As night deepened, I tossed and turned in bed, unable to sleep. I checked the flights from Shanghai to Sanya on my phone. Ye Zhi should be able to catch the 10:30 flight; calculating the time, it would take her another hour to reach her destination.

I'm quite worried about her, afraid she's encountered something particularly difficult, and also worried she's tired... But my concern for her can only stay at this level, because I'm just as busy. If we really were in a romantic relationship, this kind of busyness would be quite hurtful, because two people need time to be together, but Ye Zhi is a woman who can leave anytime, anywhere because of various work commitments.

So, love can be simple at times, but it can also be quite complex at others. At least for now, I don't have the ability to change anything between myself and Ye Zhi. We can only maintain the status quo, with one of us living in Shanghai and the other in Dali.

...

Around midnight, Chen Jin finally returned to his rented room. He smelled strongly of alcohol, but he was still sober. I said to him, "It's so late. I thought you weren't coming back tonight."

As Chen Jin hung his coat on the clothes rack, he replied, "I just went to a hotel with Ding Lin and had a 'breakup sex'... but staying overnight together is out of the question. When you break up, you have to be prepared to break up."

I don't know what to say.

Chen Jin added, "Ding Lin said that after she gets the house in Kunshan, she'll list it online for sale, and she'll return the 150,000 yuan I paid her... Can I keep that money?"

I don't think she'll give it to you.

Chen Jin asked, full of doubt, "Why?"

“If she really wants to sell this house, she doesn’t need to wait until she gets the house. As long as there’s a buyer, she can go to the developer now to change the name on the property, and it won’t affect the sale.”

"Maybe... she wants to keep it and wait for it to appreciate in value... after all, the market for second-hand houses is still quite good right now."

"If the market continues to be good, will she just keep waiting? ...and then your money will become a mess."

Chen Jin thought for a moment, then replied with a hint of sorrow on his face, "She really is capable of doing such a thing; actually, deep down, I never intended to get the money back." After a slight pause, he continued, "She bought an apartment in Kunshan, which means she's settled down near Shanghai... That's a good thing, and I'm willing to grant her that wish; but, now that things have come to this, why is she still pretending to ask me for the money back?"

I comforted her, saying, "Maybe it's because she feels guilty towards you. Saying that will make her feel better."

Chen Jin laughed self-deprecatingly: "Tell me, what the hell was my eye for choosing a woman like this? ... Even now, to make herself feel better, she's still lying to me... Since I, Chen Jin, am not planning to stay in Shanghai anymore, what's another 150,000 yuan?"

"Learn from this experience and try to find a good woman next time."

Chen Jin sat down on the chair opposite the bed, lit a cigarette, and after smoking half of it, suddenly changed the subject and asked me, "Is that girl you ate with at the food street today really your girlfriend?"

"Where did you see the suspicious point?"

"I really don't see anything suspicious, I'm just resentful... Why can you, Michael, find such a beautiful woman, while I have to end up with a woman like Ding Lin... I saw it all during dinner... You're incredibly audacious, you just went and kissed that girl on the lips; if it weren't for the fact that things had gone too far, what you did would be a very serious case of sexual harassment, do you think that girl would let you get away with it!?"

I picked up the cigarette pack on the bedside table and looked at it. There were no cigarettes inside. I gestured to Chen Jin, and he understood immediately. He tossed me a cigarette right away.

After lighting it and puffing out a cloud of smoke, I said to him, "To be honest, I don't really know what our relationship is right now... It's pretty complicated between us. To put it simply, it's a case of the woman being stronger and the man weaker..."

Chen Jin interrupted me and asked, "How strong is it?"

I squinted and replied, "I met her on the way to Dali. Her tire went flat, and I helped her change it... Do you know what kind of car she drives?"

"You know, I've seen the world in Shanghai, I won't be scared by you."

"The top-of-the-line G-Class."

"The 6.0, twin-turbocharged one?"

"Um."

"I remember the base price of this car was close to four million, that's really outrageous!"

I took a drag of my cigarette, and then I remembered the scene when I first met Ye Zhi at the observation deck... I didn't know whether I was lucky or unlucky.

I finally spoke to Chen Jin and said, "If you had a girlfriend like this, would you want her or not?"

Chen Jin thought for a moment and replied, "To be honest, if it were me, I would probably get nervous just chatting with her, let alone fantasize about the two of us living together!"

"What you're saying is really true... When I first became friends with her, I was exactly like that, and I even avoided her a bit."

"How did you overcome it later?"

I smiled wryly: "If I could really overcome that, things wouldn't be like this between us now."

"Then you're pretty awesome!"

"What a load of rubbish... Only you know the truth." After a short pause, I continued, "Let's not talk about this anymore, it's too exhausting... I need to get back to Dali urgently. Give me a definite answer, can I leave tomorrow morning?"

"No problem at all. I'll return the keys to the landlord, and we'll just leave whenever we want."

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