Chapter 1 Yuxiang Gardenia
During the rainy season when Su Miao was six years old, there was a layer of moss floating at the entrance of the alley with peeling walls. She squatted on the bluestone floor holding a rusty iron box containing glass marbles, watching ants line up to carry gardenia petals that had been knocked down by the rain.
The mottled vermilion-painted courtyard door next door suddenly creaked. The boy in a white shirt came out holding a stack of old books. The corners of the books wrapped in brown paper were stained with dark water. There is mist on his eyelashes, like the white porcelain Guanyin worshiped in the ancestral hall at the end of the alley.
"Hey!" Su Miao jumped up and blocked the way, and the marbles in the tin box jingled. In the open palm lay two White Rabbit toffees that had been melted by body temperature, and the candy wrappers were stuck in the palm prints. "My mother said that children who don't share them with neighbors will be struck by lightning."
Jiang Yan took half a step back, revealing his clear eyes behind a pile of old books. He looked at the twisted rabbit pattern on the candy paper, and his Adam's apple slid gently on his thin white neck: "It's about accumulating virtue, not being struck by lightning."
The raindrops slanted across Daiwa, and Su Miao stood on tiptoe and stuffed the candy into his breast pocket. Jiang Yan froze like a newly carved statue on the bluestone, with a sticky sugar mark on his white shirt. The sound of an old-fashioned clock chiming in the distance made him startled. The old books in his arms fell into the water, and the fragrance of ink floated between the yellowed pages.
Later, Su Miao found out that this little boy was named Jiang Yan and he was the young master of the Jiang family. Jiang Yan was so early-witted that he was almost lonely. He could recite "Enlightenment of Rhythm" at the age of five, and he could solve Mathematical Olympiad problems at the age of seven. However, he knew nothing about the world.
Once, Su Miao secretly stuffed a strawberry hairpin into Jiang Yan's schoolbag. She thought Jiang Yan would like this hairpin very much, but three days later, she found the hairpin in her homework book, with a neatly written note beside it: "It seems to be a lost item, please claim it."
Intention: His name is Jiang Yan, he is my sweetheart and the person I like.