When the doorbell rang, Zhang Xiaoman was reading an industry report. She was wearing an old hoodie, her hair tied casually behind her head, and on the desk were several open notebooks—these were her work notes from her time at Deep Brain, most of which she had returned upon resigning as required, leaving only these few handwritten ones that she brought out with her. She had been flipping through them for days, trying to further analyze the future direction of AI architecture.
She thought it was delivery.
Opening the door, she saw Li Yunxiao.
He stood at the door, wearing a black windbreaker with the zipper pulled to the very top, looking like he had just rushed over from some very windy place. In his hand, he carried a bag of fruit; the colors of apples and oranges showed through the translucent bag. Fang Xiaoyu stood beside him, the distance between them about the width of a fist, neither far nor close, but that subtle aura made Zhang Xiaoman freeze for a moment—she had known Fang Xiaoyu for over a decade and had never seen her stand next to anyone like this.
"Xiaoman," Li Yunxiao said.
"Why are you here? I heard from Xiaoyu you went on a business trip to Beijing?"
"Came to see you," he said it as a matter of course, as if rushing back overnight from Beijing just to see her was the most normal thing in the world. He handed over the fruit, "Have you eaten?"
Zhang Xiaoman stepped aside to let them in. The living room only had one sofa, one coffee table, and a few pots of pothos that Fang Xiaoyu had brought over. Li Yunxiao scanned the room, said nothing, placed the fruit on the coffee table, and sat on the corner of the sofa, his tall frame not taking up much space.
Fang Xiaoyu poured two glasses of water, handing one to Li Yunxiao and one to Zhang Xiaoman. When handing the water, Li Yunxiao's fingers brushed against the back of Fang Xiaoyu's hand; both of them paused almost simultaneously, then casually pulled away as if nothing had happened, but Zhang Xiaoman saw it.
"Xiaoman," Li Yunxiao put down his water glass and spoke straightforwardly, "Come to Zhiyuan Tech."
Zhang Xiaoman froze. "What?"
"Come to my side." He looked at her, his eyes very earnest. "Whatever you want to do, I will support you. Tech, team, resources—whatever you want, I will give it to you."
"You—" Zhang Xiaoman frowned, "Do you know what my situation is right now?"
"I know."
"Then why are you still—"
"The Mother Matrix can't drag me down," Li Yunxiao interrupted her, his voice not loud, but very firm. He looked into her eyes. "I am not Deep Brain. My company didn't take that money. My board doesn't have those people. I am just me."
Zhang Xiaoman fell silent. She looked at Li Yunxiao and suddenly recalled the last time she saw him—it was an industry forum, he was on stage talking about Zhiyuan Tech's self-developed chip architecture, and the audience was packed with investors. At that time, he was high-spirited, speaking with an unquestionable sharpness. And now, he sat in her cramped living room, wearing an unremarkable windbreaker, holding a glass of plain water, earnestly saying, "I am just me."
She felt her throat tighten a little.
"Thank you," she said, "But I don't want to drag anyone down."
"You aren't dragging anyone down."
"I will." Zhang Xiaoman's voice was very calm, as if stating a fact she had repeatedly confirmed. "The Mother Matrix issue won't just pass like this. Over at Deep Brain—" she paused, not mentioning Lin Zhao's name, "some people won't let me go. If you pull me in, you'll drag Zhiyuan into the mud too."
"That is my business."
"That's not just your business." Zhang Xiaoman looked at him. "You have a team, you have investors, you have hundreds of employees. You can't—"
"I can," Li Yunxiao said, "And I've already decided."
The living room was quiet for a few seconds. Fang Xiaoyu stood nearby, not saying a word, but Zhang Xiaoman noticed her hand quietly drop down, her fingers hooking onto Li Yunxiao's cuff. That movement was very light, almost unconscious, yet also like she was reminding him of something.
Li Yunxiao looked down at that hand, his mouth twitching slightly, but he didn't shake it off.
Watching this scene, Zhang Xiaoman suddenly felt a bit dazed. She remembered that over the past few days when Fang Xiaoyu was keeping her company, she would occasionally look down at her phone, her mouth curling into a cautious smile Zhang Xiaoman had never seen before. She thought it was about work, but now she understood.
"You two—" Zhang Xiaoman looked at Fang Xiaoyu, then at Li Yunxiao, "Since when?"
Fang Xiaoyu's face flushed slightly, but quickly returned to normal. "Not that long."
"How long?"
"Three months," Li Yunxiao answered for her, his tone flat, as if stating a project timeline.
Zhang Xiaoman glanced at Fang Xiaoyu. Three months. That meant it was before the Mother Matrix turmoil, back when she was still at Deep Brain and everything hadn't collapsed yet. Fang Xiaoyu hadn't mentioned a single word to her about it.
Fang Xiaoyu read the meaning in her eyes and sighed softly. "I originally wanted to wait until things stabilized on your end before telling you."
"So you're telling me now?"
"Because you need to know now," Fang Xiaoyu said. "You aren't alone."
Zhang Xiaoman opened her mouth to say something, but found that words felt very light at a moment like this. She lowered her head and saw the bag of fruit on the coffee table; the apples and oranges rested together, their colors so vibrant they hardly seemed real.
Li Yunxiao stood up and zipped his windbreaker back up. "Think about it."
"I—"
"You don't need to answer me right now." He looked at her. "But remember one thing."
"What?"
"You will be okay too," he said, pausing before adding another sentence, "Please trust Lin Zhao."
Zhang Xiaoman's head jerked up.
Li Yunxiao had already turned and was walking toward the door. Fang Xiaoyu followed behind him, looked back at Zhang Xiaoman at the door, her lips moving as if she wanted to say something, but ultimately she just nodded gently and closed the door.
After the door closed, the apartment returned to silence. Zhang Xiaoman stood rooted to the spot, Li Yunxiao's last sentence replaying over and over in her mind—"Please trust Lin Zhao."
He knew everything. He knew about Lin Zhao's silence, knew about Lin Zhao's situation, and might even know what Lin Zhao was doing. When he said that sentence just now, his tone carried a strange certainty, as if telling her a fact she should have known all along.
But she didn't know anything.
She walked to the window and saw a black Defender starting up downstairs, its headlights illuminating the plane trees along the road. Fang Xiaoyu sat in the passenger seat, the window rolled down halfway, the night wind blowing her hair. Li Yunxiao turned his head and said something to her, Fang Xiaoyu smiled, and reached out to roll the window up.
The car drove away.
Zhang Xiaoman returned to the sofa, picked up her phone, hesitated for a long time, and sent Fang Xiaoyu a message: "How far along are you two?"
The message showed as read. After about thirty seconds, Fang Xiaoyu replied with a single phrase: "Serious."
A few seconds later, another message arrived: "Don't change the subject. Think about his invitation."
Zhang Xiaoman stared at the screen and didn't reply. She put her phone on the coffee table, leaned against the back of the sofa, and closed her eyes.
Her mind was a mess. Li Yunxiao's invitation, Fang Xiaoyu and Li Yunxiao's relationship, Lin Zhao's silence, Xiao Zhi's sentence "He hasn't changed"—all the information was like a pile of scattered puzzle pieces; she vaguely felt they should fit together into a complete picture, but she couldn't find the core piece that would tie everything together.
The only thing she was certain of was that Li Yunxiao's last sentence wasn't just spoken casually.
"Please trust Lin Zhao."
He said "Please"—not "You should," not "You must," but "Please."
That was a request.
Zhang Xiaoman opened her eyes, looked at the ceiling, and softly said a sentence, not knowing if she was saying it to herself, or to some unknown ear somewhere:
"I am trusting."