The Heart That Drifts Away ‘SEE YOU MORNING’ 153 All Living Beings

Arriving at the office in the morning, only Jin Yan was there. Lin Yuhui knew him fairly well, because he often brought his children to work on weekends, and sometimes Lin Yuhui would play with them for a while.

As soon as Lin Yuhui came in, Jin Yan started complaining.

“Don’t you think he’s sick?”

“Huh? What’s wrong?”

“Just because I didn’t hold the door for him, he grabbed me and lectured me for ages.”

Oh, Lin Yuhui knew who he meant. His own company shared an office with Sinosteel Group. He often ran into that man as well. He was quite old, but always neatly dressed, with a tidy hairstyle. His bearing and appearance made it clear he was a leader there.

Every time Lin Yuhui saw him, he would hold the door for him, whether the man was on the other side of the glass door or behind him. Not because he was the big boss here, but simply because Lin Yuhui respects his elders. He was raised by his grandparents, and all the love in his childhood came from them, so he naturally developed the habit of respecting older people. As long as the elder wasn’t going too far, he would always give them face.

“He was still far away, just because I passed through the door and didn’t leave it open for him – who would have seen him?”

“Well, what can you do? State-owned enterprise leaders get spoiled,” Lin Yuhui said, helping Jin Yan vent and calm down, while secretly laughing to himself. In his heart he thought, I’m the one who spoiled him.

Because when Lin Yuhui first arrived here and didn’t even know who he was, he still held the door for him, every time they met. He had a good impression of that leader – he often saw him walking outside the office, smoking, discussing work with others, always dignified. And the leader’s rule that female employees were not allowed to wear shorts or revealing clothes – Lin Yuhui fully agreed with that.

Once, Lin Yuhui opened the door to go out, turned and saw the man far behind him, so he held the door fully open, waited for him to come through, then closed it.

So it seemed there was a certain affinity and preference between people.

But when he saw Cerise, he felt a little tightness in his chest. Even though he was trying to gradually remove Cerise from his world, her figure and voice still drew his attention. So Lin Yuhui controlled himself, trying not to look at her.

At the project kickoff meeting, the boss was not present. It seemed he wanted the young people there to take the lead, while he participated remotely via video.

Cerise was under Stephanie, the project manager, so chairing the kickoff was part of her responsibilities. Only Lin Yuhui worried that her qualifications and knowledge were not enough to bear the corresponding responsibility. But fortunately, other professionals were present, and with everyone watching, there wouldn’t be any major problems.

Of course, there were both key professionals and fresh blood. The young people were all busy crowding around Cerise.

Lin Yuhui truly could not understand what those young men wanted – “It doesn’t matter if it lasts forever, just having it once is enough”? So he just watched the noise of the mundane world from afar – those dramas driven by hormones and vanity.

In the heat exchanger design and selection, Lin Yuhui was the lead for the specific technical work. Although he sat aside and rarely spoke, he would add emphasis whenever technical parameters, materials, or mechanical structure details were wrong or inaccurate. On one hand, it was his duty; on the other, he didn’t want Cerise to take the blame for things she didn’t understand. Whether Cerise noticed his thoughtfulness was unclear, but when he checked whether Cerise had put his emphasized points into writing, he saw Mu Shangzhi looking at him with a sly, smiling expression – obviously he had noticed something.

Mu Shangzhi was an original veteran of the company and a smart man. He shared the same office with Lin Yuhui and Cerise, so he certainly knew the whole process – how Cerise had been shouting in the office every day about finding a partner, and how Lin Yuhui had gone from rejection to contact, and now to a return to calm, yet still with some lingering feelings.

After the meeting, back in the office, Lin Yuhui couldn’t stop thinking about the work instruction for purchasing flanges mentioned during the meeting. But to buy the correct flanges, it’s not just about material and nominal diameter; pressure rating and execution standards also matter. After a moment’s thought, he wrote a note and handed it to Cerise.

“Regarding the flange purchase mentioned by Shanghai, it’s actually not complete. I think these details should also be noted. Do you dare to add them in?”

Lin Yuhui was very polite, letting her choose what to do. He just asked if she dared, not saying “you should”.

Cerise looked at the content and smilingly refused.

Lin Yuhui noticed that she had previously imitated his note-taking and would look things up online when he mentioned something new. But when he brought up boring professional knowledge, she showed no interest in learning more, nor any willingness to learn from him. So Lin Yuhui already knew clearly whether she was suitable for him, both in life and at work.

In the afternoon, Lin Yuhui’s phone rang. He had chosen a song by Fei Yuqing as his ringtone, using an audio editing software to capture his favorite segment: “Life is like duckweed, gathering and parting without pattern; why must we long for each other day and night…”

“Hello, I’m from the Changyi CDC. May I ask if you have received the COVID-19 vaccine?”

“No, I have heart disease – coronary artery stenosis and congenital myocardial bridge.”

“Oh, I see.”

“Yes, even a common cold virus infection would seriously affect my heart, so a vaccine reaction could kill me.”

“Oh, alright then.”

“Mm, alright.”

After hanging up, Lin Yuhui vaguely felt that the epidemic situation might be getting more severe. Now both his workplace and hometown were promoting vaccination. He had an inexplicable sense of unease.

He began to think that if stricter epidemic controls were implemented, would it impact his normal life? Because he relied on many food and drug supplements to maintain his life, and he slept poorly, but heart problems are worsened by lack of sleep.

And all these material needs were available at his home. Moreover, as he had told the boss, he only needed to intern at the company for half a year, mainly to get familiar with the company’s software and business relationships – in that regard, he was progressing very quickly.

Around Lin Yuhui in the office, Dylan was still driven by his base desires, hitting on Stephanie and Cerise – one a married woman, the other an unmarried girl.

What Lin Yuhui couldn’t understand was: if Stephanie responded to him to maintain her work relationship, then Cerise had absolutely no reason to entertain this guy. Did a man’s flattery really elevate one’s own status? Lin Yuhui even felt that Cerise lowered herself by exchanging pleasantries with Dylan.

Dylan was an extremely selfish, alcohol-and-lust greedy creature. Lin Yuhui had seen through him in no time, from the few work interactions they had. He would flirt and chat with the women in the office, yet for his own comfort, he would turn the air conditioning down low and let the women freeze. So Lin Yuhui avoided interacting with someone of that character as much as possible.

Among the crowd, he seemed like an existence isolated from the world, living in his own space, following his daily routine every day, without exception.

The same routine: after work, go to the cafeteria for dinner. In this low-latitude region, even at five in the afternoon, the sun was still high. It shone through the western floor-to-ceiling windows into the cafeteria, illuminating rows of tables and chairs. The chair backs and table corners glinted. For a moment, Lin Yuhui suddenly realized that this was the scene from his earlier dream.