After tossing about, the two quietly finished their meal.
Yan Xun cleared the table and, under Chu Tingyun’s guidance, placed the used tableware into the dishwasher.
“There, press that button.”
Ding—
With a soft chime, the dishwasher—that glowing beacon of human technology—began to heat up and get to work.
Yan Xun thought to himself that this rented apartment was indeed quite nice. Although the decor looked a bit dated, the furniture, home appliances, and kitchenware were fully equipped and brand new.
“I’ll go take a shower first.”
Chu Tingyun’s tone was so utterly natural that Yan Xun, who was currently crouching on the floor inspecting the dishwasher, subconsciously nodded.
“Mm, okay.”
Only after the words left his mouth did he process what they meant.
But by then, President Chu had already familiarly headed to the bedroom, grabbed his pajamas, and gone into the bathroom to shower.
Click.
The bathroom door was locked from the inside. Shortly after, the sound of splashing water echoed out.
“…”
Yan Xun blinked slowly. The small amount of alcohol had slowed his brain down, and only now did he belatedly realize that he would probably have to sleep in the same bed with Chu Tingyun tonight.
Realizing this, Yan Xun suddenly felt a bit nervous.
He stood in the kitchen for a while, then paced around the living room and study a couple of times. Finally, he ran into the bedroom and changed the four-piece bedding set.
Having done all this, Yan Xun went to sit in the study. He waited for a good while before the person in the bathroom slowly emerged.
Chu Tingyun knocked on the study door. Pushing it open, he saw the young man sitting rigidly upright, staring intently at the computer screen. Hearing the sound, Yan Xun looked up at the door.
The man was wearing a black long-sleeved pajama set, seemingly made of a light, thin, and form-fitting silk material. However, the buttons were dutifully and neatly fastened all the way up.
He tilted his head slightly, leaning casually against the doorframe. The line from his neck to his shoulder looked exceptionally elegant under the warm light.
“Busy?”
Yan Xun: “No… just reading the news.”
Reading the news?
“Is that so.”
This answer made Chu Tingyun want to laugh. He nodded casually and gestured toward the bathroom.
“I’m done, you can go wash up.”
“Mm.”
Just as Yan Xun stood up, the man who had just left seemed to remember something and turned back to tell him,
“I warmed some milk in the kitchen. Remember to drink it.”
“Okay.”
Yan Xun agreed.
He didn’t know if it was just his imagination, but he found that Chu Tingyun seemed to really like giving him milk to drink.
Regardless, Yan Xun obediently drank it all.
By the time he finished washing up and returned to the bedroom, Chu Tingyun was already curled up under the covers, asleep. The room was very dark, with only a small nightlight left on by the bedside.
There was no amorous or ambiguous atmosphere, only an unfamiliar, tranquil, and warm presence quietly diffusing through the night air.
Yan Xun stood quietly at the door for a long time before tiptoeing over. He carefully lifted a corner of the blanket and slowly lay down.
Click—
The small nightlight was gently switched off.
The bedroom windows were soundproofed, so the entire room was incredibly quiet in the dark. Yan Xun could only hear the steady, low breathing of the person beside him.
Compared to Chu Tingyun’s naturally relaxed, cat-like curled sleeping posture, Yan Xun slept very rigidly. He lay perfectly straight on his back, hands plastered to his sides, dutiful and completely motionless.
The two of them were separated by a distance of about twenty to thirty centimeters, sharing the bed in a posture of utmost mutual respect.
In the dark, Yan Xun stared at the ceiling, suddenly finding the future to be so wondrous and unpredictable.
The last time they met, he and Chu Tingyun were still discussing divorce, seemingly destined to part ways and excise each other from their respective lives.
But now, they were sharing a bed.
Yan Xun turned his head slightly. The pillow covered his ear, allowing him to hear his own pulse, which wasn’t quite calm.
As far back as he could remember, this was the first time Yan Xun had shared a bed and a blanket with anyone else.
He felt a bit unaccustomed to it, but also not quite as unaccustomed as he had imagined.
It was just like how Yan Xun had always believed it was impossible for him to like a man, yet tonight’s unexpected kiss hadn’t filled him with disgust; instead, his body had yielded a reaction he could hardly hide out of shame. This alone proved a lot.
Yan Xun looked at the blurry silhouette of the person beside him and began to ponder that thought which had quietly sprouted in his heart earlier.
—Perhaps I really did like this person in the past.
Thinking and thinking like this, whether from mental exhaustion or the two sips of red wine Chu Tingyun had poured into him, Yan Xun’s consciousness began to gradually blur. He unknowingly fell asleep.
At this moment, the complex, chaotic thoughts in his brain transformed into thousands of silver-white butterflies, twirling and dancing, weaving a hazy, tender, and unspeakable dream.
Then, their wings fell, turning into a sky full of heavy snow. The snowflakes piled up layer by layer, building a massive snow mountain.
Inside the snow mountain hid a castle.
A classic, ornately carved fireplace radiated a heavy heat, while thick, heavy drapes tightly blocked out the light from outside the window.
Everything seemed dim and chaotic; he could only vaguely make out the surrounding furnishings and the blurry outline of a certain person. Right now, a thick, soft, massive bed was gently swaying, and faintly, the sound of metal chains clinking together could be heard.
Yan Xun felt as if someone was pressing down on him. Then, that person began to kiss him. First kissing his face, then licking the most sensitive tip of his ear. The movements were urgent, yet carried a hint of pacifying coaxing.
