Chapter 107 Extra: Xu Junheng and Wen Haijing Three Years Later

More than three years later.

In Vancouver in January, the air is crisp and the sun shines generously, illuminating the UBC campus. Wen Haijing finished her department's academic seminar, wrapped her scarf tighter, and hurried home. Thinking of her lovely baby at home, she didn't feel the chill in the wind.

My daughter, Xu Yi, is three months old.

After graduating with a master's degree, Wen Haijing continued her doctoral studies and gave birth to Xu Yi during her first year of doctoral studies.

Pushing open the apartment door, warmth and the familiar sweet scent of baby formula wafted out. In the living room, the nanny was changing Xu Yi's diaper. And Xu Junheng, her husband, was standing by the kitchen island in the open kitchen.

He was wearing a soft light gray sweater, holding a baby bottle in his hand, his brows slightly furrowed, meticulously adding formula into the bottle.

The man who exuded an imposing aura at the negotiating table was now meticulously following the "standard procedure" of preparing formula for his three-month-old daughter.

This scene made Wen Haijing stop by the door, gently touching the softest part of her heart.

Xu Junheng seemed to sense something and turned his head.

Upon seeing her, the focus in his eyes instantly melted away, and a smile appeared in his eyes. "You're back? How did the meeting go?"

"It went very smoothly." She walked over, took off her coat, and naturally tiptoed to kiss him on the chin. Xu Junheng took the opportunity to put his arm around her waist and returned a light kiss on her forehead.

The nanny had already efficiently changed Xu Yi's diaper and was carrying the little one over. As soon as Yi Yi saw her mother, she babbled and stretched out her little hand. Wen Haijing took her daughter, the soft little body, still smelling of milk, nestled into her arms, instantly dispelling all the chill from outside.

Xu Junheng also finished making the milk, tested the temperature, and came over.

Xu Junheng took the baby with practiced ease, holding the bottle steadily in one hand and protecting his daughter's head with the other. His gaze was focused and gentle as he watched the little one sucking hard on her face.

Xu Yi quickly finished eating, let out a small burp in her father's arms, and began to droop her eyelids.

Wen Haijing took the baby, gently patted him, and handed him to the nanny. Xu Junheng put away the baby bottle, sat back down next to her, and put his arm around her shoulder.

Sunlight moves across the carpet, and time flows by quietly.

Xu Junheng's large hand unconsciously stroked her arm. He knew she was under a lot of academic pressure, and although she had asked for help, no one could replace her role as a mother. All he could do was try his best to share the burden and give her the strongest support.

A few minutes later, the doorbell rang.

It's Xu Yao.

Xu Yao was wearing a navy blue coat, a bright red wool scarf, her long hair tied in a ponytail, and carrying a backpack. Her cheeks were flushed from the cold wind.

"Dad! Aunt Wen!" Her voice was clear and bright, full of the vitality unique to her age.

"Yaoyao's here, come in quickly, is it cold today?" Wen Haijing greeted her with a smile.

After changing her shoes, Xu Yao looked towards the nursery, lowered her voice, and asked excitedly, "Where's Yi Yi?"

"She just fell asleep." Xu Junheng took her heavy schoolbag. "Keep your voice down. You can go check on her."

Xu Yao immediately tiptoed over, leaned against the nursery door, and craned her neck to peek inside. When she saw the tiny bundle in the crib, her face lit up with undisguised delight, and she silently mouthed "Wow!"

After looking at it for a while, she returned to the living room, satisfied, and took out a light pink gift bag tied with a silver ribbon from her schoolbag, handing it to Wen Haijing.

"It's for my little sister!" she said, her eyes crinkling. "My mom and I picked it out at the mall this weekend; we think it's really cute!"

Wen Haijing took it and opened it with Xu Junheng. Inside was an extremely soft flannel bodysuit shaped like a little rabbit, with long ears and a fluffy short tail, along with matching rabbit paw-shaped socks and a carrot plush toy that made a soft bell sound when shaken.

