There were only two messages.

But I stared at them for almost five minutes.

The first had been sent the night my phone broke.

【Where are you?】

The second came the following afternoon.

【Why aren’t you talking today?】

My brain went blank.

For three months, I had sent hundreds of messages into what I thought was an empty tree hole.

Breakfast.

Cats.

Rain.

Homework.

My fear of presentations.

The annoying onion dumplings in the cafeteria.

Even ridiculous jokes that made me bury my face in my pillow immediately after sending them.

And now…

The tree hole had spoken.

I almost threw my repaired phone across the bed.

My fingers became cold.

My heartbeat accelerated.

I typed a sentence.

Deleted it.

Typed another.

Deleted that too.

Finally:

Tieu Dang Lung: 【My phone broke.】

The reply came in less than ten seconds.

Eagle: 【I know now.】

I stared.

Then another message appeared.

Eagle: 【I thought something happened to you.】

My face instantly became hot.

Why was he worried?

I held the phone with both hands.

Tieu Dang Lung: 【You… read my messages?】

Three dots appeared.

Disappeared.

Appeared again.

Eagle: 【All of them.】

I covered my face with the blanket.

All?

All?!

That meant he had seen the terrible flirting joke about the piece of meat in his heart.

I wanted to disappear from the earth.

As if he could see my embarrassment through the screen, another message arrived.

Eagle: 【The meat joke was terrible.】

I nearly died.

Tieu Dang Lung: 【Please forget that one.】

Eagle: 【No.】

Tieu Dang Lung: 【Why?】

Eagle: 【It made me laugh.】

I stopped moving.

For some reason, those five words made my heart beat even faster.

From that day onward, my silent tree hole stopped being silent.

He didn’t talk much.

Usually I sent ten messages and received one or two responses.

But he remembered everything.

When I complained that the cafeteria dumplings had onions, the next morning he asked:

【Did you find something without onions today?】

When I said I had to give a presentation and felt sick from anxiety, he wrote:

【Don’t look at everyone. Pick one point on the back wall and talk to it.】

When I managed to finish the presentation without running away, I immediately messaged him.

Tieu Dang Lung: 【I survived!】

He replied:

【I knew you would.】

Nobody had ever said that to me before.

Not “good job.”

Not “you’re lucky.”

I knew you would.

Slowly, I began waiting for his replies.

And something strange happened.

Because talking to him felt safe, talking to other people became slightly less terrifying.

First, I managed to order food without rehearsing the sentence five times.

Then I answered a professor’s question in class.

Later, I even went to the student office alone to correct a registration problem.

My therapist noticed immediately.

—You seem different.

I lowered my head.

—I made an online friend.

—A friend?

My ears turned hot.

—Maybe.

That night, I told Eagle about the session.

He replied:

【So I’m medical equipment now?】

I laughed so loudly that Dieu Hi Nguyet looked over from her bed.

—What are you laughing at?

I immediately locked the screen.

—Nothing.

She narrowed her eyes.

Lately, Hi Nguyet had become interested in my mysterious online friend.

Mostly because she had begun regretting selling me the account.

One evening she suddenly asked:

—Has that eagle guy ever transferred money to you?

I shook my head.

—No.

She relaxed immediately.

—I knew it. Fake rich guy.

Then she added:

—Good thing I got five hundred yuan out of him.

I didn’t respond.

Whether Eagle was rich or poor had stopped mattering to me months ago.

Then one Friday, our university announced a charity investment forum.

Several major companies would send representatives.

The biggest sponsor was Jingcheng Capital.

The name meant nothing to me.

But it meant a lot to Hi Nguyet.

She nearly screamed when she saw the poster.

—Jingcheng Capital? Their chairman’s youngest son is supposed to be coming!

Her eyes glittered.

—People online call him the Crown Prince of Jingcheng.

I remembered something.

Five hundred yuan.

“The Crown Prince of Jingcheng.”

I slowly looked at my phone.

No.

Impossible.

That night, I cautiously asked:

Tieu Dang Lung: 【Are you busy tomorrow?】

Eagle: 【Very.】

Tieu Dang Lung: 【Work?】

Eagle: 【University event.】

My fingers froze.

I stared at his eagle avatar.

Then I locked my phone.

Definitely coincidence.

The next afternoon, Hi Nguyet dragged three roommates to the forum hall.

I originally didn’t want to go.

Crowds still made me uncomfortable.

But my professor had assigned attendance credit.

So I sat in the final row, close to the exit.

When the host announced the main guest, the entire auditorium erupted in whispers.

—Please welcome Mr. Lu Jingyan, executive director of Jingcheng Capital.

A tall young man walked onto the stage.

Black suit.

Calm expression.

No unnecessary smile.

He looked completely different from the spoiled rich boy I had imagined.

Hi Nguyet grabbed my sleeve.

—That’s him!

I nodded weakly.

Then my phone vibrated.

Eagle:

【Are you here?】

My entire body stiffened.

I slowly raised my eyes toward the stage.

Lu Jingyan was listening to the host.

His phone rested face down beside his hand.

I typed:

Tieu Dang Lung: 【Where?】

A few seconds later, he picked up his phone.

Looked at it.

Typed once.

My phone vibrated.

【Your university auditorium.】

I stopped breathing.

Another message.

【Last row. White sweater. Red phone case.】

I nearly dropped the phone.

