Back Then, I Adored You

He sat on the sofa in the foyer of the hotel, a burning cigarette between his fingers as he talked on the phone.

He didn’t look too good. It seemed that he had just gotten angry. It might have been that the number he called hadn’t gone through. He was so furious that he threw his phone hard on the table. He took two long puffs before he picked the phone back up, pressed on the screen, and raised it back up to his ear.

This time, he looked even angrier than before. When Qin Zhi’ai thought he would throw his phone again, Gu Yusheng looked like he had seen something. He paused and turned around to look at her.

As Qin Zhi’ai was thinking why he was there and whether she should go over to greet him, Gu Yusheng looked down and stubbed his cigarette out in the ashtray. He stood up and walked over to her.

He’s not here to see me, is he? Qin Zhi’ai thought to herself.

Qin Zhi’ai stood still and watched him walking right in front of her. She was too shocked to say anything to him.

“How come you didn’t pick up the phone?” Gu Yusheng still looked mad and sounded unhappy. It sounded like he was blaming her for not picking up his call.

“What?” Qin Zhi’ai asked in surprise, then realized he had been calling her. She wondered if he had come to see her.

As Qin Zhi’ai’s head spun, she saw him frowning slightly. She immediately stopped thinking and explained to him, “After the live show my phone ran out of battery.”

Qin Zhi’ai asked again after pausing for a second, “What were you calling me for?”

“What room are you staying in?” Gu Yusheng didn’t answer Qin Zhi’ai. Instead, he asked a different question.

Qin Zhi’ai looked at Gu Yusheng in confusion.

Gu Yusheng looked up at the clock in the lobby. It was ten minutes to five, which was 12:00 a.m. in Beijing time. Before she answered him, he anxiously took her purse from her hand and started to search for something in it. He took out her room card and took a look at the numbers on it before he grabbed her wrist and rushed to the elevator.

As they stood in the elevator to go upstairs, he looked so anxious that he kept lifting his arm to look at the time. When the elevator door had opened, he grabbed Qin Zhi’ai’s wrist and ran to her room.

He took the room card and swiped it. He pushed Qin Zhi’ai into the room first and immediately followed her into the room. He lifted his arm to check the time again after he closed the room door. There were exactly three minutes left.

To be honest, this was Gu Yusheng’s first time giving a gift to any girl in his whole life. He would be lying if he said he wasn’t nervous.

On the train to Paris, he had been thinking about how to give her the present.

He planned well, but he still became nervous when the time came.

This was so awkward for Gu Yusheng. When he had experienced life-threatening moments in the military, he hadn’t acted like this. Gu Yusheng was organizing his lines in his head. However, they just wouldn’t come out of his mouth.

Seeing that he had only one and a half minutes left, he knew her birthday would end soon if he still didn’t say anything.

The more he worried, the more nervous he became. He was so nervous that his mind went blank, and he forgot everything he was supposed to say. He lifted up his arm and checked the time. There were only fifty seconds left. He bit his lip roughly and took out a jewelry box from his messenger bag. He shoved it at Qin Zhi’ai without even looking at her and mumbled, “Happy Birthday.”