4

The next day, Wen Fu got up with a gray face.

Actually, he'd woken before the alarm. Wen Fu had dozed off for two hours, opened his eyes, checked the time — six forty. Still dark outside.

He got out of bed barefoot, stepped onto the floor, walked to the window like he was being pulled there, and on some impulse yanked the blackout curtains open.

Thick fog in the early morning. Looking out the window, everything was hazy, like a sheet of smoke stretched across the view.

Wen Fu looked up at the moon, then dropped his gaze — and suddenly spotted someone in the garden below.

Through the fog, it was a blurry figure, sitting motionless on a bench. Far from Wen Fu's window. Pitch dark out there, only the halo of one streetlamp on the Residential Complex road lighting anything up.

If you weren't looking carefully, that little shadow almost dissolved into the dark, part of the night itself.

But Wen Fu recognized Fei Bolin at a glance.

Same outfit as yesterday. Head tilted slightly up, looking at Wen Fu's window. The gold-rimmed glasses caught a faint glint of light. As if the guy had never gone home, just sat down there all night facing Wen Fu's room.

Probably hadn't expected Wen Fu to suddenly throw open the curtain and look down. When their eyes met, the figure on the bench visibly stiffened.

Wen Fu froze for a couple seconds, blinked, then turned and ran downstairs.

No shoes. He took the private elevator down — half a minute tops — but by the time he stepped outside, the bench was empty.

A cold wave of wind hit him, pouring down the collar of his pajamas. Cold seeped through the floor tiles into the soles of his feet. Wen Fu breathed a puff of white into the fog and figured he must be hallucinating from sleep deprivation.

His Residential Complex was low-density, low-rise buildings, big gardens between every block, one household per elevator, heavy greenery, tight security — no one who wasn't a resident could get in. Fei Bolin couldn't have just appeared out of nowhere.

A few years back, Wen Fu had been renting a regular apartment complex outside the Third Ring Road. These past two years, with the stalker fans ramping up, he'd finally caved to Stella's insistence and moved here.

He was only wearing a single layer of cotton-linen pajamas. Now that he was coming back to himself, he felt the cold.

Just as he was about to head back, the phone in his hand buzzed.

Alarm first, then Zhou Ji's call came right after.

Wen Fu put it to his ear, looking down at his reddened toes, voice low: "Hello?"

A warm voice on the other end: "Wen Fu, you up?"

Zhou Ji was only a year older than Wen Fu, but he'd been in the industry way longer — started as an assistant right out of vocational college. Wen Fu wasn't his first artist, wasn't even his most famous one, but he was the one paying the highest salary.

In their line of work, a personal assistant was the least valuable job around. Slaving for a top-tier star, you'd top out at three or four thousand a month, no social insurance, no housing fund. But these past few years with Wen Fu, Zhou Ji was pulling in around two hundred grand a year.

Wen Fu was frugal with himself, but generous with the people around him. Like the money he made as an idol only existed to keep himself fed.

And even that bar was low — a pack of instant noodles was enough for Wen Fu.

The extra money? Wen Fu had no use for it. Either the company took its cut, or he handed out year-end bonuses to the team, and whatever was left over went straight to disaster relief.

Zhou Ji had been around the scene for years. First time he'd ever seen someone in the fame-and-money game who genuinely didn't care about the money.

Stella had hinted once: "Don't you want to save up, buy a place or something?"

Wen Fu just shook his head. Didn't seem to have any plans to settle down.

Fei Bolin hadn't been found yet. He didn't know where he was supposed to live.

Zhou Ji yawned on the other end: "I'm heading out, about thirty minutes to your place. Get yourself together and come down. Temperature's dropping today, layer up — need me to bring you anything?"

Wen Fu stepped into the elevator, thought for a second: "Coffee."

"Got it."

After hanging up, Wen Fu went back inside and sneezed.

He stood in the entryway in a daze for a bit, then decided to take a hot shower while he still had time.

He'd barely slept at all last night, plus nothing to eat or drink this morning. By the time he got out of the shower, he didn't even notice his steps had gone a little floaty.