My head snapped upward.

Onstage, Lu Jingyan was looking directly toward the last row.

Toward me.

Then…

he smiled.

Only slightly.

But enough.

Hi Nguyet followed his gaze.

Her face changed.

—Why is he looking here?

I couldn’t speak.

After the event, I tried to escape through the side door.

I had almost reached the staircase when someone called behind me.

—Khuong Dang Dang.

My feet stopped.

Nobody online knew my real name except the account verification system.

I turned around.

Lu Jingyan stood several meters away.

Without microphones and stage lights, he somehow seemed even more intimidating.

My instinct was to run.

He noticed.

—Don’t.

I froze.

He softened his voice immediately.

—I mean… you don’t have to be afraid.

I stared at him.

—You knew?

—Your name?

I nodded.

—After the account ownership changed.

That reminded me.

—Then… why didn’t you answer for three months?

He was silent for a moment.

—Because the person who had the account before you sent me twenty-seven messages asking what car I drove, how many properties my family owned, and whether I could buy her a handbag.

My face burned.

Dieu Hi Nguyet.

Lu Jingyan continued:

—Then suddenly the account changed owners and started telling me the cafeteria dumplings were terrible.

I wanted to dig a hole.

—At first I assumed it was another strategy.

—So you ignored me?

—Yes.

—For three months?

He looked slightly embarrassed.

—I got used to reading them.

I blinked.

He added:

—Then you disappeared for three days.

His voice became quieter.

—And I discovered I wasn’t used to the silence.

My heart skipped.

Before I could answer, someone rushed toward us.

—Mr. Lu!

Hi Nguyet.

She had changed her lipstick and was smiling more sweetly than I had ever seen.

—Do you remember me?

Lu Jingyan looked at her.

—No.

Her smile stiffened.

—I was the previous owner of that WeChat account.

His expression immediately cooled.

—Oh.

One syllable.

Hi Nguyet somehow became excited again.

—Actually, there was a misunderstanding. I gave the account to Dang Dang temporarily.

My head snapped toward her.

Temporarily?

She continued quickly:

—She doesn’t really know how to chat with people, so I let her use it for practice. Since you two already know each other now, she can give it back.

I stared at her.

—But I paid you five hundred yuan.

Her face changed.

—That was just—

Lu Jingyan interrupted.

—You sold her an account containing my private contact information?

Silence.

Hi Nguyet swallowed.

—It wasn’t exactly—

—And now you want it back because you know who I am?

Her face turned red.

Several students nearby had begun watching.

Hi Nguyet looked at me angrily.

—Dang Dang, say something! I introduced you two. If it weren’t for me, would you even know him?

She wasn’t wrong.

But before I could speak, Lu Jingyan said:

—Thank you.

Hi Nguyet’s eyes lit up.

Then he continued:

—The five hundred yuan was probably the best transaction you’ve ever made.

Her smile disappeared.

He looked at me.

—Because you sold the wrong person the right account.

My ears burned so badly I thought they might actually catch fire.

After that day, Hi Nguyet stopped asking for the account back.

Mostly because Lu Jingyan blocked every account she used to contact him.

As for us…

We didn’t suddenly become a couple.

He knew I struggled with social anxiety.

So he never forced me into situations I couldn’t handle.

Our first “date” lasted twenty-three minutes.

We sat in a quiet bookstore café.

I barely spoke.

He drank coffee and read while I stared at the same page of a book for ten minutes.

When I apologized afterward, he looked confused.

—For what?

—It was awkward.

—Was it?

—We barely talked.

He shrugged.

—You talk plenty online.

Then he added:

—Offline, you can take your time.

For the first time, someone didn’t treat my silence like a defect that needed correcting.

Months passed.

I improved.

Not because love magically cured anything.

I still attended therapy.

I still had difficult days.

Sometimes crowded rooms exhausted me.

Sometimes I rehearsed a phone call three times before making it.

But now I knew fear didn’t mean incapability.

A year later, I could give presentations without shaking.

Two years later, I graduated.

After the ceremony, Lu Jingyan handed me a small box.

I stared suspiciously.

—What’s this?

—Your investment return.

Inside was a five-hundred-yuan note.

I looked up.

He smiled.

—You invested five hundred yuan in an online boyfriend.

I laughed.

—The returns seem terrible.

—Really?

He took another box from his pocket.

This one was much smaller.

I stopped laughing.

He opened it.

A simple ring.

No audience.

No dramatic kneeling.

He simply asked:

—Would lifetime returns improve the deal?

My eyes immediately filled with tears.

I nodded.

—A little.

Years later, Hi Nguyet once messaged me after seeing our wedding announcement.

She wrote:

【If I’d known he was really Lu Jingyan, I never would have sold you that account.】

I looked at the message for a long time.

Then replied:

【I know.】

Because that was precisely the difference between us.

She had wanted the man behind the bank account.

I had talked for three months to an eagle profile picture that never answered me.

I didn’t know what car he drove.

I didn’t know his surname.

I didn’t know whether he had money.

I only knew that somewhere on the other side of the screen was a silent person who had become the safest place for all the words I couldn’t say aloud.

And in the end, the five hundred yuan I had once painfully handed over didn’t buy me a rich boyfriend.

It bought me something far more valuable.

A chance to speak.

And somehow, the person who had quietly listened to every word…

became the person who stayed to hear the rest of my life.