"So cute! Your little sister will love it. Thank you, Yao Yao," Wen Haijing said sincerely. After Xu Yao came to Vancouver to attend high school, considering the distance, she usually lived in an apartment near the school with her nanny, Aunt Wu, and would often come over on weekends or holidays.

She showed great affection for the little girl and never forgot to bring her small gifts every time she visited.

"My little sister is growing so fast, the clothes I bought last time seem to be a bit too small again," Xu Yao said a little embarrassedly. "This bunny outfit is a plus size, so she should be able to wear it for a while longer!"

Xu Junheng responded with a smile, "Very thoughtful."

Xu Yao smiled, then remembered something and took out a few books from her schoolbag: "Aunt Wen, there are a few math problems in this week's homework that I'm not quite sure about. Could you take a look at them for me when you have time?"

“Of course.” Wen Haijing nodded.

After her parents' divorce, Xu Yao discovered that her mother, Lin Wanru, hadn't changed at all; she still preferred young, attractive men. Her new relationship was glamorous and lively, filled with the clatter of mahjong tiles and the clinking of glasses at social gatherings, which took up most of her time.

But her father's changes were subtle: he almost stopped drinking and smoking for social occasions, and he showed her more care than before. He even remembered the trivial things she mentioned, which was almost impossible before.

Xu Yao picked up on these subtle changes one by one, piecing together a new picture in her heart. So, she decided to follow her father to Vancouver to study. Lin Wanru would visit her on holidays. She had once thought that the rift in her family meant a diminishing of love, but now she discovered that a kind of care had become clearer and more concrete after the separation.

However, after transferring to a school in Vancouver, she faced obvious academic challenges due to the completely different education system and language environment.

When she faces difficulties, the first person she thinks of seeking help from is almost always Wen Haijing.

Xu Junheng naturally cared about his daughter, but when it came to a specific topic, it wasn't his forte. Moreover, when it came to the depth and systematic nature of academic research, Wen Haijing, a doctoral student who had worked her way up from being a top student, was undoubtedly a more suitable guide.

That year, when Wen Haijing was in Vancouver for the first time explaining homework to Xu Yao, she recalled how she had tutored her years ago when she was struggling to make a living. But now, their relationship was much closer.

As it got late, after the family finished dinner, Xu Junheng drove her back to her apartment near the middle school.

Before leaving, Xu Yao ran to the nursery door and silently said "Goodbye, little sister" to the sleeping Xu Yi before reluctantly leaving.

The illegitimate child of Xu Junheng that year was later discovered to be Qiao Qianyue, a woman from the Qiao family with a bad reputation, who forged a paternity test in order to climb the social ladder.

Night enveloped Vancouver in a tranquil blue-gray hue.

Half an hour later, Xu Junheng returned home and went into his study to work on some documents. He saw Wen Haijing sitting on the sofa in the study. So he went over and put his arm around her. Wen Haijing was almost curled up in his arms, her head resting on his neck, completely enveloped by his familiar scent and body temperature.

“Jingjing,” he called to her, “there’s something I remember very clearly. During the four years we were apart, I relived it many times.”

Wen Haijing shifted slightly in his arms, indicating that she was listening.

“It wasn’t our first meeting, nor was it…” He omitted a painful moment, “It was seven years ago, the day you were lying in a hospital in China.”

His voice was low and hoarse for a moment, and he tightened his arms, as if trying to dispel the chill brought by that memory.

“That day in the hospital bed, you looked at me and calmly told me that you scored 7.5 on the IELTS and wanted to study abroad.”

“7.5 points…” He repeated the number, his tone carrying a sigh that hadn’t faded even after so many years, “Back then, I was standing by your bedside when this score came crashing down on me, and I was immediately shocked.”

"You were shocked by the score? Why? I've never heard you mention it before."

Xu Junheng lowered his head, his forehead gently touching her temple. "Do you know how much I struggled to prepare for the IELTS exam back then? My family enrolled me in tutoring classes, one-on-one VIP classes. I was quite serious at first, but after the exam results weren't ideal, I became restless and couldn't sit still. I thought those questions were incredibly boring, and I argued with the teacher quite a bit, which really angered my dad."

