Chapter 1

At the end of June, the air conditioner in the village office had broken. It was so hot inside that even a sparrow would freeze for a couple of seconds after flying in.

Not long after returning from a meeting in town, Xie Anqing distributed the official documents at a study session. She’d always had a high tolerance for cold and heat. No matter how bitter the weather, she never got fidgety. But her body was only human, and the heat had worked up a sweat all over her. When she shifted slightly, a bead that had gathered behind her ear slid down her neck and disappeared beneath her collar.

The drop traced a path down into the depths of her body, so light it was almost impossible to follow—and impossible to ignore.

Uncomfortable, Xie Anqing loosened her tie and undid two buttons, then returned to her reading.

In the steady silence, fresh sweat gathered beneath her chin. It swayed there, then dropped as she turned a page.

Plap.

Across from her, Publicity Committee Member Xie Beibei had been nodding off. She jolted upright and stared at Xie Anqing, who had already settled back into her studious stillness.

After a moment, Beibei leaned forward. “Secretary, can I ask you something?”

“Go ahead.”

“Could you change your clothes?”

“Is something wrong with what I’m wearing?”

“No.”

There was absolutely nothing wrong with it.

A standard short-sleeved shirt and slacks, specially tailored by the town office when summer began. Anyone else would look like an insurance salesman in them—though she had nothing against insurance salesmen, to be clear; she was only making a reasonable comparison.

But when their secretary wore them, it was different. Add a regulation tie and a square-buckled belt, then give her that slight frown as she read through her documents, and—wow. So proper. So easy on the eyes. So reassuringly steady. And so damn cool.

Well…

That was assuming the tie wasn’t loosened, the top two buttons weren’t undone, and sweat wasn’t trickling down her chin and neck.

Xie Beibei glanced around to make sure they were alone in the office, then lowered her voice. “Secretary, you’re straight. You have no idea how much room you’re giving a lesbian with a weakness for good looks, hands, voices, and strong women to let her imagination run wild.”

“How much?”

“If there were a bed in here, I’d already be lying on it.”

Xie Anqing paused while marking an important point. She twirled her pen halfway around her index finger and tapped the notebook with the other end.

Tap.

“Auntie, have mercy—spare my life! But this really isn’t my fault. Why are you wearing formal clothes, anyway? And why wear them when the air conditioner’s broken and the temperature’s pushing a hundred degrees?”

“Is this my fault? If you’d called the repair service ten minutes earlier yesterday, they wouldn’t have bumped us to the back of the queue. Now we have to wait until tomorrow.”

“I admit I’m guilty, but I still want to know: You’re not going to the county to attend the people’s congress, and you’re not going to argue with the town mayor for funding. So why are you dressed up?”

“I’m waiting for someone.”

“Who?”

“Someone I haven’t met.”

“Uh…”

“How long have you been waiting?”

“I don’t know.”

“…What?”

“How long have you been waiting for them?”

“A week.”

“…………What?!”

Xie Beibei stared at her aunt in shock and confusion, then eyed her warily. “Auntie, are you sure you’re doing okay?”

Her aunt didn’t answer.

The village office had gone a little too quiet, so Beibei started talking to fill the silence. “I think we should call again about the air conditioner. I’ll do it now.”

She snatched up her phone and tried to make a run for it.

Xie Anqing finished the last line of her notes, looked up, and swept her gaze over Beibei without a trace of emotion. “I’m going to inspect the reservoir. Get the fire-safety materials ready. After dinner, you’re coming with me to hold a community meeting.”

“Sure, Auntie. I’ll get right on it.”

Xie Anqing gathered her documents and headed out. As she passed Beibei, she tapped the corner of the risqué manga hidden beneath the Party-building materials. “Read something decent. You’ve been letting that stuff rinse your brain clean.”

Beibei was personally attacked, but somehow couldn’t quite muster any outrage. “Sure, Auntie. I’ll switch to something else tomorrow.”

Her aunt didn’t smile much.

When she didn’t smile, even if the Empress Dowager herself came knocking, Beibei knew she’d better listen to her aunt first.

But they’d grown up together. Why was Beibei so obedient to an aunt who was six months younger than she was?

A born servant?

Or maybe it was because her aunt had grown so unfamiliar over the past few years.

Beibei remembered when they were seven or eight. As soon as school let out, the other kids would either sneak into the fields to steal melons or climb trees to raid birds’ nests. They were so mischievous that even the village dogs got sick of them.

Her aunt was the only well-behaved one.

Every day, she either took paper and brush to the Chinese teacher next door to practice calligraphy, or sat quietly under the pomegranate tree at home, doing her homework until her grandmother—the primary school principal—finished work and came back.

Her grandmother had spent most of her life working to get the village children, especially the girls, into school. By then her legs had grown unsteady. Without a word, her aunt would carry water and go with her to the fields to water the vegetables.

The aluminum buckets were big and heavy when full. Even an adult had to lean sideways to carry one at a quick pace. How had her aunt, a tiny, undernourished-looking child, managed it?

