However, what surprised Gu Jiqing the most was that he actually met Yin Lan before he boarded the plane.
In fact, after New Year’s Eve, Yin Lan would message him and call him almost every day to show her concern for him. Every month, she would send new clothes and various homemade snacks to his dormitory, and they would always arrive on time as well.
Sometimes while eating snacks, he would even find a stack of banknotes under the box, as if she was afraid that Gu Jiqing would not accept her money, and she was also worried about what to do if Gu Jiqing was really hungry.
Every time she developed a new dish, he would send the recipe to Zhou Cibai as soon as possible and tell him that Gu Jiqing would definitely like it.
Gu Jiqing has never been a greedy person since he was young. This kind of maternal love that comes from his mother’s cautious tentativeness is enough to become a kind of warmth for him.
It was just because he was worried about Yin Lan’s timid nature. If she knew that he was going abroad, she would call him every day and worry about whether he had enough money and what he would do if he met bad students who carried guns and smoked marijuana. So Gu Jiqing chose to keep the matter a secret for the time being.
As a result, Yin Lan heard the news from somewhere. Ten minutes before Gu Jiqing went through the security check, she hurried to the airport with a huge suitcase. After quickly checking in, she only had time to give him a big hug.
“Mom knows that Zhizhi is the best. It was mom who delayed you in the past. From now on, Zhizhi must do everything you want to do. Mom will always support you. Don’t be afraid of anything.”
That was a warm and firm hug.
When Gu Jiqing arrived at the apartment and opened the suitcase, he saw a full container of Lao Gan Ma1A chilli sauce brand., all the rice, homemade chili sauce, and a thick stack of clothes for spring, summer, autumn, and winter.
He picked up a coat and was about to hang it up, but he heard a rustling sound of papers rubbing against each other. He reached into his coat pocket and took out a stack of US dollars in cash.
Not just this coat, not just this one pocket, but almost every piece of clothing and every pair of pants had some small change hidden in it.
Even the socks were not spared.
When Gu Jiqing shook out a pile of cents from the little yellow duck five-toed socks that Yin Lan bought for him, he finally couldn’t help but squat on the ground, fiddling with the pile of coins, and smile with his head down.
He had suddenly come to some real reconciliation with himself.
He thought that people might be learning how to love throughout their lives, but some people are born good at loving, so they can heal others with their love, while others have to learn clumsily and hard throughout their lives.
If Yin Lan is the latter, then Zhou Cibai is the former.
In fact, Gu Jiqing did not have a smooth life when he first arrived at the new school.
Because he was new to the place, there were cultural differences, prejudice and discrimination, different course schedules, and so on, so he often felt out of place. In the first few discussions and research sessions of the group project, he was intentionally or unintentionally isolated.
In addition, there are many geniuses from various countries around him, so the pressure naturally increases.
Fortunately, he has no problem with language communication. When he communicates with others in a nice and gentle tone, there are always many people who have more favor and patience for him because of his beautiful oriental face.
Gu Jiqing also quickly gained the favor of the landlord with his superb baking skills and clean and tidy living habits, and the landlord allowed him to borrow the oven at any time.
Therefore, after attending class parties several times with exquisite and delicious cakes or pizzas and relying on the excellent results in the first test, Gu Jiqing quickly became one of the most popular figures every time a project group was formed.
But the pressure did not ease.
He had to get up at 6:30 almost every morning, eat a quick breakfast, and rush to the classroom or library.
The class time each day was not that much, but the research project he participated in to prepare for the competition took up all his spare time.
It was often late at night when he returned to his host family after finishing his project discussions. He would still continue to study pure English references and professional materials in the small attic with a desk lamp on until the early morning.
Sometimes, he was so tired that he fell asleep on the table. The next day, he got up quickly and washed up, and then another day began.
Boring fast food became his daily menu. Occasionally, when he was not so busy, he would steam a pot of rice for himself, eat up the dwindling bottles of Lao Gan Ma, and finish the meal. This was considered the best improvement in his diet.
Because of the time difference and the fact that they were both very busy, he and Zhou Cibai often only had time to video chat at the turn of dawn and dusk.
Often while video chatting, Gu Jiqing would fall asleep unknowingly to the sound of Zhou Cibai’s voice.
At a time like this, Zhou Cibai would not hang up the phone. He would just put the phone on the stand and then lower his head to continue drawing his drawings. When he was tired, he would look up at Gu Jiqing’s sleeping face on the screen, then smile and kiss him, and then touch that face with his fingertips.
