Chapter 01

Recently it had been rainy and misty, and the mist in the air had made the city gray, and it was only today that we got a sunny day. But it was still raining last night, and the puddles of water that had accumulated on the concrete floor reflected off the branches of the trees that speckled the greenbelt.

The green belt in the university is far more than the outside of the city, take a deep breath, organic matter from the release of actinomycetes escaped to the mucous membrane of the olfactory region, Jiang Yimiao smelled the fresh scent of the soil steaming hot from the rain.

“Be careful, don’t step on the puddles.” The woman tugged on her arm.

“Mom, I have eyes that can see.” Jiang Yimiao raised her head and glanced at her. She saw that Shen Man was staring at the cell phone in her hand, with – Walking with a cell phone can see a ghost written in her eyes.

Jiang Yimiao smiled and silently put her phone back into her bag, “I’m returning a message from a colleague.” She explained, then looked down and drew a handkerchief to wipe the sweat from her face.

The days of February and March in South City could already wear short sleeves, not to mention that it was almost June now. However, because of the cloudy and rainy days, none of the recent body temperatures were very high. But her forehead was still covered with beads of sweat, and her heart only felt hot and panicky.

Jiang Yimiao wasn’t afraid of heat and sweaty body, just because she had moved the luggage for a morning today.

In April and May, after finishing the trivialities of her thesis, Jiang Yimiao went to the company where she got the offer to work as an intern.

The company is a large Internet factory, coincidentally and her university in a district, just one in the north and one in the south, commuting is very inconvenient, she had to temporarily in the company near the village rented a short-term rental apartment.

I guess it’s a bad match, she didn’t live very comfortably, plus after that, she planned to develop in the south side of the city for a long time, Jiang Yimiao had to search for a new house to prepare for the long term rent.

Unfortunately, after personally running through several lots and looking for an agent, she couldn’t find the most suitable house.

Until Shen Man suddenly called a while ago to say, a friend of hers went abroad to work for many years, there are two sets of houses in Nancheng has been empty, not sold or rented out, one of which happens to be just a subway station away from the company, which can let her live in.

The friend Jiang Yimiao also know, is the previous acquaintance for more than twenty years next door neighbor Zhao aunt.

Jiang Yimiao is not the kind of person who likes to bother others, and always feels a bit embarrassed. Auntie Zhao persuaded her to let Jiang Yimiao live in their empty house first, so that she could take her time in finding an apartment, and if she was comfortable, she could stay there for a long time.

It just so happens that she graduated this month, and her short-term rental contract expired, so today she and her parents went back to school to move the last of her dormitory luggage to Auntie Zhao’s house.

Jiang Yimiao’s father, Jiang Zhixue, sent the last batch of luggage to Auntie Zhao’s house. The mother and daughter stayed at the school cafeteria to have a quick lunch because they were too hungry to stand it.

The two of them were now coming out of the cafeteria and walking on the road to the school entrance, where Jiang Zhixue’s car was already parked in front of the school waiting for them.

Jiang Yimiao suddenly paused in her steps, she frowned and squinted her eyes, seemingly looking at the lake on the opposite side of the road.

“What’s wrong, are there still things left to pack in the dormitory?”

Jiang Yimiao shook her head, “No, it feels like I’ve seen someone very familiar.”

Her gaze was falling on the back of a man by the lake, the distance was a bit far, she could only see the color of the clothes on that person, the same as her, white on top and black on the bottom.

It was just intuition that made her always feel that it was someone she knew.

Other than that, Jiang Yimiao could only see the lake reflecting the sunlight, sparkling microwaves. Everyone else was like a small ball with color, rolling slowly in her field of vision.

“Classmates from the same major?” Shen Man had only finished asking when her cell phone rang. At a glance, it was Jiang Zhixue calling to rush the two of them, and hung up after a few hurried words.

Jiang Yimiao shook her head, somewhat awkwardly lifting up the broken hair that had fallen to the corner of her forehead, “No, never mind, maybe I was wrong.”

