Where the Moon meets the Sun

Epilogue .03

When Yue was born, Shen Zhang Yong felt his heart expand and a fierce sense of protectiveness rise inside him.

She will be loved and protected like no one before her. He would make sure of it.

His wife, however, put a break on all his thoughts of making sure she would never talk to a boy and having her kept under lock and key so she will never be hurt or be taken advantage of.

"She's going to be strong", she told him, "She is going to do everything and anything she wants to do. Boys won't be a hindrance to any of that, you wait and see."

In their first child's younger years, they had a tug of war about how to properly raise her and it was both exhilarating and anxiety-inducing.

He teaches children but true learning for him came in raising his own.

He was strict with her but no one can ever argue that there was any one who looked out for her more.

That changed when he met Dylan.

Ever since Yue pursued acting, he has only met a handful of her friends, and all of them girls.

He and his wife rarely visited her in Beijing so they would only get the opportunity to meet the people she surrounds herself with when they vacation with her in their hometown.

When Yue asked them whether she could invite a friend over for dinner and she mentioned it would be her Meteor Garden leading man, he was very surprised.

He won't forget how absolutely charmed his wife and son were with the young man and how he tried hard to not be charmed too but when he noticed Dylan's small gestures towards his daughter, he knew he stood no chance.

The young man would then shoot a series in Hunan and even without his daughter, he came by their house for visits, especially as he and Yang started to hang out to play those addicting computer games.

For about three months, he became a sort of another child for them and even Yue mentioned that she was getting jealous because he saw her family more than she did.

He would set up video calls with her so she could talk to them or be with them during dinners.

He did it far more actively that even his wife did and he appreciated how much he was able to talk to his daughter through the young man.

"Do you love my daughter?", he asked him once when they both took a smoke after one of the many dinners Dylan had with them.

Zhang Yong could not remember anymore what night that was but he won't ever forget their conversation.

"I do, Uncle."

"Are you trying to gain our favor so you could win her over?"

"No offense but while I honestly think I should do everything to make me worthy of her, going about it by hoping those close to her influence her into liking me may not be the way to win her heart. She has her own mind and knows her heart well. I know she loves all of you but she won't listen to anyone about who she should love."

"Have I told you how I hate that you always answer so well?"

They have an ongoing joke about how Dylan must be a robot who is able to parry every question thrown his way in probably the most perfect manner without ever seeming like it was unnatural of him.