He pulled on the down jacket he'd set out last night — black jeans, canvas shoes, same as always — threw on a cap and mask, and walked out the door in a daze.

The moment he got in the car, Zhou Ji handed him a steaming bowl of burning-noodle: "Eat up. Dai-jie's not here, I snuck out and got this for you."

Then he stuffed the coffee into Wen Fu's hand.

Wen Fu tipped his head back and downed half the coffee first.

Zhou Ji couldn't help but remind him: "Eat first. Don't chug the coffee like that."

He was technically an assistant, but most of the time Zhou Ji looked at Wen Fu more like a little brother.

Not just him — everyone on the team felt that way after spending enough time with Wen Fu.

Wen Fu didn't talk much. Once you got to know him, you'd realize his isolation wasn't baseless. He had no friends in private life. His phone contacts were nothing but the company and the team. Even parents — that kind of role had never shown up in Wen Fu's life.

Nobody said anything, but everyone noticed. The curious ones had quietly asked Stella, who clammed up on the topic. Plus Wen Fu was careless about daily life — kind of just winging everything. Hungry? He'd grab whatever. Cold? He'd throw on random layers. Like showering on an empty stomach, chugging coffee when tired, hearing the temperature dropped and just pulling on the thickest down jacket he owned... on and on. Someone had to remind him that things have an order, a sequence. Clearly no one had ever taught him as a kid.

Nobody wanted to use the word, but Wen Fu was, plain and simple, a life idiot.

Over time, everyone got used to it. They kept an eye on the small stuff so he wouldn't muddle through every day completely clueless.

Wen Fu obediently put down the coffee and picked up the noodles.

Then he lifted his chopsticks, opened his mouth, and inhaled like he was starving.

Zhou Ji: "..."

Zhou Ji pressed a hand to his forehead and sighed: "Slow down. It's a half hour to your School. Good thing Stella's not here, she'd see this and start yelling. How do you never fix this habit?"

Wen Fu said nothing, head down, just kept eating.

When he finally lifted his face from the bowl, Zhou Ji glanced over and felt a vein start throbbing in his forehead.

Wen Fu, confused: "What?"

Zhou Ji: "Did the noodles hit you?"

How does someone get oil splashed on the corner of their eye from eating noodles?

Did he fight the noodles?

He grabbed two tissues with a couple quick pulls, wrapped them around his fingertips, and reached toward Wen Fu: "Don't move."

Wen Fu had been leaning back to dodge, but the moment Zhou Ji said it, he froze.

When Zhou Ji's tissue-wrapped fingertips dabbed at the corner of his eye, Wen Fu turned his face slightly away, lashes trembling once, twice, beyond his control.

Zhou Ji thought, as he wiped: little butterfly.

He laughed: "When you blink like that, your eyes look kinda like your tattoo."

Wen Fu didn't catch it: "What?"

Zhou Ji pulled his hand back: "Nothing. Still a bit to go before School, get some more sleep."

Wen Fu said: "Not sleeping."

He finished off the last of the coffee. His energy finally dragged itself back up a notch.

Zhou Ji watched him for a while: "You look paler than usual. Didn't sleep well last night?"

Wen Fu pressed his forehead against the car window, lowered his lashes, and gave a barely-there 'mm.'

"Insomnia?" Zhou Ji asked. "What were you thinking about?"

Wen Fu didn't answer.

Silence in the car for a moment. The sky was starting to lighten, looking like it might rain but wouldn't commit.

Zhou Ji eyed the sky, twisted around to the back seat, dug through a bag looking for an umbrella for Wen Fu.

Wen Fu rolled down the window, faced the wind, and suddenly asked: "Will it snow?"

"Snow?" Zhou Ji laughed, still digging through the bag. "You ask this every winter. Jin City is the south, not the northeast. It's not that easy to snow here."

The car pulled up to the Chuan Da University gate. The sky had cleared again. Zhou Ji had to put the umbrella away and nag at Wen Fu: "School's crowded, I'll wait outside. Call me when you're done with your meeting."

Wen Fu got out of the car, nodding.

