When she arrives at the gate of Lu Zhining's school, Zhou Ji'an calls once but can't get through, so she walks around the school for a while.
When she can't walk anymore, she finds a bench to sit on, watching people come and go, and is bored and dazed.
It takes more than half an hour, and she makes another call, but no one answers, so she gets up and prepares to go back. She has to find a reason for him in her heart—he must have something urgent.
Her phone rings as soon as she gets to the school gate and takes a taxi. The voice seems to carry the wind: "I just had something to do here, so I didn't receive your call. Where are you now?"
The driver honks the horn, and she apologizes to the driver and says she will not leave. The driver mutters a few words and drives away.
Zhou Ji'an: "I'm at the school's main entrance."
Lu Zhining naturally hears the situation on her side: "Stand there and don't move. Three minutes, I'll be there soon."
Zhou Ji'an hums and waits for Lu Zhining to hang up, but he doesn't hang up: "Why don't you hang up? Are you afraid that I will run away?"
The words are meant as a joke, but Lu Zhining actually admits: "Yes."
Zhou Ji'an suddenly finds a familiar way of speaking: "Are you not pretending to be a stranger?"
Lu Zhining has already seen her, but Zhou Ji'an is facing him sideways and seems to be still smiling. He couldn't help but take two steps, and then suddenly stop: "Then why should I pretend?"
The faint smile on Zhou Ji'an's face slowly disappears, and after a long while she murmurs: "Because you're angry."
Lu Zhining: "What are you angry about?"
Zhou Ji'an scratches the side seam of her pants uncomfortably and remains silent.
Seeing her frustrated look, Lu Zhining's eyes are so dark that no light can be seen, and then he says: "Turn left."
Zhou Ji'an turns sideways and sees Lu Zhining.
His skin is pale, not like Cheng Zhou's wheat color, so the redness of his cheeks is easier to see. There are beads of sweat on his forehead.
Zhou Ji'an sees this and runs towards him. She takes out a small pack of tissues from her bag and hands it to Lu Zhining: "Wipe the sweat."
Lu Zhining keeps looking at her without any movement, and the emotion in his eyes makes her a little confused: "Why are you looking at me like this? Is there something on my face?"
Lu Zhining Ning takes out a tissue and changes the subject while wiping the sweat off his face: "Nothing, let's go eat, I'm hungry."
Zhou Ji'an doesn't notice and asks a frequently asked question: "What to eat?"
Lu Zhining has expected this to happen and has a plan in mind: "Let's eat noodles, there's a noodle shop that's pretty good."
Although she has studied here for four years and has visited almost all of the university towns, the changes in the past few years are still quite big, especially since she hasn't been back much in the past few years.
When she comes here, she takes a quick look and finds that the places she used to eat have changed their signs.
Lu Zhining should be more familiar with this place than she is now. She has no objection to the idea of eating noodles, because she likes eating noodles very much, but...
"Are you sure you just want to eat noodles?"
"Why? What do you want to eat?"
"I can eat anything." Zhou Ji'an sees Lu Zhining raise his eyebrows and stutters, "I am not as picky as before."
"I just say, wouldn't it be too perfunctory just to eat noodles?"
Lu Zhining stares at her for a long time with his eyes downcast and then says, "You don't need to use that social etiquette on me."
Before Zhou Ji'an explains, he interrupts and says, "I just want to eat noodles." After saying that, he turns and leaves
Zhou Ji'an takes back what she wanted to say just now and hurriedly chases after him: "Then let's go eat noodles." She is so naive that she really thinks it is just to eat noodles until later...
Just as they leave the school gate, they hear someone calling, "Zhining."
Zhou Ji'an says silently in her heart, This voice is quite nice.
Then the voice gets closer and closer, Zhining? She turns her head and looks behind her.
Lu Zhining notices that she didn't catch up and stops walking.
A tall and thin girl runs towards them and waves when she sees Lu Zhining stop.
Zhou Ji'an pokes Lu Zhining: "Is she looking for you?"
He looks at the coat in the girl's hand and nods.
The girl runs to them breathlessly, gathers her long hair that is floating behind her, and hands the coat to Lu Zhining: "I forgot to give you your coat just now. When I remembered, you ran far away and didn't hear me calling you."
Lu Zhining raises his chin to Zhou Ji'an: "Umm."
Zhou Ji'an tilts her head towards him, her light red lips open, revealing the little tongue inside, and seems to quietly ask a question.
Although she knows what he means, she is irritably complaining in her heart: Do you take me as your 'servitor'? And I haven't been your 'servitor' for a long time, okay?
Lu Zhining seems to have enough of her lack of tacit understanding: "Take it." Every word is emphasized.
Xiao Zhou, the 'servitor', twitches her cheeks and takes the coat with a fake smile: "Give it to me, thank you."
The girl blinks unnaturally, and then she says gently: "You're welcome."
Then she chats with Lu Zhining again: "The last evening party we hosted together and also had a four-hand piano program. The leaders of the university thought it was very good, so they hope we can work together again during the school anniversary."