“You’re very pretty,” Pei Jie tells me in Chinese. She goes on to gush about something I can’t entirely understand, but I hear the words model, and perfect, and beautiful, and it’s like she’s plucked them straight out of my old dreams for the future. But they’re old dreams for a reason. Abandoned, expired. Once upon a time, I would’ve jumped at this kind of opportunity to prove myself. Now, though, I hesitate.

Before I can respond, Pei Jie holds out her camera and starts scrolling through the photos she’s taken in the past. There are dozens of different styles—girls reclining on velvet couches in crimson qipaos, their lips painted crimson to match; smiling sweetly and hugging bouquets of flowers to their chests; leaning, bored, against a brick wall with lollipops in their mouths, their plaid skirts and button-down shirts designed for an alternate world where school uniforms are actually meant to be flattering; posing against an ice-blue backdrop in a stunning ball gown, pearls spilling down the sides. And though the girls themselves are all completely different from one another, she manages to capture their best features.

“Do you want to?” Cyrus asks me quietly, stepping closer to my side. “Don’t feel like you have to say yes.”

I squeeze his hand, my gratitude too deep to be arranged into words. Even though he couldn’t possibly know the real reason for my reluctance, he still sensed it. “I think it’s fine,” I tell him. “I want to give it a try.”

He scans my face for another beat. “Are you sure?”

I nod and turn to Pei Jie. “Okay, let’s do it.”

“Amazing. I promise it’ll be quick—these photos are going to turn out great.” She starts to usher me forward down the street, waving for Cyrus to follow. “Your boyfriend can watch,” she adds, and then, in a whisper just to me, like we’re gossiping at the back of a classroom: “Zhen shi ge shuaige ya.” Thanks to my exchange with the lettuce seller, I understand the word for handsome in an instant.

“I guess he is handsome,” I allow, neither confirming nor denying the boyfriend comment.

She nods discreetly to the girls in the crowd as they pass Cyrus, many of them doing double takes or elbowing their friends when their eyes land on his face. “You often see girls who are much prettier than their boyfriends, but he’s the perfect fit for you.”

I wonder what she’d say if she saw the girl I was before walking on the street next to him. If she’d still think we were a perfect fit, or if she’d assume, like my classmates had, that I was the one obsessed with him and he was only tolerating my presence.