After a long time, watching Gu Jiqing sleep peacefully through the screen became Zhou Cibai’s favorite thing to do.
It seems that as long as they can see each other, they have the motivation to move forward with hope through such hardships.
However, in this kind of visible and intangible relationship, the longing and love are unstoppable.
At first, Gu Jiqing just thought he was not used to it.
But the longer the time went on, the more he realized that it was not because he was not used to it, but because he missed it.
He missed how Zhou Cibai could carry him out of bed, dress him, and coax him to eat breakfast every morning. He missed how Zhou Cibai would drive his car to take him to and from school and shield him from the wind in winter and the sun in summer. He missed the plate of pork ribs that Zhou Cibai would make for him every time he wanted to do something bad with him.
He missed the sweetness in the middle of the watermelon. He missed being able to angrily call Zhou Cibai a fool every night when he woke up from nightmares. He missed Zhou Cibai’s call of “Gu Zhizhi” every time he was angry and helpless.
He missed everything about Zhou Cibai, and his thoughts grew day by day, to the point where suddenly, one morning, he realized that he could only spend his life with Zhou Cibai.
There is no one else, it can only be Zhou Cibai.
So even on Zhou Cibai’s birthday and his own birthday, the two of them could only meet briefly because of their busy studies and various exams, hug each other for a night, and then have to return to their own busy lives.
However, all of Gu Jiqing’s social circles still knew that this beautiful and intelligent oriental beauty had a very handsome boyfriend, and they were very much in love.
Every boy who tried to strike up a conversation ended up failing.
Only a French boy named Cedrian2His name was 塞德里安 in Chinese, and Cedrian was the outcome of my research xD.refused to believe in evil and was determined to pursue Gu Jiqing, sending her a rose every day, more punctually than the professor’s emails.
For this reason, Zhou Cibai flew to the United States and had a fierce fight with him, and then the two of them inexplicably became friends.
From then on, all of Gu Jiqing’s romantic opportunities were blocked by Cedrian.
When Gu Jiqing looked at Cedrian with a bruised face and nose, he couldn’t help but send a WeChat message to Zhou Cibai to ask him what kind of magic he had used.
Zhou Cibai just replied with four proudly and rustically words: [True love is invincible]
There was also a photo of Zhou Zhou, who was still holding his head high and feeling good about himself after having his hair shaved.
Gu Jiqing could only laugh.
Forget it, he was too lazy to care about their dog-world affairs, and he also didn’t need to worry about Zhou Cibai encountering peach blossoms.
Anyway, just like Xia Qiao said, Zhou Cibai almost had the words “My boyfriend’s name is Gu Jiqing” tattooed on his forehead.
Time just passes day by day.
On both sides of the Pacific Ocean, with their respective longings for each other, they welcomed the autumn together, endured the cold winter, enjoyed the wonderful spring, and arrived at another midsummer.
This year, the sales of the picture albums and peripheral products were better than they had imagined. Boss Xiao Jiang was very loyal and increased his share of the profits. Together with some other business authorizations, the bill that Gu Jiqing left with Zhou Zhenbai was basically almost paid off.
By the end of the semester, the transcript was also exceptionally good.
In the Global Mathematical Modeling Contest and the Interdisciplinary Modeling Contest [1], he and two other senior students who were on exchange from China produced satisfactory works and won the Outstanding Winner Award, which is only given to the top 0.14% of teams.
In addition to a $10,000 team prize, their research on how to apply mathematical analysis to construct cost-effective and livable buildings in densely populated low-development areas also received further investment from sponsors.
Originally, the American investors said that if they returned to their country, they would cancel the investment in order to avoid technology outflows. However, on the afternoon of the day when the news came out, related domestic companies extended olive branches one after another.
So after discussing it with the team and with the support of professors from Tsinghua University, they decided to return to China to continue to improve the relevant research.
As the conceptualizer and core computing backbone of this research project, Gu Jiqing will, if nothing unexpected happens, find that this will also be the starting point of his career.
Using Cedrian’s words, Gu Jiqing’s brain is as perfect as his face.
“Gu, you are so outstanding, why don’t you invite your family and friends to attend the end-of-term awards ceremony? They will definitely be very proud of you.”
Half a year later, Cedrian’s originally poor Chinese has become much more fluent.
The so-called award ceremony was actually just a ceremony organized spontaneously by the college. In addition to seeing off the graduating senior students, it was also a farewell to these exchange students.
