CTJM - 19

Chapter 19: Red Light

Wei Chi was someone who carried a certain recklessness within him.

Perhaps it was because he was too young, or perhaps it was because he had a strong family backing that made him fearless—he simply didn’t understand how to read the room or navigate social niceties. He did whatever he wanted, said whatever came to mind, and charged forward without regard for consequences.

“Miss Yin,” indeed, the CBD gentleman was displeased. His first reaction, however, wasn’t to confront Wei Chi directly but to turn to Yin Mengxi with an accusatory tone. “Who is he? Your ex-boyfriend?”

The day had already piled up enough unpleasantness for Yin Mengxi—from seeing Xiao Zhi with Tang Fei during the interview at University A, to encountering Sun Jianbin, Zheng Ze, and Liu Xiaoting back at the station, to the phone call from her mother just moments ago. She couldn’t lash out at any of them, but this blind date was someone she didn’t have to tolerate. She couldn’t find a single reason to endure him anymore. Faced with his questioning, she intended to respond firmly, but unfortunately, Wei Chi beat her to it.

“What’s it to you? And who are you to talk to her like that?”

Wei Chi was already fuming.

“Prattling on with endless questions, can’t you see you’re not needed here? Still lingering around, do you think you’re so charming?”

The CBD gentleman, accustomed to dealing with high society, was ill-equipped to handle someone like Wei Chi, who disregarded conventions and propriety. After being confronted directly, his face turned an ugly shade of red. However, his height—barely reaching 175 cm with the help of shoe inserts—made him reluctant to clash with the taller and more imposing Wei Chi. In the end, he could only direct a parting threat at Yin Mengxi: “I’ll report everything that happened here to your family!”

With that, he stormed off.

Coincidentally, just as he left, the steak they had ordered arrived. Yin Mengxi glanced at it, noting its appealing presentation, and gestured for Wei Chi to sit down with a slight nod of her chin. “Have you had dinner? If not, sit down and eat something.”

As she spoke, she had already picked up her knife and fork.

Wei Chi was utterly speechless. He plopped down across from her, still fuming, and stared at her accusingly. “You can still eat food ordered with that guy? If I were you, I would’ve flipped the table by now!”

Flip the table?

That was something only children would do. Adults had to be more tactful, preserving each other’s dignity.

“What else can I do? Call him back to pay the bill?” Yin Mengxi sighed. “The money’s already spent—don’t waste it.”

She appeared remarkably calm, already halfway through cutting her steak as she spoke.

Her composure only made Wei Chi’s outburst seem all the more misplaced. Frustrated, he took a deep breath and began cutting into his own steak with unnecessary aggression, as if he had some vendetta against cows, hacking the meat into a chaotic mess.

“Why are you even going on blind dates?!”

Unable to hold back any longer, he slammed down his knife and fork midway through cutting and launched into another round of questioning, his voice loud and insistent.

“Fine, blind dates happen—but with someone like him? How can you stand eating with him without feeling miserable?”

In truth, Yin Mengxi had already thought through all the questions Wei Chi was asking.

She had started reflecting on them from her very first arranged blind date: people often said blind dates were like a mirror, clearly revealing how matchmakers viewed your worth. The well-meaning aunties who introduced her to these men likely saw her as deserving no better than what they offered. At 29 years old, it seemed she was no longer considered worthy of higher-quality matches.

Was she angry?

At first, yes. But over time, anger gave way to helplessness. She couldn’t refuse outright, but accepting felt impossible too. So she remained stuck in this awkward limbo, waiting for one side’s patience to run out before it could finally end.

“You wouldn’t understand,” the intricacies of human relationships were too complex to explain, so Yin Mengxi could only brush Wei Chi off with a vague response. “When you’re older, you’ll get it.”

But this only fueled Wei Chi’s frustration further.

“How much older are you than me?” He pushed his plate forward, almost laughing in exasperation. “I’m already 23—you’re only six years older. Does calling me a kid every day make you feel superior? Why do you think I don’t understand?”

“Fine, you’re an adult, you’re amazing, you’re the only one who understands—then why are you letting yourself be treated like this? And why can’t you see that I like you?”

“And blind dates? Even if I’m at my worst, I’m still better than that jerk who just left! If all the people you meet on blind dates are like him, then why not just give me a chance?”

He rambled on in a torrent of words.

Yin Mengxi wasn’t oblivious to Wei Chi’s feelings for her.

Initially, his family had placed him in the programming center for training—a prestigious and sought-after position. She had worked with him for a while, but after the fallout with Sun Jianbin, she was reassigned to the humanities documentary department. Unexpectedly, Wei Chi followed her there, claiming he wanted to learn from her. It was all a smokescreen.

Young men often had courage—they didn’t hide their feelings and weren’t inclined to either. Occasionally, she found such straightforwardness refreshing, but more often, it weighed on her.

“Wei Chi, I see you as a great junior colleague, an excellent collaborator, and perhaps even a good friend in the future,” she set down her knife and fork, looking seriously at the young man sitting across from her. “But I don’t have any romantic feelings for you. Our relationship will only go this far.”

...It was brutally direct.

