Shangguan Yu closed the door behind him and wanted to look at the messages but stopped at the last moment. No, he should do one thing after the other. Since it had likely already been quite some time since Ao Jing sent him the message, a few more minutes wouldn’t change anything. He should first change back and then he could take a look without needing to hurry. Thus, he already came out of the cubicle two minutes later and motioned for his mother and sister to go and pay.

Shangguan Xin raised her brows. "Ah? Don’t tell me you’re already finished? What did he write then?" While she did know the code to unlock his phone and could’ve looked at it when she took the photo, she respected her brother’s privacy. She wouldn’t just read his messages if he didn’t tell her to.

Shangguan Yu just gave a wry smile. "Well, this isn’t really the right place, is it? How about going to pay first and then we can go to eat something? I can look at the messages while we do that."

Shangguan Xin shook her head, not quite understanding how he could withstand even glancing at it. If that was her husband, she definitely wouldn’t be able to take it. Anyway, he would know what he was doing.

The three of them left the store after paying and then looked around in the mall until they found a small restaurant where they sat down to eat lunch.

Looking at her phone, Shangguan Xin sighed. "I can’t believe so much time has passed after just going through two stores. Thank god I’m already married. If I had to pick out clothes for a first date for myself, we’d probably still be here in the evening."

Her mother nodded. "That’s true. Although, you should still make sure that you treat yourself to something nice every now and then. I’m sure that Xiao Lan wouldn’t mind at all."

Shangguan Xin gave her a happy smile. "Of course, he doesn’t. My husband is the best."

Shangguan Yu smiled and took out his own phone, finally opening the message that Ao Jing had sent. Or, well, he should probably rather say the messages. As it turned out, Ao Jing hadn’t texted him only once. No, he had actually sent him a message when he woke up and left for work, and then another one wishing him fun when he went shopping. After a while, he had sent a third message telling him that he shouldn’t worry too much about what to wear since that wasn’t the most important thing.

Especially seeing the last message, Shangguan Yu couldn’t help but smile. If he had seen this before, he probably wouldn’t have worried that much. Now, he just had confirmation for what he had already thought anyway. In a good mood, he texted back.

[I’m sorry for only replying now. I was in a hurry this morning to get to the mall early and didn’t check my phone. Anyway, do you think this is alright for our date? My sister said it’s cute.]

He attached one of the photos that his sister had taken and then send it over. When he did, he couldn’t help but nervously drum on his leg with his fingers. Ah, now, Ao Jing would also see his photo. He couldn’t help but worry. Just what would he think? Would he also feel like he was handsome? Or was he not to his taste?

Shangguan Yu forcefully closed WeChat and then rubbed his face. He really needed to stop thinking about this type of stuff. He would see tomorrow how things went. Until then, he should just try to stay calm. It wouldn’t help anyone if he was always like this.

While Shangguan Yu started to eat with his mother and sister, Ao Jing stared at his phone in a daze. Normally, he wouldn’t check his phone while at work but today was the first exception to that rule.

Since exchanging numbers with Shangguan Yu, he hadn’t been able to help himself and was checking his phone constantly. He was hardly able to put it down for five minutes. At work, he had tried to focus more but it really was hard. The only reason he had been able to not do it the whole time was because Shangguan Yu hadn’t written back after the first message yesterday.

Well, while he might frame it as if that was a good thing, he was actually vexed. Just what was the reason? They had been talking yesterday evening in the game, having a good time, and then Shangguan Yu had left to spend time with his family. That was something he could understand. He hadn’t been happy about not being able to spend more time with him but, well, he also didn’t want to hold him back with things he wanted to do.

Anyway, he had passed his time by going to check out the marketplace again. But after that … It really had been difficult to keep his mind off their relationship. When there still hadn’t been another message when he went to sleep, he had been a bit worried. And this morning he had had a hard time to dare to send out his first message. It had been even harder sending the second one and the third one had been complete torture.

Now, that he finally got a reply, he felt like dancing through the office. And seeing that Shangguan Yu explained why he hadn’t messaged earlier, the weight that had been on his shoulders was suddenly lifted, making him feel as if he could soar through the air.

And then, he saw that photo.

It wasn’t anything fancy. Obviously, he had still been standing in the store when it was taken. But … Well, there wasn’t much that could compare to seeing the love of your life for the first time.

Even if he wanted to, he just couldn’t avert his gaze. This was the type of photo that he inexplicably wanted to print out and hang on his wall in a nice frame. Then, he could take it into his hands every day and look at it lovingly. And some years down the line when they had dated for a long time already, that would be a very fond memory. They would be telling each other stories about how they had gotten to know each other in the game, about how they had their first date, and Shangguan Yu would tell him how he had come to choose that outfit.

Just the image in his head was already very beautiful. It was so beautiful that he really didn’t know how he should pull himself out of it and get back to work. In fact, he just wanted to run out of the building, jump into his car, and drive over to see Shangguan Yu immediately.