After dinner, Tan Wenjing and Li Haojun took a stroll on the path from the backyard to the solar farm. Apart from the shadow of the backyard of the house, the rest of the path was still under the reflection of the evening sun in the sky. Li Haojun held her hand, this little sister was very attached to herself, and he also cherished having such a companion in this world. Although he had forgotten his previous life experience, but the kind of inner peace and tolerance in middle age makes Li Haojun enjoy the current calm and quiet life. Although he himself sometimes wondered, without the past experience, how did he get the current state of mind? Could it be that it came from the soul?

Thinking about it, looking at the setting sun, a touch of residual red in the sky, and then turning his head to see Tan Wenjing, is with himself looking at the evening sun, such a time, let a person have a kind of forever stay in this moment will not get tired of the feeling.

Tan Wenjing walked, pulled Li Haojun's arm and asked.

“Tomorrow I'm going to Spokane again to exchange data, are you going with me?”

“Didn't I go with you last time too? Why not? Alas? Why didn't I get a notification of the data exchange.”

“Is that so? Maybe the data from your place was transmitted to my terminal as well, it's all in the same area after all.”

“Well, it's possible. So are we still driving tomorrow?” Li Haojun asked.

“No, call a cab.”

“Why don't we drive this time?” Li Haojun asked curiously.

“Because I like ......” Tan Wenjing pouted mischievously.

“Alright, it's good that you like it.” Said Li Haojun wrapped his arm around her waist, his heart lamenting the fickleness and inscrutability of women's emotions. Maybe it was because she wasn't familiar with me at that time? No, no, no, it was because I wasn't close enough to her, so she wanted to drive alone? Now that the relationship is close, she wants to sit in the back with me? It should be like this. Li Haojun tried to analyze this woman's psychology while accompanying her on a walk along the path into the night.

The next day, preparations were completed and a flying car to Spokane was booked. Generally speaking, passenger drones only have a two-person, four-person rated crew, and the two people, Li Haojun and Tan Wenjing, booked it, and depending on the passenger's weight and declared baggage, it could be either a two-person model or a four-person one. But the route to Spokane has only flying cars, meaning that after landing they can still drive on tires and keep delivering customers to the door, perhaps because of the ban on flying over Spokane, or the restrictions of regional laws and regulations.

Of course the price corresponds to the service, and today it's a north-end cab service. The streamlined body with bright yellow base color and black wide line paint distinguishes it from the competition. The large-diameter fuel-efficient tires are contained within the hubcaps, with only the lower end exposing the black rubber tires in contact with the ground. The front and rear symmetrical quadrotors are separated from the crew by a protective cover, and the foldable wings are shrunk to both sides of the body.

Li Haojun was admiring this flying machine when Tan Wenjing followed up from behind. Today, she wore a pair of treasure blue harem pants, white sneakers, a white lace collar shirt on top, and a set of bohemian red and white floral patterned large shawl on her shoulders. Dark wide-rimmed sunglasses, dark hair coiled behind the head, don't have a silver carved hairpin, diamond-shaped crystal earrings, big red lips.

Almost every time you go out Tan Wenjing is refreshing, Li Haojun watched her walk in style, and seems to be a little high and cold, did not embrace, and did not kiss to destroy her big red lips, but helped pull open the back door of the flying car, waiting for her to go up and then followed on the car, closed the door, and fastened the seat belt. It was as if she had become an entourage or bodyguard herself. With the rotation and tilting of the four rotors, the flying car unfolded its fixed wings and gradually entered the cruising state.

Tan Wenjing pulled up Li Haojun's hand, eyes behind the sunglasses looking at him, red lips with a smile at the corner of her mouth, asking.

“Every time I go on a business trip, I have to drag you along and take up your time, are you willing to do that?”

“Why do you ask that?” Li Haojun didn't quite understand, because the words seemed like a rusty relationship.

“Because you were always busy before, and now you seem to be getting back into the swing of things.”

“Oh.” Li Haojun agreed, continuing to listen to her.

“You used to be just always idle, always having your own things to do, unwilling to spend any time on other distractions.”

“Then I used to accompany you on business trips?” Li Haojun calmly looked at Tan Wenjing and asked.

Tan Wenjing spoke, just nodding her head and giving a hmmm.

Li Haojun calmly whispered, “Then I am now too.”

Tan Wenjing's mouth hangs a smile, her hands wrapped around his arm, leaning her head on his shoulder.

Through the front windshield in front of him was the rising sun in the morning, Li Haojun casually pulled up the sunshade between the front and back rows. The golden sunlight shone on Tan Wenjing's face through the gap in the fabric of the curtains, and behind the shadows cast by her dark sunglasses, her eyes were closed as she peacefully enjoyed the flight. Li Haojun stretched his left hand across her back waist, his right hand wrapped around her shoulders, and scrutinized her face.

The speed of flight is always much better than the ground, soon the two arrived at the Spokane city outside the flying car landing site, different directions, routes over the are here in order to land, and then retract the wings, rotors, with tires on the road into the city.

Arriving again at the Chanticleer Tavern, which was still empty of other customers, the pair did not sit at the bar, but took a seat at a small table off to the side and ordered some desserts and sweet white wine to eat while they waited for John.

After a while, with the pop of a Harley exhaust, John arrived, still in his cowboy outfit, still in brandy.

The three sat at a table, first John and Tan Wenjing communicated about the recent situation at their respective factories, then the small talk began, John turned his head and asked Haojun Li.

“Ethan, how are you doing these days?”

