Today wasn’t only Song Yingqiu’s birthday. It was Shao Yu’s too.
Song Yingqiu had always felt that among all the people in the world, the reason the two of them alone shared such a mystical bond as body swapping was a fine enough answer in itself: they had been born on the same year, the same month, the same day.
She even suspected they’d been born in the same second, though there was no way to verify it.
Strictly speaking, which of them was actually the older sister was anyone’s guess.
It was just that when they were small, Song Yingqiu had been the more mature one, and seeing that Shao Yu was quiet and lovely, like a clean, translucent doll, she had naturally taken to caring for her as a little sister, arranging things like a little adult, and they had settled into that dynamic ever since.
Even celebrating their birthdays together had been Song Yingqiu’s idea.
She must have been thirteen. They had been swapping for less than a year then and didn’t know each other all that well.
And the swaps were unstable in those days. Often Song Yingqiu’s soul would already have arrived in Shao Yu’s body while Shao Yu’s hadn’t yet departed, the two of them crammed into a single body at once.
Like two puddings temporarily scooped into the same cup, coexisting for the time being.
That day was Song Yingqiu’s birthday. She had been having a wonderful time and, changing into her second gown in the dressing room, had abruptly swapped into Shao Yu’s body.
Great, she thought. Shao Yu will just have to play hostess for the second half of the party.
That was when she realized Shao Yu hadn’t “left” yet.
With the body’s original owner present, Song Yingqiu couldn’t control it, but she could see.
Shao Yu was hiding on the dormitory balcony, apparently getting some air.
The glass door was shut behind her. In this little world there was only her, and far off across the night the lights of high-rises glittered.
Song Yingqiu had been about to speak, to hurry Shao Yu into saying happy birthday, when she saw Shao Yu take out her phone and slowly begin typing a message to her:
Happy birthday
Song Yingqiu was a little pleased. Not bad. So Shao Yu actually knew today was her birthday.
The next second, Shao Yu deleted the words and replaced them with:
Today is my birthday
Song Yingqiu was startled. Today was Shao Yu’s birthday too?
What a coincidence.
She watched, wide-eyed, as Shao Yu deleted everything at an even faster speed, then switched back to “Happy birthday” and sent it.
Fast, as if afraid she’d regret it.
Song Yingqiu couldn’t help herself, plus a little mischief:
“I saw everything. Happy birthday, by the way.”
Shao Yu’s hand clenched around the phone, and when she spoke it was with difficulty:
“…You’re here? Since when?”
Song Yingqiu said, “Just now. Today’s your birthday too? Why didn’t you want to tell me?”
Shao Yu said, “Because it doesn’t matter.”
Song Yingqiu couldn’t stand seeing Shao Yu so serene, so world-weary at such a young age. She had just opened her mouth to lecture her little sister when she realized how small and bare this balcony was.
As if… no one had ever celebrated Shao Yu’s birthday at all.
Song Yingqiu swallowed the words she’d been about to say and changed tack.
“My birthday matters. Go over there and have fun properly in my place. If you’re not happy enough, people will notice, you know.”
Shao Yu pressed her lips together and nodded. A few minutes later she arrived in Song Yingqiu’s body and duly lived through a night unforgettable in every sense of the word.
At minimum, she gained the life experience of being lined up and confessed to for an entire evening.
The two only swapped back the following afternoon.
This time there had been no hours of two souls in one body, but they kept notes in their phone memos to prevent slips.
Shao Yu opened the memo and first saw four or five names, some classmates, some complete strangers, men and women alike.
She was briefly lost, then read the annotations after each name:
Zhuo Ke
I think she’s your senior from school? She had cake with us. Oh, right, she asked you to breakfast!
Xu Feng
I only smiled at him once and he suddenly confessed. So strange. I told him no puppy love and turned him down.
Duan Tiantian
Sweet as her name. Would you mind if I used your body to go on a date with her?
…
Shao Yu: ?
Meanwhile, her roommate across the room was still savoring the memory:
“Your birthday party last night was wild. Whose birthday’s next? Can we do it like that again?”
“Shao Yu was so lively last night, so outgoing. Nothing like you. Remember how many people you freaked out?”
Shao Yu: “…”
In the span of a few short hours, just how unforgettable a birthday night had Song Yingqiu given her?
Setting aside the parts that made Shao Yu want to bury her face in her hands, ever since that year when they turned thirteen and Song Yingqiu learned they shared a birthday, she had celebrated it with Shao Yu alone, just the two of them, no more inviting crowds.
From their green student days all the way to her full-bloomed twenty-seventh year, without a single exception, until now.
Memories flickered through Song Yingqiu’s mind. Her gaze went hazy for a moment before refocusing on the Shao Yu in front of her.