[Be good, Xun-xun…]
That person pinched his jaw, using a coaxing tone to make him open his mouth. This was likely a very deep kiss, lingering and passionate to the extreme. Then, heavy, ragged pants intertwined. Yan Xun felt as if he had touched that person’s waist. The skin was very soft, exceptionally fine and smooth. The muscles underneath were pulled taut, trembling visibly, then shaking faster and faster.
[Ah…]
Next, Yan Xun heard the other party’s distorted moan, as if on the verge of death, making his blood boil.
Buzz—
Just like a computer losing power and going to a black screen, the chaotic dream abruptly vanished.
At the exact same moment, Yan Xun snapped his eyes open.
He panted heavily, having actually broken out in a thin sweat. It took a long while for his chaotic consciousness to slowly clear.
Only tiny fragments of the blurry dream remained. Yan Xun didn’t remember the exact details, but he knew he had had a dream full of tender, erotic spring colors.
Just then, Yan Xun suddenly realized he seemed to be holding onto something, because he felt a patch of warm, supple, and delicate skin.
“Mm…”
The person in his arms let out a muffled sleep-murmur.
Almost simultaneously, Yan Xun realized who he was holding.
His hand had even slipped inside the other person’s pajamas, resting flat against that person’s lower back.
This discovery instantly made Yan Xun freeze all over, not daring to move an inch. Only after confirming that Chu Tingyun had no intention of waking up did he carefully retract his hand, simultaneously pulling the other’s pajamas back down and covering him with the blanket.
After doing all this, Yan Xun got up quietly, going to the outside bathroom to rinse off his sweat. Once his brain and body had completely calmed down, he quietly returned to the bedroom and lay down properly on the bed.
It was now 4:30 AM. A sliver of morning light was already seeping in from outside. But Chu Tingyun was still sleeping soundly. Half of his face was sunken into the pillow, his soft, black eyelashes resting quietly like butterfly wings, inexplicably softening one’s heart.
Yan Xun watched him quietly for a moment. Just as he was about to withdraw his gaze, his eyes were suddenly drawn to the other’s loosened collar.
—There was a thin red string there.
He reached out and gently pulled the red string out.
In this very moment, time seemed to suddenly freeze.
Yan Xun had finally found his lost little jade Guanyin pendant.
It was here.
…So it was here all along.
Yan Xun had been adopted at the age of seven. The only thing on his person that belonged completely and utterly to him was this tiny jade pendant.
It was the only thing his biological parents had left him. It was incredibly important. Yan Xun never took it off and never let anyone else touch it.
Not even Zhou Ze, his best friend, was allowed to.
But now, this tiny jade Guanyin rested against another person’s chest, tainted with another person’s body heat.
“…”
Yan Xun looked at it for a long, long time, until the morning light outside gradually illuminated the jade pendant bit by bit.
But in the end, he didn’t take it back. Instead, he carefully placed it back inside the man’s collar.
Having done all this, Yan Xun closed his eyes again. It was still too early, and he planned to squint for a little while longer before getting up. However, he didn’t expect to actually fall asleep the moment he closed his eyes.
This time, Yan Xun slept very well. He didn’t dream again, nor did he jolt awake. He didn’t wake up until the sun was hanging high in the sky.
The man who had been curled up next to him like a cat last night was already gone. Yan Xun got up and walked to the living room, only to find Chu Tingyun making breakfast in the kitchen.
“Awake?”
The man was wearing a set of loungewear, speaking in a very natural tone,
“Come over and eat breakfast.”
“…”
Yan Xun stared at him blankly for a few seconds, then nodded and agreed.
Breakfast was simple: fried eggs and sandwiches.
The difference was that Chu Tingyun was drinking coffee, while Yan Xun had hot milk.
“We have to attend a wedding tomorrow, so I need to get you a suit,”
Chu Tingyun said, taking a slow sip of his coffee.
“But we’ll only be able to pick one out at the mall in the afternoon, because I have a video conference this morning. What about you, what are you going to do?”
“I…”
Yan Xun chewed on his sandwich, thought for a moment, and said:
“Study, I guess.”
Now, as an unemployed vagrant, Yan Xun was forced to live off Chu Tingyun, so he was very anxious to find a job.
But a job isn’t something you can just find on command; at the very least, he needed to figure out what he could do right now. So Yan Xun planned to review his former skills.
“I still have some professional documents saved on my computer. I’ll read through the programming books on the shelf, and learn to use the relevant skill-based software, things like that.”
Hearing this, President Chu smiled:
“Alright, then do your best.”
“Mm.”
Since Chu Tingyun made breakfast, Yan Xun very consciously took on the cleanup duty, which specifically meant putting the dirty plates and pans into the dishwasher.
The dishwasher… this machine truly was a beacon of human technology.
By the time Yan Xun finished cleaning up and went to the study, Chu Tingyun was already in his meeting.
The man wore a Bluetooth earpiece in his left ear and a new pair of half-rimmed glasses resting on the bridge of his tall nose. His shirt was crisp, his tie exquisite, his expression cold and focused. His deep, pleasant voice was so magnetic it made one’s ears tingle.
Yan Xun quietly watched him for a long time. Unfortunately, he couldn’t quite understand what Chu Tingyun was discussing with the person on the other end, because the language he was speaking was a mix of English and Russian, filled with specialized terminology.
But what Yan Xun didn’t know was that Su Yao on the other end couldn’t understand it either.
Sporting dark circles from pulling an all-nighter, she sat completely dumbfounded for a good while before finally breaking into a curse:
“Chu Tingyun, are you fucking sick in the head?! What kind of absolute gibberish are you spouting at me first thing in the morning?!!”
