Chapter 222: Move Closer

Qinghe hadn’t meant to say quite so much.

With Zhiyi watching him from across the aisle, he became aware of how little space there was between their seats and how easily the others could have heard him.

She didn’t look away or ask him to explain himself. Her fingers rested on the cushion against her ribs while she considered his answer.

"Tomorrow, after breakfast," Zhiyi said at last. "You can come then."

The invitation was so definite that Qinghe smiled before he could think better of it.

He agreed, and she settled back against her seat as though they had arranged something ordinary. He continued looking at her for another moment, noticing the loose strand of hair caught against her collar and the way her expression softened now that nobody was asking anything of her.

Outside, the showroom disappeared behind them. The road widened, and the headlights reached across drifts of dust gathered along the curb.

Qinghe had spent the evening watching hands strike doors and people crowd around vehicles. He was grateful for the empty stretch ahead, although he still found himself checking each doorway as they passed.

Shichen leaned over the map, tracing their route with a finger before turning toward Zeyu.

"The next junction takes us either north toward Luming or east toward Xiling," he explained. "We should decide before you get there."

Zeyu glanced at the rear display and then returned his attention to the road. His shoulders had remained tense for so long that Qinghe wondered whether he realized he was holding them that way.

"I want to go home," Zeyu said. "We can look at the mountain road when there’s enough light to see what we’re driving onto. I’ve done enough guessing tonight."

Nobody tried to persuade him otherwise.

Zhiyi agreed that Luming could wait, and Hanchuan told Shichen to find them a route back that avoided the underpass. The decision took less than a minute. Qinghe let his head rest against his seat as the vehicle turned east, relieved that going home hadn’t required another argument.

Across the aisle, Zhiyi lifted her water bottle. Hanchuan loosened the cap before returning it, and she drank while Qinghe rubbed a hand over his face.

"I’ve been thinking about a shower," he admitted when she looked at him. "Which is ridiculous, considering I never left the vehicle."

Zhiyi’s gaze moved briefly over his clean shirt, but she didn’t correct him.

Instead, she reminded him that he would have time for one before breakfast. The quiet reference to their plans stayed with him long after she closed her eyes.

At Xiling, Qinghe carried the cushions and water inside while Hanchuan brought Zhiyi to their room.

Zeyu remained in the garage with Jingwei, their voices following faintly down the corridor until the inner door closed.

The bedroom smelled of clean linen.

Qinghe put Zhiyi’s things within reach, checked that the journey hadn’t left her with anything beyond the aches she had already described, and stepped back while Hanchuan helped her settle.

For once, he didn’t find another reason to linger. She wanted to sleep, and he had somewhere to be in the morning.

In his own room, Qinghe stood beneath the shower until the warmth eased the stiffness in his neck. He kept remembering the woman carrying the bottles back to her husband.

There had been no shortage inside the vehicle, no difficulty reaching for a drink, yet he had spent hours holding his own bottle without opening it.

He turned off the water before the thought could lead him through the entire evening again. After drying himself, he set an alarm and left his phone beside the bed.

He woke before it sounded.

Breakfast was quiet. Shichen sat over a mug, and Jingwei ate while reading something on his phone.

Qinghe welcomed the lack of conversation. He wanted the ordinary sounds of cutlery and cupboards without anyone asking what he thought about the people they had left behind.

He was finishing his tea when Hanchuan entered with two empty plates.

"She asked whether you’d eaten yet," Hanchuan told him, setting them beside the sink. "I said I’d find out."

Qinghe lowered his cup. He had intended to wait a little longer, giving Zhiyi time to wake properly, but knowing she had asked for him made that seem unnecessary.

"I’ll go and see her," he said, rising.

He almost turned toward the medical room on his way down the corridor. Catching himself, he continued past it with his hands empty.

Without the familiar weight of his bag, he felt unusually aware of his clothes and the fact that he had chosen a fresh shirt rather than the one lying over his chair.

Outside the bedroom, he smoothed a crease that didn’t need smoothing and knocked.

Zhiyi was sitting against the pillows with Zeyu’s wooden box beside her. Her hair lay over one shoulder, and she had folded the blanket back from her uninjured foot. She looked at his hands when he entered, then up at his face.

"You remembered," she said.

"I nearly didn’t," Qinghe admitted as he took the chair beside her. "I’m used to bringing something when I come in here."

She seemed pleased by the admission. He watched her move the box farther along the blanket, making space beside her without offering him a task to fill it.

The room was quiet enough for him to hear the fabric shift beneath her hand.

He had been alone with her often, but usually there had been something to ask or examine. Now he noticed the curve of her mouth when she considered him and had to stop himself from looking at it for too long.

"What would you like to do?" he asked.

Zhiyi rested her hand in the space she had cleared. "You can tell me what you meant last night. You said you wanted to visit more than I knew."

Qinghe leaned forward, his hands loosely joined between his knees. He could have softened the answer into something she already understood about friendship.

Instead, he looked at her and let himself be as honest as she had asked him to be.

"I look forward to seeing you," he said. "Sometimes I finish checking on you and think of another question because I’m not ready to leave. I’ve probably asked how you slept more often than you wanted to answer."

Zhiyi looked down at his hands. For a moment, he wondered whether he had made her uncomfortable. Then she turned her own palm upward on the blanket.

"You can stay without finding another question," she told him. "And you can move your chair closer."