Gu Jiqing didn’t like crowds before, but he didn’t know when he started to like places with genuine smiles, so when Cedrian sent him an invitation on behalf of the college’s student organization, he didn’t refuse and even changed into a nice formal suit.
July is the hottest season in the eastern United States. The golden sunshine shines on the green lawns. Young and outstanding young men and women, wearing bachelor’s gowns and smiling proudly, calmly accept the glory that belongs to them, and also accept bouquets of beautiful flowers as well as sincere praise and blessings from friends and family.
It looks lively and fulfilling.
Gu Jiqing, standing in the distance holding a cocktail, seemed a little lonely.
No wonder Cedrian asked such a question.
In fact, on the night he received the invitation, Gu Jiqing also called Zhou Cibai to ask him if he wanted to come.
After all, he was delayed from May to now because of the competition. In fact, domestic universities should have been on vacation long ago.
But the person who answered the phone was a stranger, and the background noise was very noisy, with all the sounds of chainsaws and electric drills.
The person who answered the phone shouted in a hoarse voice, “Hello! You must be Mr. Zhou’s wife! I’m the foreman of the construction site. Something went wrong with the project, and Mr. Zhou is busy! Do you want me to call him for you?”
On a hot summer day in July, a young master like Zhou Cibai could have focused on studying for his postgraduate entrance exams or preparing to study abroad, but he insisted on going to the construction site in person. It was obvious why.
Gu Jiqing couldn’t bear to let Zhou Cibai run a trip for him again when he was so busy, so he just said, “It’s okay, no need, I’ll find him later.”
After he finished talking and hung up the phone, the contractor on the other side was obviously still stunned, probably wondering how the phone number that Mr. Zhou marked as “wife” could be a man.
Gu Jiqing was also wondering how Zhou Cibai dared to secretly change the phone number note to “wife” behind his back.
But Mr. Zhou.
Just by listening to these three words, Gu Jiqing seemed to be able to imagine all the hard work and efforts Zhou Cibai had put in this year.
It seems that his big, stupid dog is trying hard to become a domineering boss.
It’s also good.
Otherwise, it would be such a waste of that domineering and scumbag face.
Gu Jiqing thought of his first impression of Zhou Cibai about two years ago and smiled.
As soon as he smiled, Cedrian covered his heart exaggeratedly: “Oh, Gu, you are so beautiful. If your family doesn’t come today, can I give you flowers?”
As the words fell, a boy not far from them opened his arms with a bouquet of flowers. The beautiful blonde girl smiled and jumped into his arms from a distance. Then she was picked up like a cute koala and bent down to kiss his forehead.
Bouquets of lilies of the valley dropped white petals in a shower behind her.
So sweet that it’s a little eye-catching.
So is this how he and Zhou Cibai showed their affection in the past?
No wonder Lu Ping lost 20 pounds in anger.
It’s really enviable.
Because he also missed Zhou Cibai very much.
Gu Jiqing thought about it, leaned back on the edge of the table, lowered his eyelashes, and softly said, “Sorry, I can’t.”
Cedrian showed a look of hurt and confusion, shrugged his arms, and spread his hands. “Why?”
Gu Jiqing smiled: “Because I can only accept flowers from one man.”
He has a big, jealous dog, so he wants to go home to find him with his flowers.
But Cedrian asked, “Is it him?”
“En?”
When Cedrian finished saying this, Gu Jiqing was stunned for a moment.
He looked into the other person’s blue eyes with a triumphant smile, as if he had thought of something, and turned his head back in disbelief.
Then he saw Zhou Cibai, wearing a lead-gray shirt and dark gray suit pants, holding a bunch of bright sunflowers, and looking at him with a smile under a huge ancient oak tree not far away.
His skin color seemed to be a shade darker than before, and he was thinner. His hair was cut neatly short, making his features look sharper and deeper. He seemed to have shed the immature naivety between a boy and a man and become more steady and reliable.
He opened his arms towards him with a smile. “Want a hug, boyfriend?”
Gu Jiqing suddenly felt that the July sunshine in the eastern United States was a little too dazzling; otherwise, why would his eyes hurt a little.
He stood there and said in a somewhat willful and coquettish manner, “I don’t want to move.”
Zhou Cibai also smiled and walked towards him step by step, hugged him in his arms, and said, “En, my boyfriend, don’t move, I’ll take you home.”
After a year, he was able to give Gu Jiqing a real home.
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The author has something to say:
[1] The author’s nonsense competition