Shao Yu’s eyes were dark and bright, fixed on her intently. Such a cold, quiet person, at the hospital a dependable, self-sufficient doctor, out in the world so frigid that suitors lost their nerve, yet with her alone showing her most sincere face.
Song Yingqiu had admired Shao Yu’s face in mirrors countless times through borrowed eyes, but this was the first time she’d seen that shell occupied by Shao Yu’s soul, radiating Shao Yu’s own particular grace.
And that reliance, that affection in Shao Yu’s expression, aimed at her, the big sister.
Song Yingqiu’s whole heart went soft.
When her friends had teased her about being a sis-con, she hadn’t taken it seriously, brushing it off with a laugh.
Now, she finally understood how sis-cons came to exist in this world.
She felt she would give Shao Yu anything she asked. A tiny request like this hardly counted.
She took out the candles and stuck them into the cake.
“I barely ate any of the cake at Drunken Haze. That was just for show. Didn’t I tell you? I wanted to spend my birthday with you.”
“So…” Song Yingqiu finished arranging the candles, and the lighter in her fingers clicked, flames catching. “This year we celebrate together too.”
“Happy birthday, Little Yu.”
Little Yu. When they were small, this was what Song Yingqiu had called her.
She thought “Shao Yu” sounded like “Little Yu,” and Shao Yu’s protests had been futile; Song Yingqiu had called her that across phone calls and texts for years.
Song Yingqiu had also invited Shao Yu to call her “Qiuqiu,” saying it was more affectionate that way.
At some point, perhaps once they’d both grown up, the childhood nicknames had gradually fallen away.
Saying “Little Yu” now, Song Yingqiu herself paused, and seeing that Shao Yu seemed equally caught off guard, she smiled.
“Little Yu, hm. Should I keep calling you that from now on?”
Song Yingqiu thought it was a good idea. Shao Yu’s reaction was not what she expected.
Shao Yu’s expression cooled. “Call me Shao Yu.”
Song Yingqiu said, “So distant. What’s wrong with Little Yu?”
Shao Yu repeated, “Shao Yu. Hurry up and make your wish.”
Song Yingqiu made her wish as told, then opened her eyes and pressed on. “Little Yu, though.”
Shao Yu kept her lashes lowered, unmoved by her big sister’s wheedling, refusing to engage.
Compared with the coolness she’d carried from the moment they met, this stubborn silence was oddly adorable, and it only made Song Yingqiu want to tease her more.
Shao Yu wouldn’t speak, so Song Yingqiu drew the name out:
“Lit… tle… Yu…”
Shao Yu closed her eyes and made a wish.
When she looked up, her gaze was direct, the candlelight leaping in the depths of her eyes like fireworks reflected in a night lake, a silent sort of beauty.
“Happy birthday, Song Yingqiu.”
This was, in the truest sense, the first birthday they had ever spent together.
Song Yingqiu’s mischief was interrupted.
She paused. “What did you wish for?”
Shao Yu said, “Not telling.”
“I know, I know. Wishes stop working if you say them out loud.”
Song Yingqiu leaned in with a smile, the two faces drawing close above the cake.
“I’m just curious…”
Her gaze slid sideways and landed on Shao Yu’s reddened earlobe, and she laughed softly.
“What kind of wish is it, that my Shao Yu blushes just from thinking about it?”
“…? “
What Shao Yu’s twenty-seventh birthday wish had been, Song Yingqiu never pressed to the end. She had to leave her little one some face, after all.
Though she admitted, privately, that this was just the excuse she used to comfort herself as the big sister.
Shao Yu was, in essence, a grown woman every bit her equal. Whatever Shao Yu set her mind on, Song Yingqiu couldn’t control; not that Song Yingqiu could ever bear to force her.
The cake wasn’t finished; each of them ate a little and the rest was put away.
Back at Song Yingqiu’s place, she figured Shao Yu had to be exhausted, so despite having endless things to talk about, she made Shao Yu wash up and rest first.
While changing into fresh bedding in the guest room, she couldn’t help asking:
“Sure you won’t sleep with me? We could chat a little before bed.”
The proposal was mercilessly rejected.
“Separate rooms.”
“Fine, fine.”
Song Yingqiu helped fluff the pillows and heaved a deeply disappointed sigh.
“See you tomorrow. Good night.”
Everything tidied, Song Yingqiu withdrew from the guest room and shut the door.
On the other side of it, Shao Yu held her breath and listened for three or four seconds. Only when the footsteps had faded far enough did she slowly breathe out a long, long breath.
For a moment, she couldn’t tell whether her decision to follow her mentor to Lingguan City, to come to Song Yingqiu’s side, had been right or wrong.
She wanted to see Song Yingqiu, and she knew exactly how much the woman drew her.
But reality was harsher than she’d imagined.
All the cool-headedness and logic she’d honed through life and work seemed to fail completely where Song Yingqiu was concerned, accomplishing nothing at all.
