By the time Xiao Liang returned to the city with his father and older brother on the last bus, lights were glowing in every household.

As they approached the entrance to their apartment building, two neighbors walking toward them first spotted Xiao Changhua and Xiao Xiao. Then their eyes landed on Xiao Liang. They stared at him for a moment in surprise before suddenly recognizing him.

“So Xiao Liang’s back?” one of them called out. “See? We always said that kid was honest since he was little—no way he could’ve done something like that! If you’re back, that means everything’s cleared up, right?”

“Nothing happened, nothing happened. What could possibly have happened?” Xiao Changhua replied quickly.

Xiao Liang himself froze for a moment, unsure what sort of rumors had been circulating among the neighbors. His father also seemed briefly puzzled before awkwardly exchanging greetings and urging his two sons into the stairwell.

In his previous life, the family had eventually sold this apartment and moved elsewhere. They’d needed money to smooth connections for Xiao Liang’s case, and they could no longer bear the strange looks from the neighbors. Yet Xiao Liang had spent his entire childhood and youth in this building. Walking into the stairwell now, he felt an unmistakable warmth and familiarity carved deep into his memory.

The four apartment blocks nearby had been funded and built by the Ship Machinery Factory in the mid-1980s, before Xiao Changhua transferred to the municipal government. At the time, Xiao Changhua had been one of the factory’s backbone employees and had been allotted a sixty-plus-square-meter apartment—two bedrooms, a living room, plus a separate bathroom and kitchen.

Even after Xiao Changhua transferred to the municipal party committee, he never changed apartments. Two years ago, he’d been removed from his post after being implicated in the former municipal Party secretary Chen Fushan’s case. Even so, aside from this apartment, the family also owned a smaller unit allocated to Xiao Liang’s mother through her workplace.

All things considered, their housing situation in the 1990s was quite decent.

Still, after graduating, Xiao Liang had been assigned to work in Yunshe Town, an hour away by bus. He usually stayed in the bachelor dormitory there and only came home on weekends. On top of that, he’d attended middle and high school in Shishan County. As a result, his connection to the neighbors here had long since grown faint and distant.

“Is Xiao Liang back?”

Just as they entered the stairwell, his mother Ge Minglan heard the voices downstairs and immediately rushed out of the apartment and down the stairs. She was so agitated that she hurried too quickly; at the turn between the third and second floors she nearly slipped, crying out as she stumbled.

Xiao Liang hurried up and caught her.

Her hair was still mostly black, and the corners of her eyes bore few wrinkles. Yet her eyes were red and swollen with tears. Seeing that, Xiao Liang felt his own eyes grow moist.

Once the door closed behind them, Xiao Changhua couldn’t help scolding his wife.

“You stayed home yet went around talking to everyone about this. Look at the way those people were staring at Xiao Liang!”

“When did I tell anyone anything?” Ge Minglan protested, sounding aggrieved. “I have no idea how the news got out…”

The Chen Fushan case had already shown their family how cold the world could be. In recent years they’d deliberately avoided too much contact with neighbors.

Even if the police had come to the door, Xiao Liang was certain his parents would have tried their best to conceal the situation. It was hard to imagine how, in just six or seven days, the news had spread from Yunshe all the way to the city—and into the ears of their neighbors.

Of course, Xiao Liang had a pretty good idea who had the loose tongue. Judging by the dark look on his father’s face, he’d likely come to the same conclusion—that Tian Wenli’s family had been the ones spreading the story everywhere, giving her a perfectly legitimate excuse to break up with Xiao Xiao without worrying about gossip or moral blame.

“The matter’s settled now. Let people say whatever they want—we can’t control other people’s mouths,” Xiao Liang said, deliberately changing the subject so his brother wouldn’t dwell on it.

He pointed at the table, which was filled with dishes.

“Are these all cold by now? Do we have any liquor? I want to have a good drink with Dad and my brother.”

