The nearest amusement park to Heting is an hour and a half drive away. Fu Xuanliao, who was sitting in the passenger seat, started to doze off as soon as he got in the car. When he woke up, they were almost there and the rain had stopped.

"Don't blame me for not reminding you," Fu Xuanliao said with a yawn, "It just rained, so most of the rides at the amusement park are probably closed."

Shi Meng was driving, his eyes fixed on the road ahead: "Hmm."

Fu Xuanliao didn't really want to go. Even a fool could tell that such a place would be packed with people on weekends, mostly children, which was quite terrifying.

He tried to stall for time: "It's almost lunchtime, aren't you hungry?"

Shi Meng freed one hand and handed the paper bag that was placed on the tea table in the middle of the seats to Fu Xuanliao.

Upon opening it, I found a hamburger, fries, a drink, and a dragon fruit cut in half.

Fu Xuanliao slept so soundly that he had no idea when Shi Meng got off the bus and bought all this. His lips twitched: "You're quite well-prepared."

Upon arriving at his destination, he stuffed the last French fry into his mouth, wiped his hands with a wet wipe as he got out of the car, and looked around, feeling that it looked somewhat familiar.

A roller coaster with a steep incline, a Ferris wheel with an extremely long radius... Maple City has only two large amusement parks, and this one has hardly been renovated or expanded, basically maintaining the scale it had when it was first built more than 20 years ago.

As a native of Fengcheng, Fu Xuanliao had been brought here by his parents when he was a child. Thinking back, he had also been here once ten years ago, probably for a class or club activity.

It must not have been a pleasant experience, otherwise I wouldn't have forgotten it so completely, not remembering a single detail.

Shi Meng walked ahead and obediently joined the queue at the ticket office. Fu Xuanliao stood beside him, took out his phone and swiped a few times, asking in confusion, "Why not buy tickets online? You can just swipe your ID card to get in."

"I want paper tickets," Shi Meng said.

Fu Xuanliao was speechless: "What's the use of that?"

Shi Meng ignored him, stood on tiptoe, silently counted the number of people in front of her, and concluded that it would take about 15 minutes to get there.

There was nothing Fu Xuanliao could do but wait with him.

After buying the tickets, Shi Meng walked ahead, checking both tickets together, while Fu Xuanliao followed behind into the park, feeling as if he were a child brought to play by his parents.

It was already strange enough that two grown men came to an amusement park. Fu Xuanliao was on tenterhooks, fearing that Shi Meng would drag him along to ride the carousel or something similar. When the colorful lights flashed and the music started, his tall stature of 1.87 meters would probably become the most unsightly sight in the entire park.

Fortunately, Shi Meng only stopped by the carousel for two seconds before walking around it.

Then he stopped in front of the snack cart, ordered an ice cream, walked to the bench next to him, patted the empty seat next to him, and gestured for Fu Xuanliao to sit down.

Fu Xuanliao thought to himself, "Interesting. Is this a way of making me watch you eat?"

As soon as I sat down, the ice cream suddenly appeared in front of me. The crispy cone was topped with a ring of two-tone cream and sprinkled with chocolate chips. It looked quite pleasing to the eye, thanks to the hand holding it.

After a long pause, Fu Xuanliao asked uncertainly, "For me?"

Shi Meng nodded: "Mm."

He took it almost against his will, but then couldn't bring himself to eat it. After all, it was a grown man eating ice cream in a place where kids gathered...

He asked Shi Meng, "And yours?"

Shi Meng seemed stumped by his question, blinking blankly.

Fu Xuanliao decided not to wait for his answer, stood up, walked to the vending cart, and bought another ice cream. On the way, she encountered a child whose parents were preventing him from eating sweets because of a cavity. The child saw Fu Xuanliao with an ice cream in each hand and looked on with envy.

When Shi Meng received the ice cream, she was still a little dazed, holding it carefully and staring at it intently.

Fu Xuanliao couldn't stand him like that, so he said, "Thank you for lunch. It's only fair to return the favor."

The two sat in the still bustling amusement park after the rain, eating ice cream under the watchful eyes of the children.