"And then what?"

“The driver picks me up and drops me off without fail every day, and he waits in the meeting room of the organization from spring to winter. He has become an acquaintance of the receptionist and a close friend of the cleaning lady. In the end, the training institution even sent him an invitation to its annual meeting. In this way, with many stumbles and revisions, I finally managed to reach a score of 7.0.”

He smiled, a smile that conveyed both a calm acceptance of the facts and a distant contemplation of the boy from the past.

“And you…” His voice carried an almost painful pity, “In that situation, you were exploited by your family of origin, you had just experienced physical trauma, and you had so many things weighing on your mind, with nothing but darkness ahead. No one helped you, no one supervised you, and you probably didn’t even have a decent set of study materials. Yet you didn’t utter a word and carved out this path on your own. Your score is even higher than mine back then, achieved through all my hard work and with so much external support.”

He paused for a moment, then hugged her even tighter, as if trying to reach through time with this tangible embrace and touch the girl who, even in dire straits, still buried herself in her studies and made a desperate gamble.

His fingertips gently combed through her long hair, his movements infinitely tender. "Before I came to the hospital that day, I thought you would offer to buy me a car and a bag as compensation. But what you said that day made me start to respect you, and at the same time, I regretted the mistakes I made for you. Later, my pity for you slowly turned into appreciation, and then..." The steady yet slightly faster heartbeat in his chest was the best explanation.

He paused, then continued, "That afternoon, looking at you like that, I suddenly thought of myself from a long time ago. Not the Xu Junheng who filled the emptiness with noise later, but someone from even earlier... the boy who would stay up all night for a problem he couldn't solve, who would be overjoyed to win a game, and who even had some ideals in his heart. I found that I actually started to miss that boy me."

After saying that, he stroked Wen Haijing's soft hair, then leaned down and pressed her down beneath him.

“You gave birth three months ago.” He spoke, his voice lower and hoarse than before. “I…” He paused, as if he found the word difficult to say, yet it was this rare “difficulty in saying” that made it seem real. “I’ve been abstaining from sex for a long time.”

Wen Haijing's eyelashes trembled slightly.

Wen Haijing raised her hand, her fingertips first touching the back of his hand that was resting on her cheek, then slowly moving upwards, stroking his slightly furrowed brow, brushing across his high nose, and finally stopping at his tightly pursed lips.

Her gaze was clear and bright, like the night sky after an autumn rain, reflecting his shadow.

Xu Junheng kissed her lips, and she wrapped her arms around his neck, her fingertips disappearing into the coarse, short hair at the back of his head.

Then, Xu Junheng's hand moved to her cardigan, a soft off-white cardigan adorned with a row of small pearl buttons.

Soon, he unbuttoned all the buttons on Wen Haijing's sweater.

Beneath the wool sweater was a silk camisole, and Wen Haijing's shoulders gleamed softly under the light.

He leaned down again, planting kisses on her fair shoulder, wanting to leave a mark, as he asked, "How many babies do you want to have?"

Welcome all readers and fans to leave comments and vote! Thank you for your support.

I love it!

Anything else? Haha

Thank you for reading.

Thank you for your message. They're expected to have one last bonus chapter tomorrow, focusing on how he, as her son-in-law, helps her resolve issues stemming from her family of origin. However, Jingjing is busy with her studies, and they only have one child. Mr. Xu doesn't have any preference for sons over daughters.

Okay, could you tell me which book you'll be writing next?

Thank you for your question. It might be "Years Later, Heart Fluttering Again." I'm still revising the outline. I haven't completely decided which book to write yet; I've considered some ideas for three previous books. Thank you for your continued reading and support.

I absolutely love this work! I bought all the copies to support Toyama-sensei, and I'm really looking forward to her new masterpieces! Toyama-sensei, keep it up!

Thank you for your message, it's very heartwarming.