dumplings, Ms. Zhu went to play mahjong with her friends. Zhu Yiyi curled up in bed in her room when a phone call came in.

“Hello, Amy.”

“My dear, are you free now?”

“Yes, what’s up?”

“I was in a hurry today and left some documents in the department meeting room, but I’m in Shanghai now.”

Zhu Yiyi had a strong work ethic. The moment Amy finished speaking, she had already gotten out of bed and changed her shoes, holding her phone between her ear and shoulder, and taking her bag and coat with the other hand, “I’ll go there now.”

“Okay, remember it’s a yellow sealed bag.”

“I remember, don’t worry, Amy.”

“Zhuzhu, hiring you to join Shi Shun was truly the best, best, best decision of my life,” Amy blew a kiss through the phone, then remembered something, “Oh, right, I prepared New Year’s gifts for everyone on my desk. The others took theirs this morning. Yours and Ling Mai’s are still there. Don’t forget to take them when you go back.”

Preparing New Year’s gifts was a tradition at Shi Shun Group.

The bigger the company, the more they cared about employee cohesion. Only by capturing the hearts of employees in small details could a company start from the grassroots and achieve unity and cohesion.

Therefore, even a small fry like Zhu Yiyi had a gift. Last year, hers was a set of skincare products. It was expensive, a high-end brand she couldn’t afford to buy herself, but Shi Shun easily prepared one for every female employee.

Ling Mai was so happy that she couldn’t close her mouth. She even posted it on her Moments, causing a wave of envy, jealousy, and hatred among her friends.

Zhu Yiyi packed up and went out. As she went downstairs, she asked, “Amy, should I put the documents directly on your desk after I get them?”

“No.”

“Ah?”

Amy’s voice came slowly from the phone, sounding unreal, “Send them directly to He President’s office.”

Zhu Yiyi’s steps faltered, and her breathing became lighter in an instant.

There were children in the neighborhood setting off fireworks, and the smell of gunpowder from the firecrackers wafted over on the wind. She turned her head to look.

The fireworks exploded in the night sky with a bang, emitting a dazzling light.

Her fingers felt as if they had been burned.

She couldn’t imagine that the first person she would see on New Year’s Eve.

Would be He Shen.

_

The subway was busier than usual on New Year’s Eve.

Especially for middle school students who were on holiday and didn’t have classes. Young boys and girls, with their youthful throbbing, sat shoulder to shoulder, hand in hand on the subway. Even without saying a word, their eyes were so sweet that they seemed to drip with affection.

“So today we’ll just watch the Big Big Wolf movie, and then go eat fried chicken,” the girl said softly, leaning against the boy’s shoulder, “That way we’ll only spend a hundred yuan.”

“Baby, I have money. I also prepared a New Year’s gift for you.”

“Really? Won’t it be expensive?”

“As long as you like it!”

Zhu Yiyi listened from the side, remembering the things she had brought with her when she left home. She opened her backpack and looked inside.

A black gift box, containing a tie.

It was the one she bought yesterday at YMD Mall, and the only one she could afford.

The young couple in front of her were whispering sweet nothings again.

The girl said softly, “You bought me something so expensive, I can’t repay you…”

The boy kissed her, “I like everything you give me.”

The girl shyly punched him.

Zhu Yiyi sighed, what a good age this was. No need to worry about making a living, no need to be resentful of social intrigue and unspoken rules, full of energy and vitality.

Even dating could be sweet to death.

Ding dong, the subway announcement sounded, and the doors opened.

The cold air of the winter solstice rushed in. Zhu Yiyi followed the crowd out of the subway.

The subway station wasn’t far from the company, a ten-minute walk.

Zhu Yiyi had dressed warmly when she left home, and she was sweating from the heat of being pregnant. After walking for a while, she took off her thick coat and held it in her arms.

She hurried to the meeting room, found the sealed document, and took the elevator upstairs.

The elevator went all the way to the top floor.

The urban buildings of Beijing were scattered like stars, and Shi Shun Group was a towering building among them. On New Year’s Eve, the entire building was surrounded by dazzling neon lights, every frame was beautiful, like a slow-motion shot in a movie.

It was like an ivory tower, isolated from the world.

This was the world of the rich.

A world she couldn’t touch.

And this was He Shen’s office.

Zhu Yiyi stood at the door, took a deep breath, and tried to face the person she was about to see with a normal work attitude.

She raised her hand and knocked on the door, “He President?”

But there was no answer from inside.

She called out a few more times, but there was still no answer. She walked a little closer to the door and realized that it was ajar.

She gently pushed it open.

The large office was gray, giving off a cold and solemn feeling. Even on the bustling New Year’s Eve, it felt cold and impersonal, devoid of any human touch.

High-level executives’ offices contained confidential documents.

Zhu Yiyi wasn’t supposed to stay long, so she put down the document and was about to leave when she caught sight of a piece of white paper on the desk.

It looked like a medical report.

After the experience of being sent a pregnancy test report after a blind date, Zhu Yiyi was extra sensitive to anything that looked like a report.

She leaned closer, and a few lines of text caught her eye.

Beijing First People’s Hospital.

Medical Report.

Gynecology.

Zhu Yiyi’s pupils constricted, and her breath instantly caught in her throat. She felt like a thief sneaking into someone’s house, discovering a shocking secret.

She quickly covered her mouth, afraid of making a sound.

An unthinkable thought entered her mind.

Could it be that he was the one…

Her intuition told her that she should leave now, otherwise it would be like eavesdropping.

But the pregnancy test report, with its invisible name, seemed to have a magical pull, attracting her closer, and closer, until she reached out to take it.

Just as her fingers were about to grasp the thin pregnancy test report, a voice came from above her head, “What are you looking at?”

Zhu Yiyi’s heart skipped a beat. Her hand trembled, and the pregnancy test report slipped from her grasp, falling lightly to the ground.

Half of it was covering her shoe.

The other half was covering He Shen’s leather shoe.

She turned around stiffly.

In the silent and deserted office, only a mixed-white light was on, making the cold-colored walls even colder.

The man stood behind her, staring at her silently. He didn’t know how long he had been watching.

It was after work hours, and he had taken off his glasses. Without the barrier of the gold-rimmed frame, his sharp eyes looked clear and piercing, as if they could see into people’s hearts.

He saw into the depths of Zhu Yiyi’s heart.

He Shen bent down, naturally picked up the pregnancy test report, and handed it to her, his voice soft as he asked, “Don’t you want to see who it belongs to?”