This child’s thinking is always very jumpy, Shen Man is to understand her daughter, see her not interested in continuing this topic, Shen Man also did not continue to talk about it.

Jiang Yimiao’s hometown is in Linshi, it’s very convenient to come and go. So her parents sent her to her new place, helped her pack her bags, and decided to go back after dinner.

Before moving this luggage, Jiang Yimiao had already figured out the power and water sources in the house and the use of natural gas in advance, and once she returned to the house she took a shower, turned on the air conditioning and slowly cleaned up the objects in the bedroom.

Her things are not much, but if you want to carefully clean up also need a lot of time.

Afraid of delaying her parents’ return home, Jiang Yimiao simply tidied up a bit.

“Oh yo, your clothes, why are they all black, white and gray?” Shen Man opened her closet and said with some surprise.

Jiang Yimiao who was all soothed after the bath rolled around on the bed, “I just like black and white gray, hehehe.”

“I really don’t understand your young people’s current aesthetic.” She laughed helplessly, Shen Man was a bit obsessive-compulsive, and helped Jiang Yimiao rearrange her clothes according to the colors and categories of clothes.

Jiang Yimiao rolled over on the bed again and grabbed a doll at the foot of the bed, this was the only doll on her bed, and one of the few objects that she could associate with cuteness.

The doll was about twenty-five centimeters tall, with a round belly and an ugly expression, but she loved it.

The warmth-less lump of cotton was held in her arms, and Jiang Yimiao pinched the doll’s soft belly.

“Mom, is Auntie Zhao not going to return home?”

She propped up her head and looked at Shen Man, Auntie Zhao and they were all from the same hometown, she would only come back during the New Year, and she had a house in her hometown.

And the house on this side of the South City had indeed been empty and unoccupied for a long time.

“She has a stable job over there, she’ll probably come back when she retires.”

Jiang Yimiao rolled over and arranged herself in a big shape on the bed, “That’s also true.”

She recalled that she seemed to have heard Shen Man say earlier that Auntie Zhao had earned tenure at a foreign university.

Just as the words fell a sudden sound came from her ears, Jiang Yimiao looked up to the outside of the room, “What’s dad doing, why is it crackling outside?”

“Your dad is mopping the floor, I don’t understand why he can always be so noisy mopping the floor, it hasn’t changed in decades.”

Shen Man’s words sounded like she was spitting but with a smile on her face, she turned around and pulled Jiang Yimiao up.

“Clothes helped you re-fix, and it’s almost time to eat, don’t be lazy, get up.”

“I want to eat hairy crabs.”

“I want to too, tonight your dad is treating.”

“Rip him off.”

Mother and daughter exchanged an unspoken high five.

It wasn’t until the sky outside the window was gilded with a layer of golden light that Shen Man and Jiang Zhixue drove off, disappearing in front of Jiang Yimiao’s eyes along with the setting sun that fell in the twilight.

After going to the parking lot to send parents to leave, Jiang Yimiao re-entered the home, she crossed her waist and took a look at the house, this house Auntie Zhao did not live for a long time before, presumably to do investment before buying.

The decoration is also very simple, although not gorgeous, but not lose the beauty.

She was the only one left in the house was surprisingly quiet, so quiet that she could hear the sound of coat hangers outside the balcony as the wind slid and collided with each other, and in the balcony lit only by moonlight, it seemed crisp and a little strange.

Jiang Yimiao had been living in a group since middle school, even though she had already been out for a month on an internship, she still hadn’t fully adapted to living alone, and this feeling made her strange and a little uncomfortable.

Until she heard the sound of the spatula knocking on the iron pot while cooking dinner from the next balcony, she finally felt the living atmosphere around her, and the discomfort in her heart gradually dissipated.

This house is a commercial house in the neighborhood, the surrounding traffic is very convenient, today is Friday, the evening of the neighborhood people come and go.

