Go achieve your initial dream.
In the silent night, Jiang Huaixi and Lu Zizheng’s house was in complete darkness, except for the open door of the study, casting a dim, warm light.
In front of the desk, Jiang Huaixi sat upright and tense, one hand resting on the keyboard, the other holding the mouse, seriously editing the photos taken on Qingming Day. Beside her, Lu Zizheng, with one hand supporting her cheek, slightly squinted her eyes, her gaze tightly fixed on Jiang Huaixi’s computer screen, watching intently.
Under the deep blue sky, amidst the emerald green lush forest and bamboo, Lu Zizheng turned back with a smile, her beautiful hair flying… another fresh and beautiful picture was created.
Lu Zizheng couldn’t help but arch her eyebrows, praising with a sentence: “Truly beautiful…”
Jiang Huaixi glanced at Lu Zizheng with pride and said: “Probably because the skill is good.”
Lu Zizheng laughed softly and said with dissatisfaction: “Couldn’t it be because the model looks good?”
Jiang Huaixi gave Lu Zizheng a sidelong glance, slightly furrowed her brows, clicked the mouse a few times, and pulled up a few photos that Lu Zizheng had taken for her, placing them next to the ones she had taken of Lu Zizheng, one on the left and one on the right, with a stark contrast.
Lu Zizheng, tall with long legs and a charming smile, stood in contrast to Jiang Huaixi, who appeared wide and stout, with a fierce expression, either rolling her eyes or glaring. The moment Lu Zizheng saw this masterpiece, she couldn’t help but burst into laughter.
Jiang Huaixi let out a light hum and said: “Are you sure you’re not making fun of me? You almost turned me into a meme.”
Lu Zizheng found Jiang Huaixi’s rare and image-ruining eye roll increasingly amusing, and she laughed so much that she leaned on Jiang Huaixi’s arm. Seeing her blissfully unaware face, Jiang Huaixi angrily clicked to close the pictures, shook her arm disdainfully, and tried to shake off Lu Zizheng.
Lu Zizheng, seeing the situation was not good, finally stopped laughing, breathless and weakly said: “I was wrong, from now on I will humbly learn from you.” After speaking, she paused again and asked flatteringly: “Huaixi, did you learn photography before? I think you look very professional and skilled.”
Jiang Huaixi responded softly with an “En” and explained: “When I was little, because my health wasn’t very good, I couldn’t go with my family when they traveled. Each time, I could only look at the photos they brought back to understand the places they had been, to understand the outside world. Later, I fell in love with this way of recording, and I seriously studied photography for a time. Speaking of it, I once dreamed of becoming a photographer who travels the world when I grew up…”
Lu Zizheng, leaning on Jiang Huaixi’s arm, pondered slightly and asked puzzledly: “Then why not later?”
Jiang Huaixi was silent for a while, then after a long time, she slightly curled her lips, gazed at Lu Zizheng, and smiled: “Maybe, it’s because I have attachments.”
Lu Zizheng raised her eyes to meet Jiang Huaixi’s bright gaze, and her cheeks suddenly blushed. She lowered her head, hummed twice, and said: “When did you learn to be so slick-tongued, always using sweet words to deceive people?”
Jiang Huaixi let out a light laugh and gently nuzzled the top of Lu Zizheng’s head with her chin, her usually cool voice carrying an obvious tenderness: “Just tell me, do you like to hear it or not? Hmm? Do you like to hear it?”
Lu Zizheng nuzzled Jiang Huaixi’s arm with her warm cheek and softly hummed: “I don’t like it…”
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Jiang Huaixi raised an eyebrow and said: “Oh? Then I just won’t say it anymore.”
Lu Zizheng, dissatisfied, poked Jiang Huaixi’s arm with her chin, and Jiang Huaixi smiled as she extended her other hand to gently rub Lu Zizheng’s hair.
After a moment, Jiang Huaixi suddenly asked Lu Zizheng: “Zizheng, what was your childhood dream?”
Lu Zizheng was slightly stunned, then smiled and said: “The age where I could dream is too far away, I can’t quite remember.”