“You nearly ruined your life because of drinking and you still want alcohol?” Ge Minglan snapped immediately. “From now on, as long as I have any say in this house, no one drinks. Not a drop!”

She had never gone to Shishan herself. For days she had sat beside the telephone, restless and anxious, calling constantly to keep up with the situation. In her eyes, although Xiao Liang had been framed, the fact that he’d gotten drunk had still played a crucial role.

So she had decisively banned alcohol from the household.

Xiao Liang noticed that the bottles of liquor that used to sit in the glass cabinet by the dining table were gone. His mother must have gotten rid of them all after the scare.

In his previous life, after going through that disaster, Xiao Liang had also avoided alcohol for years. Only after the memory faded somewhat did he slowly relax that rule. Thinking about it now left him feeling oddly nostalgic.

Without sitting down, he joined his mother in the kitchen to reheat the dishes.

Meanwhile, Xiao Xiao sat expectantly on the cloth sofa in the corner of the living room. Hugging the telephone on the coffee table, he turned to Ge Minglan and said:

“Mom, I’ll call Wenli over for dinner. She misunderstood Xiao Liang before—now that everything’s cleared up, she won’t have anything left to say.”

Xiao Liang glanced at his father. Xiao Changhua simply turned and walked into the room without a word.

Ge Minglan, however, didn’t think much of it and immediately agreed.

“Good idea. Call Wenli right away. I didn’t know when you’d be back tonight, so I didn’t call her earlier.”

Xiao Liang saw his brother already lifting the receiver. He said nothing and continued reheating dishes in the kitchen.

In his previous life, when Tian Wenli broke up with his brother using Xiao Liang’s scandal as an excuse, Xiao Xiao had been devastated for a long time. Yet even then, he had never once blamed Xiao Liang. On the contrary, he had always encouraged him to push through that miserable chapter of his life.

After reheating all six dishes his mother had carefully prepared that afternoon, Xiao Liang carried them back to the table.

Xiao Xiao was still holding the phone, trying to explain something. Their parents sat silently at the table, their expressions heavy.

Not wanting Xiao Liang to overhear his argument with Tian Wenli, Xiao Xiao eventually put the receiver down and hurried back into his room to continue the call there.

When Ge Minglan reached to place the receiver back on the base in the living room, Xiao Liang smiled faintly and gently stopped her.

The three of them sat by the dining table, quietly eavesdropping on Xiao Xiao’s conversation.

From the tone drifting out of the bedroom, it was clear Tian Wenli remained resolute. Even after such a dramatic reversal in Xiao Liang’s situation, she had no intention of changing her mind. Nor did she deny that the story about Xiao Liang had spread because her family had “accidentally” let it slip.

In his previous life, Tian Wenli had quickly climbed to someone with better prospects after breaking up with his brother. Now it seemed even more likely she had already been keeping two options open. At the very least, that “better prospect” must have started courting her enthusiastically the moment Xiao Liang’s family lost power.

Otherwise, it was hard to believe she could cut things off so decisively when she and Xiao Xiao both worked at the Municipal Economic and Trade Commission.

Worried that placing the receiver back might make a noise that Xiao Xiao or Tian Wenli would hear, Xiao Liang gently set it on the coffee table instead.

Then he gestured for his parents to follow him into the hallway outside the apartment.

“The day after I ran from the accident scene, I called home twice. The second time, I was actually at the phone booth right at the alley entrance. Tian Wenli came out of our place behind Officer Sui and the others. She and my brother argued right there by the booth about me.”

“I saw it clearly—she never believed I was innocent. She’d already been planning to break up with him; she just needed the right excuse.”

“It’s only been a few days, yet the whole apartment building is already talking about my case. Mom wouldn’t gossip about it, and there’s no way the news traveled this fast from Yunshe. On the phone she said her family just ‘let it slip’ by accident… who would believe that?”

He looked at his father.

“Dad… you probably guessed that already, didn’t you?”