"And..." Zhou Ji grabbed his arm, opened his mouth, wanted to warn him about the stalker fans tailing him, but figured reminding him wouldn't do much good, so he let go again. "Forget it. Go to class."

The group meeting ran three hours — mostly the advisor going over project proposals and papers due over winter break. Just before noon, the meeting wrapped up, and Wen Fu hadn't even made it out of the Management Studio when he got a text from Zhou Ji.

[New Era: Class done?]

[Little Sis: Done]

The next second, Zhou Ji was calling.

Wen Fu picked up. Before he could say anything, Zhou Ji was already talking fast: "Don't come down. The stalkers are blocking the entrance. Wait for me to come up."

Zhou Ji took the stairs two at a time, panting, dragged Wen Fu toward the bathroom, and started stripping the moment they got in: "We swap clothes. I'll walk out in yours, you follow behind. When you see them chasing me, you run the other way. I'll bring your clothes back tonight."

Wen Fu swapped clothes in a daze, still hadn't come back to himself, when Zhou Ji took his cap and put it on his own head.

The second the cap came off, Wen Fu's flattened-down hair sprang up in every direction.

Zhou Ji: "..."

How does someone wake up with hair like this every single day.

Wen Fu, clearly oblivious to anything being off: "Aren't we going?"

Zhou Ji took a couple steps toward the door, couldn't help himself, turned back, reached for Wen Fu's head.

Wen Fu's first instinct was to dodge. Zhou Ji said: "Don't move."

Wen Fu stopped and let Zhou Ji smooth his hair down a couple times.

Still a mess, but at least it looked better than before.

"If you just paid a little more attention normally, you'd get yelled at by Dai-jie a little less." Knowing it was pointless, Zhou Ji still couldn't help nagging.

The two of them, masked up, walked downstairs one behind the other. Zhou Ji spotted where the stalkers were, shot a look back at Wen Fu, and then broke into a run through the crowd of students.

Sure enough, the four or five stalkers immediately took off after him.

Wen Fu, while they weren't looking, took off running toward the other School Gate.

The second Wen Fu started running, the stalkers who'd been chasing Zhou Ji for ten meters figured out something was off, and immediately pointed at Wen Fu's back: "That's him!"

The whole group swerved and went charging the other way.

One of the girls even turned back to curse at Zhou Ji: "F*** you!"

Most sasaeng fans were female fans, young, with questionable character and extremely immature minds. All they thought about wasn't studying but stalking artists' private schedules, chasing and intercepting them in various public and non-public settings, causing huge trouble for the artists' personal lives.

A few years back, the top-tier actor under Stella who'd transitioned from idol had been chased to his hotel by stalkers, who hid under his bed and in his closet to steal his clothes. Artists getting their phone numbers doxxed and receiving harassment calls and random knocks on the door at 3 AM was just daily life.

Wen Fu hadn't run into this stuff before, but these past two years, with his popularity skyrocketing, the stalkers had gotten bolder too.

The thing was, the ones doing this were mostly wealthy underage girls — otherwise they wouldn't have the spare cash and time to chase schedules all over the country. Even if the artist called the cops, at most they'd get a verbal warning. Most stalkers came out of that with zero intention of changing, and would escalate or even retaliate.

Stalking was a one-sided bullying. The artist and the team had no choice but to swallow it.

These hard lessons had been learned by Stella's team from the artists they'd managed before. So by the time Wen Fu ran into stalkers, the team had already mastered all kinds of ways to help him dodge them — though 'dodge' was all they could do. Striking back wasn't an option.

Good thing Wen Fu was a hell of a runner. From childhood on, aside from professional athletes on TV, nobody he'd ever seen could outrun him.

By the time those stalkers chasing Zhou Ji figured out something was off, Wen Fu was long gone.

Two blocks past the School was a commercial building. Lunch hour, traffic everywhere. Wen Fu ducked inside without thinking.

He'd eaten here with Zhou Ji before, so he knew which floor had restaurants. He was hungry anyway, so he skipped the elevator and took the escalator up — less chance of running into stalkers or getting recognized in an elevator car.

But no sooner had he reached the third-floor corner than he ran into Fei Bolin again.