Jiang Huaixi slightly frowned and said with dissatisfaction: “Then now, just carefully think back.”
Lu Zizheng raised her eyes to look at Jiang Huaixi and saw that Jiang Huaixi’s beautiful black eyes were full of seriousness, which involuntarily made her heart tremble, and she became serious. She sighed and said: “Once, I really liked reading books and seemed to have seriously thought about becoming a university language teacher, and also a writer. During winter and summer vacations, I could travel around, submit articles to magazines, and live a leisurely and free life.”
Jiang Huaixi lightly responded with an “En” and asked: “Then later, why did you change to study economics?”
Lu Zizheng was silent for a moment, then laughed with some self-mockery: “Maybe later I felt the need for life to be a bit more realistic. Studying economics meant I didn’t need to pursue a postgraduate degree, I could start working and earning money earlier, and it paid a bit more than a teacher’s salary.” After speaking, she somewhat desolately asked Jiang Huaixi: “After my father passed away, I increasingly understood that I no longer have the privilege of naively dreaming. Huaixi, do you think I’m too realistic?”
Jiang Huaixi gently rested her chin on top of Lu Zizheng’s head and lightly touched Lu Zizheng’s face with her hand, speaking in a warm voice: “How could I? Zizheng, I only feel more heartache.”
In their senior year, Jiang Huaixi once heard the counselor lament over Lu Zizheng. At that time, the counselor held Lu Zizheng in high regard, believing she could achieve great things, and suggested that Lu Zizheng study abroad after graduation, or if she was unwilling to go abroad, the college also offered a guaranteed postgraduate spot, hoping Lu Zizheng would seriously consider it. However, Lu Zizheng stubbornly refused both suggestions, firmly expressing that she had no such intentions. The counselor did not understand the underlying reasons, but Jiang Huaixi guessed them.
How could Lu Zizheng feel at ease going abroad, leaving Mother Lu alone in the country? Moreover, studying abroad requires money, and so does postgraduate study. Lu Zizheng, being so sensible, could not bear to let Mother Lu endure a few more years of hardship, fearing she might be eager to graduate a bit earlier to work and ease her mother’s burden.
At that time, Jiang Huaixi had thousands of words in her heart she wanted to tell Lu Zizheng, wanting to reassure her, wanting to fund her education, wanting to help take care of Mother Lu, wanting so many things… But she lacked one thing, the identity to help her unreservedly.
She knew Lu Zizheng would not accept. So, in the end, she could only watch with heartache as Lu Zizheng gave up a better, brighter future, watching her struggle and slowly improve along the way…
And now, she finally has the identity to pamper and love her without reservation, to satisfy her completely.
Jiang Huaixi, in a warm voice, seriously said to Lu Zizheng: “Zizheng, you have me now. I give you the right to be naive, the right to dream, the right to be willful. Don’t wrong yourself anymore.”
Lu Zizheng lowered her head, not daring to look at Jiang Huaixi, moved to tears. Yet, she still deliberately steadied her voice and joked with Jiang Huaixi: “You see, you’re starting to attack me with sugar-coated artillery again.”
Jiang Huaixi laughed and said: “Because you love to hear it.” After speaking, she seriously added: “Zizheng, when we go back, let’s realize your initial dream together, okay?”
Upon hearing this, Lu Zizheng raised her head in surprise, looking at Jiang Huaixi in puzzlement.
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Jiang Huaixi slightly curved her lips and blinked as she asked Lu Zizheng: “Do you still want to be a teacher, a writer?”
Lu Zizheng hesitantly asked her: “Is it still possible?”
Jiang Huaixi smiled, her voice light yet gently firm: “Of course, it’s still possible.”
She said: “If you’re willing, when we return to Linzhou in May, after I’ve finished with Huaichuan’s engagement and some company matters, we’ll contact schools and mentors to prepare for the December exams. I’ll accompany you, and we’ll go back to school as students together, okay?”