Li Haojun smiled and nodded his head, hmmm, and then felt that it was not right, what can't be said, if not a word is said, the understanding of things will run to the side of the privacy of personal life. So he added.

“Quite good, life adaptation situation is much better. Thanks for the concern.”

“I hear you're in charge of the new plant?” John asked again.

“Yeah, I've been doing these things with Tan Wenjing before as well, so I got up to speed pretty quickly, it's all the same kind of production facilities.” Li Haojun replied.

“She used to be the one doing these things with you, you know?” John laughed.

Li Haojun smiled bitterly, “I really don't remember,”

After saying this, the two of them laughed, and Tan Wenjing didn't interrupt, just watched with a smile on the side.

Li Haojun while answering John, while thinking, he is from what channels know that I took over the new factory it, we are level, the company employees rarely contact each other, could it be that the person who left the company he knows?

Is chatting, Li Haojun vision of the rest of the light to see the bar pushed the door in a person, brown shawl hair, trench coat high-heeled boots, elegant gait, the other side also noticed this side of the person, turned his head to look over, the eyes meet, four eyes, is she! Sophie.

Surprised that she will come here, see her only one person, Li Haojun hurriedly got up to greet, invited her to come and sit.

Giving up his seat, introducing Sophie first.

“John, Emily, this is Ms. Sophie Martine, our VIP customer, just visited our Ellensburg factory a few days ago, I was the one who received her.”

“This is Mr. John Weyant, our Montana colleague, this is Emily Qin, same Washington state as me, she is also my girlfriend.”

Hearing him introduced up to this point, Tan Wenjing's somewhat smug expression flashed on her face, being introduced like this by her own partner in front of the opposite sex, especially when the other party was also a big beautiful woman.

When John was introduced, Sophie simply nodded her head, and John only responded with courtesy, unable to tell if they had known each other or not. When Tan Wenjing was introduced, it seemed that Sophie carefully sized her up.

Introduced each other finished, Sophie sat beside himself, Li Haojun remembered the day of the wedding march also feel a little embarrassed, but also in reflection is not the day he made a little too much, fortunately Sophie did not mention this matter in front of their own girlfriends, as a joke told to everyone.

Between conversations, Li Haojun gave Sophie order suitable for women's catering, personally served over, and explained, “Our company colleagues will meet from time to time, I did not expect to meet you here, really coincidental ah.”

But Sophie didn't follow his words, didn't mention why she came here, Li Haojun couldn't be bothered to ask, so he digressed and talked about some company products.

Tan Wenjing didn't say anything, sometimes looking at Li Haojun sometimes looking at Sophie, but more scrutinizing Sophie. John also did not take the initiative to chat with Sophie, only Li Haojun always talk to Sophie, to avoid the cold scene, and she also only selectively answer or cope with a little, but her eyes more drifting to Li Haojun, Li Haojun noticed, of course, he also noticed Tan Wenjing scrutinizing the two of them, so purposely let his eyes to give her more care, so as not to have any ideas.

Li Haojun also noticed that Sophie was keenly aware of the atmosphere between him and Tan Wenjing, so she kept a low profile, with the stability that is proprietary to mature women, and politely finished her food and drink before excusing herself to make an appointment and saying goodbye to leave.

Li Haojun sent her away, came back and sat for a while, John also left, so completing the mission, he and Tan Wenjing also embarked on the return trip.

The two sat in the flying car, Li Haojun recalled the experiences of these days, filtering in his mind what signs there were that could corroborate the intrinsic connection between the interactions between John, Sophie, Tan Wenjing, himself, he had forgotten too much, he wanted to understand the intrinsic connection of the external world. At this point Tan Wenjing shook his arm and asked.

“So you were there to receive that beautiful woman visiting that day, why didn't you tell me?”

“There's nothing important, why bother mentioning it, it might even make you angry.”

“Am I that petty? Do you have a crush on her?”

“No, she's not my favorite type, she has her characteristics, beautiful, but I know very well is not suitable for me.” Li Haojun explained, then suddenly asked.

“Do you think she's a clone?”

“Why do you ask?” Tan Wenjing was a little surprised.

“Oh, I'm just a bit skeptical about this world. Haha, maybe I've forgotten too much.” Li Haojun laughed to himself, not wanting Tan Wenjing to worry because of this overthinking, and turned to ask for other aspects of information, and

“Generally speaking how often did you used to go for data exchange?”

“About a month, the time is not fixed, the length of the cycle is not fixed.”

“Well, do you think the company is monitoring our status? To make sure we provide stable services.” Li Haojun further asked.

“This ......,” Tan Wenjing hesitated, “is not impossible.”

“So maybe Sophie is an incident to try to somehow pull me away from you some. What do you think?”

Tan Wenjing thought for a while, didn't answer, and looked up at Li Haojun again.

“But why did you do it?”

“Because I have a tendency to expand my abilities, in order to protect your relationship with me, isn't it true that I've done this before?” Li Haojun asked seriously and gravely.

Tan Wenjing thought for a moment and said, “You were indeed the same before as you are now,” Tan Wenjing recalled while adding, “In all aspects, work, study, research, and in the way you treat me, you really haven't changed.”

“Well, times have progressed, the earliest drove slaves to do their work with whips, then they used human survival instincts to squeeze, then they used wealth, profit, and power to seduce, and now maybe it's all about utilizing people's wills, or provoking people's wills.” So I wondered if there was a connection behind this series of events.

“Oh,” Tan Wenjing answered, but didn't say anything, just looked at Li Haojun.

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)