Chapter 20. First Kiss

"Everything went well." Ke Fan sent a message after the core meeting ended.

"Great, then what should we do next?" Nie Fei responded quickly.

"According to the previous plan, I will try to meet him next week."

Just tap the keyboard and send.

Heaving a sigh of relief in his heart, Ke Fan looked out the window.

Summer has arrived in Jinshi. The sky is azure, the trees are lush and green, and the leaves sway in the breeze. The greenery is full of vitality, everything is thriving, and everything seems to be moving in the right direction.

A smile appeared on Ke Fan's lips.

She lowered her head to look at the screen in her hand again, scrolling through the chat records between her and Nie Fei over the past few months.

In fact, at the beginning, she didn't think about every exact step.

She just knew that she couldn't let things get any worse, and she had to take the first step no matter what.

So after getting Dr. Xu's contact information from Nie Fei, she sent a detailed email explaining Yi Lingjia's condition: his uncontrollable medication, his beginning self-destructive tendencies, and his obsession with himself.

Finally, she asked, "If I am his inner trouble, can I help with his treatment?"

Dr. Xu gave a clear and positive response and gave her the key points for follow-up treatment.

Step 1: Emotional Re-experiencing.

The first stage is emotional re-experience. Increase contact with Yi Lingjia within a non-intimate "safe distance" to help him break the frozen shell in his heart and regain his emotions.

Step 2: Emotional Reconstruction.

The second stage is emotional reshaping. Through stronger external stimulation, Yi Lingjia can vent and empty his negative emotions, and relearn the ability to create positive emotions independently.

The day she received the email reply, she had just finished a two-week business trip and returned to Hai City two days earlier than expected.

Sitting in the car on the way home, she was dozing with her eyes closed when her phone suddenly vibrated and she received this email.

I read the email quickly and made a decision quickly.

The case in Jinshi has been delayed in the police station for a long time. Because it is rather difficult, Xing Xiao and others have repeatedly refused to take it.

She had originally been considering taking over, but because her schedule had been so busy recently, she wasn't sure if she could find a whole block of time to actually conduct an in-depth investigation.

Now the first step has been taken - if we want to increase contact, going to Tianjin is the best choice.

The next day, she knocked on Li Chengjin's office door.

After setting the itinerary, Ke Fan and Nie Fei also made plans for an "accidental reunion".

The Oasis Wind Farm happened to be adjacent to one of Yi Shi's fisheries. Nie Fei asked Yi Lingjia to go out to sea that day on the pretext that a client was coming to the fishery for an on-site inspection.

Then, step by step, they continued to invade.

Ke Fan recorded every step and gave feedback to Dr. Xu via email.

After the reunion, Yi Lingjia's mood did fluctuate, but it seemed that his dependence on drugs was also increasing. Nie Fei would occasionally see him rubbing the medicine bottle in his pocket in a somewhat morbid manner - he never wanted to show the medicine bottle to others.

Dr. Xu's email response eased her concerns:

"This is a normal phenomenon, proving that his existing emotional mechanism is losing control. We can continue to increase the stimulation to break it in one fell swoop."

"And if possible, I'd like to know what medication he's taking."

Continue to increase the stimulation.

These words circled in Ke Fan's mind, and she was slightly distracted.

At this moment, she was standing in the morning light in front of the window, holding the seabed sample test report that Lu Qiaoyuan had just sent. The data showed that there was a high probability of seabed subsidence.

I want to go back to Tsu City again, but how can I continue to improve?

It wasn't until Lao Xie suggested organizing a party that she began to think about it.

I introduced Lu Qiaoyuan to Lao Xie and brought Ji Hang along. Sure enough, at the dinner party, they mentioned her "boyfriend" as expected, and the information they provided was enough for Yi Lingjia to piece together Lu Qiaoyuan's name.

Everything was going according to plan, but the moment she saw Yi Lingjia's face suddenly change, she felt a dull pain in her heart.

Maybe it was because she drank that bowl of red bean sweet soup that afternoon.

It came from a seafood restaurant called Fengshun, exactly as her ex-lover had promised.

I tangled with him outside the box or in the stairwell just to take the opportunity to see his medicine bottle.

But when he looked at her with those broken black eyes that were no different from six years ago, she couldn't help but kiss his lips.

*

It was an unexpected, tender kiss.

Ke Fan gently stroked his lips with his fingers, and the deepening touch he had felt that day seemed to still be there.

Inevitably, I think back to the first time the two of us kissed.

That was the sixth month he had been pursuing her, and also the third month since his first confession failed.

He sat with her in the library for the whole day, but Ke Fan didn't talk much to him.

Yi Lingjia seemed to have run out of ideas. Coming out of the library, he followed her with a wronged look on his face and asked:

"Ke Fan, can you tell me what gift you want for Christmas?"

The young man stared at her with his sparkling eyes, and his round, moist eyes were filled with affection that could not be hidden.

She was actually already moved, but in the past few months she gradually tasted the fun of teasing him, so she deliberately said:

"Nothing."

The young man looked dejected and lowered his head, but he still followed her.

The two walked one in front and the other behind, and the street lights stretched their shadows very long.

Soon, it was Christmas Eve.

The last class was a required course for the major, and the whole class was present.

After class, Yi Lingjia magically pulled out a Santa Claus sack filled with apples and announced:

"It's Christmas Eve, let's eat apples."

Nie Fei responded enthusiastically: "The squad leader will pay for everyone to have apples out of his own pocket~"

The classroom suddenly became lively and people rushed forward.

Ke Fan sat in the front row of the classroom. Yi Lingjia placed the first apple in front of her, her face slightly flushed.

"Merry Christmas."

Ke Fan put the apple into his schoolbag and went to the library to study. After finishing, he took her back to the dormitory as usual.

They lived on the new campus, where some facilities weren't fully built. The way back to the girls' dormitory was a long, winding flight of steps, and the streetlights weren't very effective, sometimes flickering or even going off. So he always insisted on seeing her off.

Especially today, it suddenly started snowing, the first snow of this year.

Yi Lingjia held an umbrella, and the two walked side by side in the snow.

It was late and the road was very quiet.

Snow drifted into the umbrella, landed on her hair, and slowly fell, passing over her soft silhouette, as beautiful as a movie scene.

When they reached the uneven road, she first stepped onto a step and suddenly turned towards him on the step.

Her eyes were looking straight into his, and the distance between them was only a foot. Yi Lingjia's heart trembled.

"So in order to give me an apple, you gave apples to the whole class?" she asked.

The moment he nodded, warmth gently fell on his lips.

The entire outside world seemed to have gone silent, leaving only the gentle rustling of snowflakes landing on the umbrella. But in my heart, I could hear the sound of fireworks exploding again and again.

This was their first kiss.

Ke Fan still remembers that after the end, Yi Lingjia's sparkling eyes were like sunlight shining directly into her heart even in the snowy night.

Back in the dormitory, she took a bite of the beautifully packaged, rosy and tempting apple.

It was the sweetest apple she had ever tasted.