Jiang Yimiao followed the sound of hanger collision walked to the balcony, standing at the railing looking out, can see a lot of teenagers wearing school uniforms.

The people and vehicles in and around the entrance to the neighborhood make this fast-paced city a rare place to have some fireworks, and the discomfort of living alone in her heart should gradually diminish.

It’s much more convenient to live here than in her previous apartment, and it’s just a three-minute walk to the subway station. Jiang Yimiao could sleep for an extra twenty minutes in the morning. As for the matter of looking for an apartment, she could only think of taking her time, waiting for the weekend when she was not working.

Jiang Yimiao had already lived here for ten days and had thoroughly adapted to the change in her identity and living environment. The days were not easy, but not too busy either.

Just last week, Jiang Yimiao suffered from influenza fever for three days, leave to return to the company piled up a lot of work, coupled with the recent coincidence of some busy, she worked two days in a row.

Today, she didn’t get home until after eight o’clock, and the night was so colorful that the ground was brightly lit thanks to the solar-powered streetlights.

It was not a cool night in the middle of summer. The center of the city was still like a furnace, sticky and hot, and it felt like I was being pricked by needles.

The bushes along the roadside rustled, the summer lacewing bugs chirping.

Jiang Yimiao clutched her cell phone in one hand and walked quickly to the neighborhood, pinching the edge of her bag with one hand, the soft leather shoulder bag was pinched into shape by her.

Even if the streetlights shone but the blurring of vision made her easily feel uneasy, even in the darkness of the school night she couldn’t walk alone at night.

Not to mention the fact that she was now in a mixed society.

It was only when she saw the reflective undershirts on the security guards in the neighborhood that Jiang Yimiao slowly breathed a sigh of relief. And such a sense of uneasiness in her from the elevator door out to see the residence room door, only completely dissipated.

Although she hadn’t lived here for long, she knew that the house across the street was occupied by a family of three, and Jiang Yimiao could even faintly hear the sound of an eight o’clock dog blood drama playing in their house. The fingertips of her tightly clutched cell phone also unloaded their strength.

“Did I leave the lights on in the morning?” Jiang Yimiao stood in front of her house, only seeing a ray of light exposed under the doorway.

Thrift and frugality was a good virtue engraved into the DNA of the country, and Jiang Yimiao frowned a little guiltily as she thought about the lights that had been on all day in this house.

While silently instructing herself to remember to turn off the electricity next time, she lowered her head and searched for the key to open the door from her bag.

The key had only been inserted into the lock hole and turned halfway around when the cell phone in her hand sent out another life-threatening call.

Jiang Yimiao stopped the action of opening the door and answered the phone.

A familiar female voice came out of the microphone, and she looked down and said back, “Sister Aya, I sent that file to you, right at five or six o’clock.”

While saying this, she continued to turn the key.

How can this door not open …… with the wrong key?

Jiang Yimiao tilted her head and clamped her cell phone, using both hands and opening the door, the door was finally opened.

“Alas, yes, yes, yes, the other document I have already printed, placed in the gray and blue folder on the far right hand side.” Jiang Yimiao lowered her head and sulkily walked into the room.

But she completely failed to notice that there was someone standing inside the door.

“Hiss.” Jiang Yimiao subconsciously touched her head, she hit a wall of human flesh straight on, not very hard or soft.

But her head hit with some raw pain.

Unsurprisingly, she should have hit someone’s chest. The other person also subconsciously held her up holding her left arm.

A flash of the recent burglary case that she had brushed up against flashed through her mind, and her body’s instinctive reaction made her jerk back a few steps, Jiang Yimiao’s fingertips still covering her forehead.

When she subconsciously raised her head until she could see the person in front of her, Jiang Yimiao was so shocked that her cell phone almost missed her grip.

She frowned, slightly open lips stunned for a few seconds, there was some surprise in her eyes, the person in front of her looked a bit strange to her, but the strangeness was mixed with familiarity.

“Book …… Zhao Shuming?”

“Why are you here?”