Rebirth 04: Starting from Taking an Unconventional Approach

They went up to the third floor, and as soon as Han Fei unlocked the door with his key, Zhang Ruiyi pushed the door open and went inside.

"It's so stuffy," Han Fei muttered. "It's like a sauna in here."

Han Fei closed the door behind him, pressed the light switch, and turned on the air conditioner.

"Your home is quite tidy," Zhang Ruiyi said, taking off her shoes in the entryway.

"I don't have anything here except books," Han Fei said in the kitchen.

What do you like best?

Han Fei thought for a moment: "Movies and records."

Zhang Ruiyi walked into the kitchen and sat down in a chair. Han Fei caught a glimpse of her out of the corner of his eye as she crossed her legs, moving as nimbly as a cat.

"It's not a book?" she asked. "I thought you were definitely going to say a book."

"Movies and records lie in a more realistic way." Han Fei paused while making coffee.

Zhang Ruiyi giggled and said, "I don't believe your story at all. You make it sound so real. Actually, I think you're a very romantic person."

"Really?" Han Fei said. "Come on, let's go to the living room. I still have a few old albums here."

Zhang Ruiyi gracefully sat down on the sofa. Han Fei played The Beatles' first album and sat down next to Zhang Ruiyi, stroking the rough wooden armrest and listening to the first note of the guitar.

Zhang Ruiyi cleared her throat: "Did you know that Jay Chou will be holding a concert at the stadium in October?"

"Yes, I've heard about it."

"I really want to go; I've never been to a Jay Chou concert before. Will you go?"

"Well, I'm not sure about that time..."

"I told you you'd go!"

"Alright," Han Fei laughed, "I'll go as long as I can still afford the tickets."

"Tell me," Zhang Ruiyi patted Han Fei's arm, "was it a coincidence or destiny that we're sitting here chatting today?"

"Why are you suddenly asking this?"

"Because sometimes I think, if my dad hadn't dragged me to the hospital that day, if you hadn't knocked on my car window, if I had really stayed in the car and slept that day... would we still have met?"

Han Fei paused for a moment, looked up at the window, and saw that the stars in the sky had all gone out.

A strange tremor ran through him, a feeling that something was about to happen. He suddenly realized that, from a moment he had never noticed before, everything around him had begun to change from his previous life. At that moment, he saw a shooting star streak across the sky in a parabolic arc, and thought that if omens truly existed, then this shooting star must symbolize some kind of meaning.

"Probably not," Han Fei said after taking a sip of coffee.

"So honest?"

"Didn't you want to hear the truth?" Han Fei smiled. "If you hadn't gotten out of the car that day, I probably would have gone back to report to Uncle Zhang that your daughter didn't want to eat breakfast. Then we would have gone our separate ways. You would have continued to complain that your dad was too controlling, and I would have continued to worry about my publishing house. We wouldn't have crossed paths again."

Do you believe in fate?

Han Fei took a breath before speaking: "I didn't believe it before, but now I think fate is like a map. The map marks the roads, the mountains, and the rivers. Where you are born, where you are going, and what obstacles you will encounter along the way are all marked there. It's just that whether you take that road, whether you go fast or slow, and whether you go around the river or swim across it, is your own business."

Zhang Ruiyi's pupils were like the dark, bright sun.

"What if you're walking along and you find that there's a wrong path on the map? Or what if you've taken a path that's not on the map?"

Han Fei smiled slightly. The question was too precise, so precise that it left him somewhat dazed. He was the one who walked outside the map. Someone who had already traversed it once before, now standing at the starting point again, clutching an old map that no one had ever seen before.

"That might be a loophole in fate," Han Fei said.

"A loophole in fate?"

"Hmm. For example, you avoided the place where you were supposed to fall, you seized the things you were supposed to lose, and you met the people you were supposed to miss. What about you? Do you believe in fate?"

Zhang Ruiyi shook her head: "I don't know. But sometimes I feel that the 'leak' I see might be the opening that fate has left for me."

"leak?"

"Yeah, sometimes I suddenly feel something." Zhang Ruiyi chuckled, then fell silent and blushed. "It's... a very clear feeling, like certain people are destined to appear in my life."

Zhang Ruiyi took Han Fei's hand. Han Fei watched as her small hand tightly grasped and stroked his large one. The music from the CD player had stopped sometime earlier. It was extremely quiet now, and Han Fei could hear his blood rushing through his ears like a waterfall.

"I just saw a shooting star," Han Fei said. "I've heard that shooting stars bring good luck."

Zhang Ruiyi nodded quietly, stretched out her arms to hug his neck, and he could feel her heart racing.

"Don't you feel," Zhang Ruiyi said softly, "that our meeting wasn't just a coincidence?"

"have."

The warmth emanating from her body, the light in her eyes, gave Han Fei an unreal sense of happiness, as if he were in a blissful dream, and he didn't want to wake up from the impending future. But he had to wake up.

Zhang Ruiyi's phone rang.

"Oh, it must be my mom." Zhang Ruiyi let go of Han Fei. "Because my dad isn't here today, she's all alone..." She took out her phone and stood up. "I'll go answer it."

Zhang Ruiyi went to the balcony to answer the phone. When she returned, Han Fei was already standing in the entryway, having put on his shoes.

"My mother..." Zhang Ruiyi began.

"It's getting late," Han Fei said. "With Uncle Zhang gone, you'll be the only one keeping your mother company."

A slight smile crossed Zhang Ruiyi's face: "It's a pity I haven't had time to drink my coffee yet."

"It's alright, we can do it next time," Han Fei said. "Let's go, I'll see you off."

At three in the morning, Han Fei was still sitting on the sofa. Tom Waits was singing Alice in his deep voice, accompanied by the crackling of a snare drum.

Han Fei's mind was racing.

The phone emitted a short buzzing sound, indicating that a text message had been received.

Han Fei picked up his phone and glanced at it, then frowned, wondering if everyone was having trouble sleeping tonight.

The text message was from Zhang Qiming, asking him to call back immediately after seeing it. Han Fei dialed Zhang Qiming's number.

"Uncle Zhang, why aren't you asleep yet?"

"Han Fei, did I wake you up?" Zhang Qiming chuckled a few times. "Well, I've arrived in the capital and am preparing for tomorrow's headquarters meeting. I've been so busy these past few days that I'm completely overwhelmed, and I left in such a hurry this morning that I didn't have time to ask you for anything."

"Are you asking me for something?"

"Yes, your project was very successful, but it's still in its early stages. To be honest, you're like a child carrying a piece of gold on a dark road. Who knows how many eyes are lurking in the shadows? Tomorrow at the quarterly strategy meeting, I need to give a key report on your project and request support from headquarters. Otherwise, what will you use to defend yourself when those big companies with lots of manpower and money start targeting you?"

Han Fei jumped up from the sofa, overjoyed to the point that he could hardly speak in a normal tone.

"This is a real lifesaver, Uncle Zhang! I'll go get it right away!"