Though Wei Chi was impulsive and mentally resilient, even he couldn’t help but feel flustered by such a blunt rejection. His heart sank, his eyes dimmed, and he fell silent for a long, long time.

“Have you ever really liked someone? Are you sure you know what it feels like to have feelings for someone?”

It took him about five minutes to find his voice again.

“Maybe you’ve just never thought about it that way… If you tried, stopped seeing me as a kid and started seeing me as a man you could date, maybe you’d realize there’s potential between us—and you’d like me—”

His words sounded sincere, and at first glance, they almost seemed reasonable. But Yin Mengxi knew it wasn’t true.

—She had liked someone before.

She knew what it felt like to fall for someone, to have feelings for someone. That fluttering sensation was overwhelming, stronger than a category ten typhoon. Once it happened, there was no escaping or suppressing it—it had to burst forth before it would settle.

“It’s really impossible between us,” she had to reject him again. “Wei Chi, I know myself well enough.”

“So who do you have feelings for?” Wei Chi’s persistence turned into defiance. “Or who did you like in the past?”

He paused here, his gaze becoming subtle, his voice lowering probingly. “…Teacher Xiao?”

“Did you two know each other?”

“Was he… your ex-boyfriend?”

The mention of the most forbidden secret struck a hidden, tender spot within her. Her failed first love was a wound that throbbed whenever the weather turned foul.

She furrowed her brow, picked up her knife and fork again, and resumed cutting her steak. She speared a piece and put it in her mouth, but it tasted like cardboard.

“So it’s really true…?”

Wei Chi’s voice carried a bitter laugh.

“I knew something was off between you two… He even called you ‘Xiao Xi.’“

“Do you still like him a lot?”

“Were you together for a long time?”

“Why did you break up in the end?”

One question after another—he was prying just as relentlessly as the CBD gentleman he had chased away earlier.

“What does this have to do with you?” Yin Mengxi’s irritation showed as her expression darkened. Suddenly, she reverted to treating him like a subordinate. “Don’t meddle in other people’s affairs.”

Seeing her annoyance, Wei Chi didn’t dare press further—not because he feared his superior, but because he didn’t want to upset the person he liked. After a pause, he tried to save face for himself. “Fine, I won’t ask. I don’t care anyway…”

After a moment, he mimicked her actions, picking up his knife and fork to eat properly. The steak was still warm, and the flavor was actually quite good, but he couldn’t taste anything either. After hesitating for a while, he couldn’t resist adding, “You two probably haven’t been in touch for many years, right? A good horse doesn’t eat grass it’s already passed. You wouldn’t consider getting back together with him, would you?”

“I saw that he has a girlfriend now—the woman who came to see him today… Maybe it’s better for both of you to live your separate lives, right?”

This was yet another sharp blow, landing squarely on the raw wound. Yin Mengxi pursed her lips, her mood sinking to its lowest point of the entire day. It felt as though all the misfortunes of the world were piling onto her, yet she couldn’t lash out. She could only swallow the weight silently.

“Work is the most important thing. Once the project is done, everything will be over,” she said with apparent calmness. “Stop having all these unnecessary thoughts and focus on doing your own job well. That way, we can finish sooner.”

Upon hearing this, Wei Chi couldn’t help but chuckle, realizing that Yin Mengxi was indirectly reprimanding him for the lighting mishap earlier that morning. He figured her ex-boyfriend probably wasn’t much of a threat—after all, she still had the presence of mind to think about work. Feeling slightly reassured, the taste of the steak in his mouth seemed to improve.

“Understood, sis! Next time, I’ll check everything eight times before I go,” he said with an eager smile. “Just watch—I won’t waste a single extra minute!”

After leaving the restaurant, Yin Mengxi drove Wei Chi back to Wuchuan Road. The return journey was particularly congested, with a sea of red taillights stretching endlessly ahead. She was stuck in the middle, unable to move.

While waiting, she casually glanced at her phone and noticed a few new messages on WeChat. One was from Yao Anqi, and there was also a new red dot on her contact list. She opened Yao Anqi’s message first, knowing it was work-related, but was surprised to find only two sentences:

“Sister Yin~ I just confirmed with Teacher Xiao about rescheduling the next interview. He said Thursday afternoon works for him~”

“Also, Teacher Xiao said he wants to add you on WeChat. I’ve already sent his business card over~”

Ah.

This...

A strange feeling suddenly bubbled up from the void. She couldn’t quite name it, but her fingers were quicker than her mind, instinctively tapping on the red dot in her contact list. Sure enough, under “New Friends,” there was a new notification.

The name was still “Wei Zhi.”

The profile picture remained the same cropped section of Travelers by Streams and Mountains.

The verification message was brief, just two words: “Xiao Zhi.”

She stared blankly, as if she no longer recognized the characters. A honk from behind startled her, and when she looked up, she realized the traffic jam had cleared, and the cars ahead had already moved forward several meters.

She quickly turned off her phone and started the car. The red taillights symbolizing “stop” grew fewer, and the road gradually cleared. In about twenty minutes, she would be home.

The world was still the same, and life went on as usual.

But somehow, she felt like she could... finally take a small breath.