After speaking, she saw Lu Zizheng’s eyes widen, her gaze bright with anticipation, so she softened her voice even more, gazing at Lu Zizheng as she began to outline a blueprint for their future: “We’ll choose the same school and the same mentor, so we can attend classes together every day. This time, I’ll sit next to you, and you shouldn’t be dissatisfied anymore, right? If you want, we can also apply for the campus radio station, with you writing scripts and me broadcasting. After a few years, when we graduate, if you want to be a teacher, be a teacher. If you want to be a writer, be a writer. If you want to travel, then travel. I’ll be with you. When you feel it’s right, we can have a child, watching her grow up slowly, and accompany each other as we slowly grow old, watching time slowly flow by…”
Lu Zizheng was listening with a face full of longing, but when she heard the latter part of Jiang Huaixi’s sentence, her eyes suddenly widened in surprise: “Wait, have a child?”
Jiang Huaixi frowned and seriously said: “You don’t want one?”
Lu Zizheng bit her lip and stammered a bit: “No, I… I quite like children. It’s just, you or me… how… how can we have…”
Jiang Huaixi raised an eyebrow and, proudly and calmly, as if it were a matter of course, said: “Well, you are the receiver, so of course you would have one…”
Lu Zizheng’s expression suddenly became somewhat petrified.
Jiang Huaixi looked at Lu Zizheng’s dazed expression and couldn’t help but laugh lightly, poking Lu Zizheng’s cheek and comforting her: “Well, this is something for much later. We can battle it out for three hundred rounds to decide roles, so you don’t need to be discouraged so early. Keep going, keep going.”
Lu Zizheng was really like: “…”
As the night gradually deepened, Jiang Huaixi continued editing photos, and Lu Zizheng opened another laptop, asking Jiang Huaixi to send her some photos. Then, she opened the editing software, clicking the mouse seriously as she edited.
The hour hand slowly, slowly, finally pointed to eleven o’clock. Jiang Huaixi felt it was about time to sleep, organized the files, and then shut down the computer.
Lu Zizheng seemed not to have finished yet and asked Jiang Huaixi to go wash up first, saying she’d be done in a little while. So, Jiang Huaixi left the study room, washed up, then returned to the bedroom, turned on a small light, and waited for Lu Zizheng to finish.
Finally, after about ten more minutes, Lu Zizheng returned to the bedroom holding her laptop. Like presenting a treasure, she turned the laptop screen towards Jiang Huaixi and said: “Let me show you the result of my whole night’s work…”
With some confusion and anticipation, Jiang Huaixi reached out and took the laptop. The moment she saw it clearly, her face instantly darkened…
It was simply an enhanced version of an expression pack making fun of her!
In the edited picture, Jiang Huaixi’s eyes were exaggeratedly rolling upwards, and the clothes on her body were painted a poop-yellow color in a fish scale-like armor shape? Plus, she was stepping on colorful lumps of strangely shaped… clouds?
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Just as Jiang Huaixi was about to angrily scold Lu Zizheng: “Do you want to sleep on the sofa tonight?” she inadvertently noticed a line at the bottom of the picture written in simple regular script:
When I was young, I also had such dreams, hoping my beloved would be a world-shaking hero who, one day, would wear golden armor and holy clothes, step on seven-colored auspicious clouds, and come to marry me in a crowd-focused setting.
Huaixi, thank you for fulfilling all my dreams of a beloved.
Jiang Huaixi’s expression finally softened, and a gentle smile gradually appeared at the corners of her lips. She raised her head and looked at Lu Zizheng, who was standing by the bedside, somewhat nervous, expectant, and shyly watching her. She raised an eyebrow and laughed, saying: “Your skill is really unbearably bad. But, I quite like it.”
Jiang Huaixi paused for a moment, extended her hand, held Lu Zizheng’s hand, pulled her into an embrace, hugged her, and rested her head on Lu Zizheng’s shoulder. She murmured gently in her ear: “Zizheng, thank you, you are also my world-shaking hero. Of course, if this hero’s photography and editing skills could be better, it would be even more perfect…”
Lu Zizheng: “…”
LP: Re-translated on September 21, 2024