It had been too long; Beibei couldn’t remember. She only remembered that whenever anyone in the village saw a child struggling along with a huge bucket of water, spilling it as she stumbled, they would always stop to help.

And that child, who had only ever called one person in her family “Grandma,” could get every complicated family title right.

“Thank you, Auntie.”

“Thank you, Cousin.”

“Thank you, Uncle.”

…

Her aunt had never been one to smile much. But she’d been so well-behaved that no one could ever have found her frightening.

Ever since she’d graduated from college and returned to the village, though, she’d grown colder by the day.

Just yesterday, in front of a few younger villagers, she’d chewed out an uncle who’d been fishing by the reservoir.

How badly had she scolded him?

The man was tall and burly, well past sixty, and hadn’t dared talk back once.

Terrifying.

Beibei shivered as she watched a kid who’d suddenly grown tall one day—now practically an adult—push off with one foot and pedal her bicycle with the other. She sighed. “My aunt’s legs are probably going to outlast my entire life.”

After inspecting the reservoir, Xie Anqing made the rounds by the ponds and riverbanks.

It was summer vacation, and all the schoolchildren were off. They loved playing by the water, and some of the villagers who enjoyed fishing never listened to warnings. Summer had only been underway for a little over a month, and the county had already reported four drownings. The authorities were taking it seriously and had ordered every village to step up its water-safety efforts.

Regular patrols of high-risk areas were one of the most important measures.

Xie Anqing rode her bicycle farther down the road. The last river she checked ran along the village, with a railway track running north to south nearby. The level crossing beneath the bridge divided the villages: Xixie Village lay to the west, and her own village, Dongxie, lay to the east.

She and the person she “hadn’t met” were supposed to meet at the crossing.

They had arranged it on Weibo a week ago.

[Message me when you’re close. I’ll meet you at the level crossing.]

[Once you’re across, you’ll be in our village.]

The other person still hadn’t replied.

Xie Anqing left her bicycle by the roadside, a bamboo flute in hand, and followed the ridge south.

She ran into Guoqing by sheer chance.

Guoqing was a stray dog adopted by the Chinese teacher next door. The dog was already getting on in years, yet still kept plunging into the water. The problem was that Guoqing could get in but not out, and all that splashing never got the dog anywhere.

Xie Anqing had already hauled Guoqing out three times this month. A fourth rescue was about to follow.

She set her flute on the ridge, took off her shoes, rolled up her pant legs, and waded into the river.

The wind swept over the wheat fields beneath the distant sky. Golden waves rolled toward her one after another.

As soon as Chen Li parked at the level crossing, she spotted someone in the river, holding a dog in her arms with a tie clenched between her teeth—perhaps so it wouldn’t get wet. The summer breeze billowed her clothes, tugging at her collar, wild and impudent. She simply climbed onto the ridge with an unreadable expression, set the dog down, then bent to pick up a flute. A green tassel at the end knocked against her slender, pale wrist.

Chen Li tapped her fingers on the car door as her manager raged through her Bluetooth headset. “Why the hell did you run off to that—what’s it called?—that village without telling anyone?”

“Nowhere in particular. I was bored.”

“Bored? Are you crazy, or am I? You’re ditching the competition, ignoring the photography exhibition, skipping the magazine cover shoot, and all you have to say is, ‘I was bored’? What does that backwater have, scenery or people?”

“Scenery and people.”

A waterfall hung from the distant mountains, bringing a rare hint of summer coolness as it poured into a river, soaking a woman’s clothes. She released the tie she’d been holding in her mouth, only for the wind from the riverbank to sweep it over her shoulder and wind it around her neck.

She didn’t seem pleased. When she tugged at it, the very dark tie caught around her pale fingers.

A striking contrast of colors.

Beside her stood a towering green tree, straight and solitary in the boundless fields.

One tree, an entire forest. Its canopy spread wide.

A striking contrast of scenery.

There was scenery, and there were people. The place might have been remote, but it had an appeal all its own.

Chen Li raised a hand and tapped her headset. “Call me in two months.”

“Chen Li—!”

Chen Li calmly hung up and removed her headset. Then she grabbed her camera and got out of the car.

The hot wind blew straight at her, fanning out her skirt and sending her long hair flying. She swept it back, tossed the high heels she’d brought along onto the ground, and stepped out of the flats she’d worn for driving.

That was when Xie Anqing noticed someone at the level crossing.

The newcomer looked nothing like Xie Anqing, who was covered in mud from rescuing Guoqing.

Under a sky straight out of a comic book, the woman stood with a camera in her left hand, her body turned slightly to the right. She lifted her right leg and slipped into her red high heel with a graceful tug. The shoes were as bold as her dress.

Dongxie Village had plenty of people who didn’t mind the heat. Xie Anqing herself went out in a short-sleeved shirt without any sun protection, and no one gave it a second thought. But this was the first time she’d seen someone in Dongxie wearing a sundress against the sun and glowing so white she seemed to give off light. Like—

Woof!