It was late autumn, cold and windy, and Fu Xuanliao's teeth chattered incessantly: "Why did you have to eat something so cold?"

Shi Meng was also terribly cold, her lips had turned white: "Isn't this what you like to eat?"

Fu Xuanliao recalled for a long time before vaguely remembering the last time he came to this amusement park. Because the convenience store was out of bottled water, he bought several ice creams to quench his thirst.

"It was summer, it was too hot, there was nothing we could do." Fu Xuanliao was utterly exhausted. "Aren't you afraid of getting stomach problems in this weather?"

As soon as she finished speaking, Shi Meng turned around and sneezed loudly. When she turned back, her nose and cheeks were red, whether from the cold or from embarrassment, it was hard to tell.

Fu Xuanliao found this amusing, took a big bite of ice cream and chewed it with a shiver, then belatedly realized something.

How did you know I like the ice cream here?

How could I have known? Shi Meng asked herself in her heart.

Without deliberately trying to remember, everything about Fu Xuanliao is clear in his unremarkable life trajectory.

Ten years ago, in the summer, cicadas chirped noisily outside the classroom. Shi Meng, then in the second year of junior high school, stayed in the sweltering art studio in the afternoon heat, revising the outline of a face many times, but was still not satisfied.

He should have deep-set eyes, a sharp jawline, and lips that look beautiful when he smiles… Shi Meng frowned slightly, thinking that she would find an opportunity to take a few more glances at him when he came home next time.

Suddenly hearing footsteps approaching, Shi Meng gathered her thoughts and almost instinctively crawled under the table.

Perhaps finding the classroom too stuffy, the two outside stopped at the corner of the corridor at just the right moment.

"Are you going to the club activities this weekend?"

"Amusement parks are for kids, I'm not going."

"You're already an adult in your first year of high school? Wait until I skip another grade..."

"No, no, no, if you jump higher than me, my dad will nag me for being useless."

The boy's hearty laughter captivated Shi Meng, who was standing just a wall away.

Are you going or not?

"I'm just a high school student... Oh well, I'll go."

"It's settled then, meet me at the amusement park entrance at 10 a.m. on Sunday."

"Okay, see you there."

...

Looking back on this incident, Shi Meng always felt like he had gotten a bargain by some strange twist of fate.

Because Shi Mu didn't expect there to be anyone in the studio, nor did he expect that he would ultimately be the one to break his promise and not be able to go.

That weekend later became one of the most important images of Fu Xuanliao stored in Shi Meng's heart.

He bought a ticket to the amusement park and secretly followed the crowd, watching Fu Xuanliao, his face dark with anger because Shi Mu had stood him up, eat eight ice creams in one go under the sun.

Shi Meng liked sweets and guessed that the ice cream had some effect on regulating her mood. So, ten years later, she followed suit and tried to make Fu Xuanliao feel better.

Indeed, it seemed to be true. After finishing his ice cream, Fu Xuanliao was much quieter than before. He no longer nitpicked or criticized Shi Meng's various irrational behaviors. He even patiently sat with Shi Meng on another bench for nearly two hours.

After the rain, the sun peeked out listlessly. In front of me, surrounded by trees, was the amusement park's roller coaster. Every few minutes, I could see the car slowly climbing to its highest point, then accelerating downwards with screams all around, rising and falling again, repeating this cycle until it returned to the starting point.

Shi Meng likes this kind of regular process. The numbers arranged in order and the cards stacked in descending order make him feel relaxed and happy.

But now he was not alone; Fu Xuanliao, the one who always made him break the rules, was sitting next to him.

"The amusement park is about to close." Fu Xuanliao raised his chin as he rushed over the roller coaster. "Don't you want to go on and experience it?"

Shi Meng turned his head and looked over in a daze.

His eyes were large and clear, as if they held two pools of water. The evening sunset and the colorful lights of the amusement park shone into his eyes, causing Fu Xuanliao's heart to skip a beat uncontrollably.

"Since we're already here," Fu Xuanliao's tone softened unconsciously. "Isn't today your birthday?"

