“My mother,” he says, brows rising, “is also very well. She hasn’t undergone any significant changes since you complimented her outfit at the dinner party last month.”
“Itwasa gorgeous dress,” I say. “How’s everything with the company?”
At this, he replies with the kind of readiness and smooth delivery you would only expect from automated messages: “The stocks for SYS have gone up again today. That’s four straight weeks of gains now.”
“That’s so lovely.” I beam at him. “Super happy for you.”
“Yes, thank you,” he replies.
“And now, just out of curiosity, how is your girlfriend?” I ask.
Even though his expression hardly changes, something flickers to life behind his eyes at the wordgirlfriend, as though he still can’t believe his luck. Henry Li and Alice Sun—former rivals, Airington’s two brightest stars before Alice left the school—have proven time and time again to be the only exception to every rule I’ve ever learned about love.
“My girlfriend is wonderful,” he says, with more enthusiasm than he’s used in the entire conversation so far. “She’s perfect.”
“She is. And is she free to hang out this afternoon? I mean, I’d ask her myself, but she’s always got her phone on silent during class, and I know you have her whole schedule synced with yours.” Once Alice had shown me the calendar she and Henry used together. A gift Henry had built just for her at the start of the new semester; everything was neatly color coded, detailed down to the exact minute, and designed to offer positive affirmations every time you ticked something off your tasks for the day. Further proof that they’re an exception. Most guys start scaling down their efforts once they believe the girl is already theirs, but Henry seems to view each passing moment as a new opportunity to remind Alice that he’s wholeheartedly hers.
“Just how much does Alice tell you about our relationship?” Henry asks.
I smile sweetly up at him. “I’m afraid that stays strictly between us.”
“She does tell you things, though. About me.”
“You could assume that, yeah.”
He clears his throat. “And are they of a... positive nature, or—”
Despite myself, I have to laugh. “Are you fishing for compliments? Why not just ask her yourself if you’re so keen to hear her praise you?”
“It would be rather undignified,” he says, adjusting his tie. “But yes, she should be free after five.”
“Amazing. And...” I hesitate. It feels strange to ask for help, even from Henry and Alice. Under normal circumstances, I’d iron out my problems by myself, all while smiling like I’m having the time of my life, so nobody else could guess that I’m struggling. Because It Girls don’t struggle. Future prom queens don’t struggle. They just do everything effortlessly. But these aren’t normal circumstances, and so I force the words out of my lips. “I kind of need your help with something. Can the three of us meet in private? Somewhere nobody can overhear us, I mean.”
His brows knit together. “Is everything all right?”
“Yes. Well, no.” Ares’s face flashes through my mind again, and I suppress a shudder. “I’ll tell you and Alice later.”
“We can meet at my house, then,” Henry says, already unlocking his phone to add the details to his calendar. “My father’s away at a conference and my mother’s at her flower arranging class until after dinner. Would you like me to prepare anything? A whiteboard? Pens?”
In Henry Li’s world, over ninety percent of problems could be solved with a whiteboard and pens. “Maybe some alcohol,” I say, only half joking.
The first time I visited Henry’s house, I’d assumed it was fake.
One of those places you rented out for a photo shoot or a promotional video withVogue. Everything looked a littletooperfect—the traditional Chinese furniture, the crystal fruit bowls filled with fresh mandarins and dragon fruit, even the engineering magazines spread out on the coffee table, which I refused to believe anyone would actually flip open until Alice confirmed that it was Henry’s idea of leisure reading.
The only evidence that he really does live here can be found in the photos lined up along the bookshelf. Multiple high-resolution shots of him receiving flowers and certificates, standing tall and posh like a Burberry model while someone drapes a medal around his neck, lifting up trophies with his name immortalized in gold italics. Lower-quality photos of him and Alice holding hands on the table at a Peking duck restaurant, her face self-conscious and half shy, probably taken when they first started dating. Another photo of them at the park on a perfect sunny day, lounging around on a picnic rug, wildflowers springing out of the grass, and a strawberry vanilla cake misspelled to say, “Happy birthday, Henny.”
There are more photos of his father, the founder of SYS: a dark-browed, bright-eyed man, handsome for his age, with a face recognizable from all the business magazines and interviews he’s done in the past. In one of them, he’s cutting the crimson knot stretched across a sparkling new office building, the air thick with firecracker smoke; in another, he’s smiling and shaking hands with some old, stern-looking gentleman.
“Henry told me we’re having an emergency meeting,” Alice says, reaching for the slippers Henry’s already laid out for her by the entrance. Her high ponytail swishes back and forth as she shrugs off her blazer. It still feels strange seeing her in a different uniform—red and yellow instead of the Airington colors, the iconic tiger crest swapped out for a swan on her front pocket.
Alice Sun isn’t like any of my fuerdai friends. We didn’t meet through our parents, or mutuals on social media, or at a promotional event. If it weren’t for the fact that we were randomly assigned to the same dorm room at Airington—back before I moved home to be there for my mom—our lives might never have overlapped. On her first day at Airington, before she’d even finished unpacking her clothes, she’d stuck a giant poster with only the wordvaledictoriannext to the window. Then, catching me staring, her expression had melted from fierce determination to something softer and sweet. “Sorry,”she’d said. “Is this blocking your view? I can move it.”
“No, no, you’re good,”I’d told her, grinning. I had a feeling then—or maybe it was a hope—that we would become best friends, and though it took a few years for it to happen, I was right.
And as much as I miss catching up with her in class, the change has clearly worked in her favor. These days she stands taller, straighter, like she’s finally settled into her own skin, and the tired circles that used to appear permanently stamped around her eyes have disappeared.
“What’s going on?” she asks me.
