Ji Shuhe thought for a moment. "It roughly means... we used to be friends. Very good friends."
"Friends? A guy?"
Ji Shuhe nodded.
Stella was even more confused. If they were friends, wouldn't agreeing to a mutually beneficial collaboration be a win-win? Why was Ji Shuhe so troubled?
She was indeed a few years older than Ji Shuhe, and unlike the workaholic Shen Xing, she made a quick calculation of when Ji Shuhe had gone to the UK. Suddenly, she had a flash of insight about Ji Shuhe's awkwardness.
"I get it! Not friends—he's your ex-boyfriend, right?"
"Of course not!" Ji Shuhe quickly denied. "When I went abroad, I wasn't even sixteen. How could I have an ex-boyfriend?"
Stella shrugged indifferently. "So what? Sweetie, don't be so old-fashioned. At that age in an American high school, let alone dating—some people might have had several more intimate relationships already."
Ji Shuhe was silent.
That was true. But she and Wen Shaoyu had only experienced the fluttering hearts of teenagers, innocent and chaste, with only comforting hugs.
Even in the past few years, when Ji Shuhe woke from nightmares featuring Wen Shaoyu, she felt relieved. Relieved that they were both constrained by circumstances back then and hadn't defined that vague affection.
Meeting someone who made your heart race in adolescence was already unforgettable. If they had made promises to each other, and then faced the subsequent separation, Ji Shuhe dared not think about how much a Scorpio like Wen Shaoyu would hold a grudge.
For instance, their reunion that day would definitely have been even more awkward.
"It's complicated between him and me."
Stella keenly detected something in Ji Shuhe's words. She crossed her long, straight legs and leaned back into her chair. "Perfect. I love hearing stories about 'he loves her, he doesn't love her.' So interesting—love and hate in the vast sea of emotions. If I can't make it in the documentary track, I could switch to filming idol dramas!"
Stella, having grown up abroad, was always straightforward—even blunt to the point of disregarding others' feelings. Ji Shuhe knew she meant no harm and was used to her style. But talking about her and Wen Shaoyu...
It wasn't that she couldn't, but it was too long a story.
Two years, from mutual disdain to nights when they only had each other. Holding hands, hugging, even hoping the other would be better and happier—yet never a single word about liking.
Those memories had probably been bottled up inside Ji Shuhe for too long. Now that someone was willing to listen, she hesitated only briefly, then began recounting the happiest two years of her life.
Yong'anli—the always-dark alleys, the lingering smell of cooking oil between two red-brick walls, the attic that was cold in winter and hot in summer, too small to turn around in. And of course, everyone in No. 86—first meetings, growing close, understanding, and then parting.
Ji Shuhe spoke in fragments. By the time her timeline stopped at that summer when all the fluttering, dependence, and persistent attachments were forced to an end—the month and day Xia Chun hurriedly took her away—the sky outside the glass window had already darkened completely.
The plane trees on the street were wrapped with LED light strings. The orange-yellow dots blinked on and off, reflected on the crowded glass now.
The lights, Ji Shuhe's bewildered face, and the cold coffee cup were all jumbled together, overlapping and interweaving. Ji Shuhe couldn't even clearly see whether her own expression was still composed.
Although Stella was impatient, she was a very good listener. She listened intently and then let out a long sigh. "Just two reserved Easterners. If this were abroad, they'd have been kissing like crazy by now."
Ji Shuhe wanted to put a hand to her forehead. After so many years abroad, she still wasn't used to this kind of blunt statement.
"So, you like him, right?" Stella asked out of the blue.
Ji Shuhe didn't speak. Her brow twisted in conflict for a long time, as if she were examining her own past like someone else's story. Finally, she calmly reached a conclusion.
"I liked him."
She confirmed that she liked the Wen Shaoyu in her memories—the teenager who understood her, who never yielded with words but had the softest heart. He would quietly light a lamp for her, hide chocolates to cheer her up—the person she had thought about often for eight years.
As for now... she couldn't say.
The Wen Shaoyu of now was mature but cold. She felt estranged, even a little afraid to reach out. Whenever she recalled the icy look in his eyes at their reunion, it unsettled her more than complete oblivion ever could.
Stella shook her head at that, then added, "What I want to say might sound a bit twisted, but I think you and your little bamboo horse have a taming relationship. Like the Little Prince and the fox."
"Full disclosure: I hate that book. Its author was a cheater. So I lean more toward the love theory rather than the friendship theory—the rose is the wife, the fox is the lover, and the book is essentially an apology letter to his wife after his affair."
"But setting aside the author's background, even though I don't endorse the author himself, I do endorse the concept of taming. The fox says, 'If you tame me, then we need each other.' And your relationship with him is one of taming and being tamed. Your departure, even if forced, represented the termination of that bond."
"You willingly submitted and depended on him, only to be abandoned. Tsk, tsk, tsk—how could he not be deeply affected?"
Seeing Ji Shuhe still looked confused, like she half-understood, Stella momentarily felt a pang of pity for that never-met little bamboo horse.
If it weren't for encountering an experienced her, with Ji Shuhe's blockhead, figuring out what the other party was harboring would probably take until the next life.
She had always said that before playing in the high-stakes game, it was necessary to gain experience through a few relationships.
Stella met Ji Shuhe's eyes and sighed wearily. "I mean, his coldness toward you now is him holding a grudge because you abandoned him!"
Ji Shuhe froze. A flash of insight pierced her thoughts.
Was that it?
"Then... what should I do now?" Ji Shuhe murmured softly, as if asking Stella, as if asking herself.
She didn't like leaving problems unresolved. Whether it was due to years of lingering resentment or the need to smoothly advance the work, Ji Shuhe urgently needed to resolve this ambiguous standoff with Wen Shaoyu and give each other an answer.
Just like when they were kids.
"Good question." Stella looked at her steadily. "First, you need to ask yourself: what do you define your relationship with him as now?"
Author's Note: [Please] Some views in this chapter represent only Ms. Stella's personal opinion...