Half an hour later, the two boarded the last roller coaster that had resumed operation after the rain.

As Shi Meng went up, she was bumped by the person behind her, and she stumbled and almost fell. Fu Xuanliao quickly caught her.

Seeing that he was timid and hesitant in the crowd, Fu Xuanliao frowned and discussed with the girl behind him to switch seats so that Shi Meng could sit in the same row as him.

The last time I rode a roller coaster was more than ten years ago. As I fastened my seatbelt and the open-air carriage climbed up the track with a rattling sound, Fu Xuanliao felt a little nervous, which was rare for him.

"Hey." He nudged Shi Meng with his elbow, "Are you scared?"

Shi Meng stared intently ahead with wide eyes, his expression as focused as when he was driving.

Fu Xuanliao shrugged, seemingly not having heard.

How could someone as audacious as him, who dared to steal from others, possibly be afraid of riding a roller coaster? However, when the carriage reached its highest point, Fu Xuanliao's hand was suddenly grabbed by the person next to him.

Shi Meng's hand was cold and soft, and it didn't feel bad to be held by such a hand.

In a moment of distraction, Fu Xuanliao turned his head to look, and Shi Meng happened to be looking at him as well.

When he heard this, Meng said, "Fu Xuanliao, I..."

With a difference of only half a second, the carriage plunged downwards at an almost vertical angle. The words that followed disappeared into the sound of the wind and screams. Fu Xuanliao only saw the lips in front of him slowly opening and closing, saying words he could not understand.

On the way back, Fu Xuanliao drove. He lowered the seat and raised the temperature, but he still felt very uncomfortable driving it.

"I should have brought my car," Fu Xuanliao said.

With his elbows propped up on the car window, Shi Meng looked out at the amusement park receding into the distance, the rotating Ferris wheel turning into a glittering little disc: "Hmm, your car has a lot of space."

Fu Xuanliao chuckled softly: "If others heard this, they'd probably think you were thinking..."

He didn't continue, because Shi Meng gave him a questioning look, clear and unambiguous, which made him seem like a filthy straight man who made lewd jokes regardless of the occasion.

But before, their relationship was one of minimal conversation, going straight to bed. A thousand flippant words like that wouldn't have taken it to heart. It was just a joke anyway; if it stung, all the better.

Now it's peaceful, more peaceful than ever before.

The aftereffects of the brief change in their relationship lasted longer than expected. When they arrived at the entrance of Heting, Fu Xuanliao pulled the handbrake, and the first thing he subconsciously thought of was—it's so late, should I take Shi Meng home?

Shi Meng had already gotten out of the car and walked around to the driver's side door to wait for Fu Xuanliao to get out.

Fu Xuanliao moved very slowly, including getting out of the car and walking the short distance of a dozen meters to his own car.

It must be because of today's trip, Fu Xuanliao thought, I really shouldn't have agreed to it.

Even so, after starting his car, he still unconsciously looked back in the direction he had come from.

The ground parking lot at Heting is very spacious, and you can see Shi Meng still standing next to the open car door at a glance.

He was thin, but stood very straight. He wasn't wearing the formal attire that he had been seen in at the banquet that day. His sweater and thick coat looked comfortable and casual, reminding Fu Xuanliao of how he had waited at the door many Saturdays.

Even though they had run down and were still panting, they insisted on pretending to bump into each other and politely said, "You've come," as if they were very well-mannered.

Actually, he's just a wild child with an eccentric personality. I don't remember when he became like this, but in short, he's nothing like Shi Mu.

But if it were Shi Mu here today, if it were Shi Mu celebrating his birthday, Fu Xuanliao would definitely not let him leave so easily.

He will take him home.

Many thoughts flooded his mind, overlapping one after another, causing Fu Xuanliao to speak before he could even think of anything.

"It's late," he asked. "Want to come to my place?"

Even a passing ant would probably think the question was redundant, because Shi Meng never needed to hesitate with him.

Moreover, the Fu family lives near Heting.

Soon after, Fu Xuanliao heard the sound of Shi Meng's car door closing, and a very soft but clear "Okay".