Chapter 13: Adding a Friend
Shortly after lunch, Wen Jiu mixed a packet of cold medicine, drank it, and laid her head on her desk for a brief nap. Upon waking, she threw herself into the afternoon’s tasks. Fortunately, her cold was mild; after the medicine, her nose wasn’t so stuffed, just a slight runny nose remained. Her afternoon work went much more smoothly.
When it was time to finish for the day, Wen Jiu saw that most of her coordination tasks were wrapped up, so she prepared to leave. Jingyan Design was not far from Yiyuan Residences, so she chose the subway for her commute home. Exiting the station, she contacted the locksmith to schedule a time to change her fingerprint lock; she didn’t want to be locked outside again with no defenses in place.
Inside the elevator, Wen Jiu composed a message, and as soon as she had a signal upon stepping out, she sent it to Shen Mengxia.
“Mengxia, are you done with work? Want to grab dinner together?”
Shen Mengxia didn’t reply immediately—she was probably still working overtime at the office. Before entering her own apartment, Wen Jiu glanced at Gu Zehuai’s tightly shut door next to hers, wondering if he was home yet.
She remembered she needed to transfer yesterday’s money to him. Not in a hurry to enter, Wen Jiu walked to Gu Zehuai’s door and rang the bell. She waited a bit, rang twice, but there was no response. Wen Jiu assumed he hadn’t gotten off work yet, so she planned to come by another time.
Just as she turned to leave, the door opened behind her. Gu Zehuai stood there in a bathrobe, towel in hand, drying his hair. He’d gone straight to shower upon arriving home, and had just stepped out when he heard the doorbell. Thinking he’d misheard, he was about to return to the master bedroom when the bell rang again. He opened the door and saw Wen Jiu about to leave.
Seeing Gu Zehuai freshly showered, Wen Jiu lifted her head to meet his gaze and spoke first: “I’m here to pay you back for yesterday’s battery, show me your payment code.”
“It’s alright, no need—it was nothing,” he said, but still picked up his phone from the dining table just inside the entrance and displayed a QR code.
“How about we just exchange contact info?” The screen showed a WeChat add-friend QR code.
Wen Jiu froze for a moment, clearly surprised that Gu Zehuai would suggest adding her. Regaining her composure, she opened her scanner and added him as a friend.
After greeting Gu Zehuai, Wen Jiu returned home, thinking she’d find some other way to repay him later. No sooner had she settled on the sofa than her phone vibrated—Shen Mengxia had replied.
“Ahhhh, Jiu, I’m still stuck at work, don’t know how much longer, probably can’t make it for dinner tonight, boo hoo hoo! My heartless boss only knows how to squeeze employees (crying hard).”
Reading this, Wen Jiu could easily picture Shen Mengxia’s outburst at the other end of the phone. She replied with a hug emoji and exited the chat.
Having just added WeChat, Gu Zehuai’s chat was right below Shen Mengxia’s. Wen Jiu tapped on Gu Zehuai’s profile.
His avatar was a sunrise atop a mountain—not a generic internet image, likely a photo he’d taken himself. The nickname was minimalist: just a single capital letter, “H.” There was no Moments feed, meaning he hadn’t posted any.
Meanwhile, Gu Zehuai, now WeChat friends with Wen Jiu, tapped into her profile. Her avatar was a back-facing shot taken at the seaside, wearing a sundress and a side-braided ponytail. Her nickname was simply “9,” equally concise.
Opening Wen Jiu’s Moments, he found a rich collection of daily photos: selfies, food, travel landscapes. Gu Zehuai scrolled through them one by one.
What he didn’t know was that Wen Jiu had two WeChat accounts—one for work, one personal. The one he’d just added was her private account. Wen Jiu kept only close relatives and friends on that account, so she often shared everyday moments. Her work account, by contrast, mostly posted links related to design and evening gowns, with only a handful of posts.