Guoqing’s fierce warning bark shattered the moment.

Xie Anqing’s eyelid twitched. Before she could move, Guoqing had already leapt over the railway and charged straight toward Chen Li.

Chen Li had clearly heard the bark. Her half-turned body wavered as she looked up and found herself face-to-face with a large dog.

Woof!

“Guoqing! Come back!”

Xie Anqing shouted and moved to chase the dog. Her foot came down on a hard clod of dirt. Pain twisted her brow, but she kept running after Guoqing.

She still wasn’t fast enough.

On her sixth step, the yellow signal at the level crossing turned solid red. The alarm sounded, and the barrier began to lower.

A train was coming. She was forced to stop on the inside of the crossing, where the last thing she saw was Guoqing grabbing the other woman’s skirt.

Clack-clack, clack-clack, whooo—

The old green train moved slowly. It took nearly three minutes for the last carriage to pass Xie Anqing. On the other side, the woman whose skirt had been caught now stood barefoot in an open irrigation channel, her hair a mess and her face deathly pale. She was rigid with shock.

The culprit, Guoqing, was pacing along the roadside, looking agitated.

Xie Anqing tightened her grip on the flute. The bones on the back of her hand stood out, pale green veins stretching across them.

Seconds broke into pieces. Time crawled.

At last, the crossing light shifted from red to yellow, and the barrier rose. Xie Anqing strode over, led Guoqing to a tree, and tied the dog there. Then she went back and asked the woman in the irrigation channel, “Are you hurt?”

Her voice held the same calm depth as a waterfall spilling from distant mountains—high, remote, and steady. Though she was asking if the woman was hurt and what she could do to help, not a trace of worry crept into her tone.

It didn’t even sound like a question. More like a simple statement.

Chen Li lowered her eyes and stared for a few seconds at a nightshade plant where the channel met the road. Then she slowly looked up and met a pair of deep eyes like the last light of sunset behind the mountains.

They matched the voice perfectly.

Her expression, her gaze, even her features all had the same quality: wind couldn’t ruffle her, and the sky could fall without unsettling her. It seemed as though nothing could make her lose control.

Chen Li’s amber eyes shifted. The movement was gone in a flash. She reached up and pulled the strap that had slipped down her left arm back beside her collarbone.

Standing against the light, Xie Anqing instinctively lowered her gaze. A patch of skin on Chen Li’s shoulder was rubbed red.

Guoqing couldn’t have done that.

But something else might have happened.

Xie Anqing looked back up at Chen Li’s face and waited for an answer. Instead, the woman studied her frankly. A few seconds later, as if she’d noticed something, the tight line of her mouth shifted and turned up.

Xie Anqing pressed her lips together without drawing attention to it. Her dark eyes met Chen Li’s, unsettled by the frankness of her scrutiny and the lingering weight of her gaze.

This was only their first meeting.

Now wasn’t the time to think about any of that.

Xie Anqing was afraid the situation might escalate and Guoqing would be killed. The dog had never attacked anyone in the three years since being adopted, but the incident could still violate the regulations on farm dogs. She ignored the untimely stare and said, “I’m sorry. Guoqing was abused by someone wearing red, so the dog reacts badly to that color.”

Chen Li didn’t look away. At last, she spoke. “I doubt that excuses the attack.”

“Of course not. Vaccination, medical bills, damages—whatever’s reasonable, I’ll pay.”

“Will you?”

Chen Li’s skirt was already soaked through. One side clung heavily to her leg; the other floated lightly on the water. Tiny fish swam past the hem.

“I will.”

Chen Li gave a short, cheerful laugh and finally looked away from Xie Anqing’s face. Her eyelids were lowered, her long, straight lashes casting a faint shadow across her cheeks. Xie Anqing watched her step out of the water and stop nearby—not so close as to intrude, but not far away, either. Chen Li lifted her wet skirt, revealing her right calf.

“Then take me to get vaccinated first.”

A cut marked her flawless white skin. Without the water to rinse and dilute it, blood ran down to her ankle in an instant.

Xie Anqing didn’t hesitate. “All right.”

She turned and hurried up the ridge, leading Guoqing along.

Her shoes were still by the big green tree.

Just as she stepped across the railway, Xie Anqing remembered something. She stopped and flung Guoqing into the river, making sure the dog couldn’t attack anyone else. Then she quickly pulled the loose tie from around her neck and turned back.

By the car, Chen Li had just put a hand on the door handle. Before she could open it, warmth suddenly washed over her feet, chilled stiff from standing in the water for so long, then spread up her calf.

The warmth was solid and real, wrapping around her once—not too loose, not too tight.

Then once more.

Poplars rustled in the wind. Light and shadow fell across Chen Li as she blinked and looked down.

The woman who’d left had returned. She was kneeling beside Chen Li, wrapping the tie around her bleeding wound.

She seemed more distant from behind than from the front, yet her fingers were warm.