A few coquettish words from Song Yingqiu and she was nearly defenseless.
Bathed and lying in bed, Shao Yu closed her eyes and pushed Song Yingqiu out of her mind, forcing herself into blankness.
She could not lose her footing.
She could not let Song Yingqiu discover, too easily, that the feelings her “little sister” held for her had long ago curdled into something else, over and over, across all those crossings of their souls.
Shao Yu had come to Lingguan City because the Provincial People’s Hospital had paid a fortune to poach her mentor’s entire team for its plastic surgery department. Her terms could only be better than before.
When her mentor, Lu Lin, asked if she wanted to come along, Shao Yu had no reason to refuse.
After resigning from her previous top-tier hospital, she had come ahead of her mentor to see Song Yingqiu first, and she didn’t need to report for duty yet.
For once in her life as a doctor, she could take a few idle days.
Song Yingqiu spent the next morning at home and flew out that same afternoon to Danchuan’s design center in Munich.
The design director had finished drafts for a new model, and she was bringing several domestic experts along. Before leaving she’d said that if negotiations dragged, there would be no end of big meetings and small ones.
Song Yingqiu was gone for five days.
By the time she returned home, Shao Yu’s vacation had nearly run out.
Shao Yu came to the airport to pick her up.
As Song Yingqiu walked out among a cluster of gray-haired experts, Shao Yu heard a girl nearby gasp, “Is that a CEO-romance heroine walked off the page?”
Song Yingqiu wore a black-and-gray pinstriped suit, her gorgeous face stripped of any Social Butterfly flamboyance in the workplace, all edge.
Especially when her brows knitted; even her assistant didn’t dare breathe too deeply.
Only at the sight of Shao Yu did her brow smooth a little.
She exchanged a few words with the traveling experts, then walked over to Shao Yu, her assistant trailing behind.
“I told you not to come pick me up, and here you are.”
Shao Yu said, “Was the flight exhausting? You look pale.”
Song Yingqiu said, “It’s not just the flight. My head’s been aching for days. Will you massage my neck and shoulders when we get home?”
Behind her, her assistant Wu Rui nearly lost control of his expression.
Since when had his fiercely self-reliant boss ever complained to anyone? She was the type to shoulder crushing pressure and still chat breezily. Was she… coquetting at this unfamiliar beauty right now?
Wu Rui couldn’t believe his eyes.
Harder to believe was what he witnessed moments later: his boss being turned down by the beauty.
“Tonight. I’m going to look at apartments this afternoon. I have an appointment with the landlord.”
Song Yingqiu made a small surprised sound. “Apartment hunting?”
Shao Yu said, “Mm. Somewhere close to the hospital. A senior sister from my program set me up with the landlord. I’m going to take a look.”
The brows Song Yingqiu had only just relaxed knitted again.
By her account, Shao Yu should simply live with her. But living closer did mean Shao Yu could sleep longer, so it wasn’t wrong, exactly.
The Provincial People’s Hospital was in the old city district, surrounded by aging buildings, and Song Yingqiu really had never bought property in that area.
And her classmates helping out again…
In the car, Song Yingqiu’s face betrayed nothing. “Fine. I’ll come take a look with you. How could I rest easy letting you go alone?”
From the front seat, Wu Rui reminded her quietly:
“President Song, moving this afternoon’s group meeting is no problem, but you still have a meeting with Miss Xiao Fu…”
Xiao Fu.
Even Shao Yu, who paid no attention to the entertainment industry, knew this was a very famous actress.
Shao Yu’s lashes dipped low.
Song Yingqiu said lightly, “If a group meeting can be moved, why would I ask permission over one meeting?”
Wu Rui said, “Understood.”
Shao Yu’s fingertips tapped a regular rhythm against the car door, the tempo a shade lighter.
After a while, Song Yingqiu seemed to remember something and told Wu Rui:
“Chao Yushan’s movie premiere is in a few days, right? Pick out a gift and send it over.”
Shao Yu’s fingertips came down with a tap and stayed pressed against the edge, never rising again.
Wu Rui said, “…Understood.”
Honestly, his boss. The great beauty was sitting right beside her, and she still had the nerve to tend her fishpond of admirers right to her face.
Wu Rui stole a glance at the beauty’s expression.
Sure enough, her face had turned colder.
A wrongness that even an assistant could sense, and Song Yingqiu remained blissfully oblivious.
Song Yingqiu even asked Shao Yu eagerly, “Are you interested in 《No Regrets》? Chao Yushan is in it. If you want to watch it, I’ll get you a ticket to the premiere.”
Shao Yu closed her eyes, every line of her face gone cold.
For the first time, she desperately wanted to kiss Song Yingqiu, to make sure she could never again say something so heartlessly oblivious.
