“……”
Yan Xun was once again rendered speechless by Chu Tingyun’s logic.
But upon careful consideration, given that they were strangers, what the other had just said seemed quite reasonable.
Willing to unconditionally trust a stranger with such an outrageous story upon first meeting and immediately lending him three hundred thousand—this behavior indeed suggested he was after more than just affection.
Previously, Yan Xun had thought this behavior aimed for the latter, but now it appeared that Chu Tingyun was rather greedy, wanting both.
However, Yan Xun didn’t want to play along with Chu Tingyun, so he didn’t acknowledge the so-called love at first sight but said, “Chu Tingyun, you’re really narcissistic.”
“Why can’t I be narcissistic?”
Chu Tingyun didn’t see this as a derogatory term; instead, he felt it should be called self-confidence.
“I’m good-looking, smart, and capable. Besides having excellent language skills, I’ve dabbled in sports, arts, and music. I may not excel in everything, but I have plenty to show for myself.”
In short, even considering only his short eighteen years of life experience, if not for his family background, it looked quite impressive. Aside from not being able to handle Jiang Shenghai, that old man, he hadn’t truly stumbled in any other matters.
As for the incident where he was framed by Jiang Yuheng, after recovering from his injuries, Chu Tingyun had ensured that the latter ended up in hot water.
He stayed at the Jiang family for a day, and within that day, everyone was in disarray, leading Jiang Shenghai to quickly contact his school and send him to boarding school.
“Yan Xun gege, there are a ton of people at school who like me.”
However, Chu Tingyun didn’t want to date; he was focused on figuring out how to escape back to Sochi or how to oppose Jiang Shenghai, ideally infuriating him.
During his rebellious phase, Chu Tingyun merely skipped classes and got into fights, even sabotaging Jiang Shenghai’s pants before a major event, causing him never to buy that brand of suit again.
“Most of them are girls, but there are one or two guys. So don’t worry, I’m not homophobic.”
When Chu Tingyun said this, his tone suggested he was confident that Yan Xun was head over heels for him.
In addition to financial assistance and unfounded trust, this person, Yan Xun, had dined with him, shopped with him, and not only voluntarily helped carry his bags but also noted his underwear size.
If this behavior were from someone else, Chu Tingyun might think that person was a creep or a sycophant, but for some reason, it felt invigorating coming from Yan Xun.
This guy definitely liked him! And it was love at first sight; he liked him immediately!
With so many admirers around, why was he still following him?
After saying this, Yan Xun shoved the bag into Chu Tingyun’s hands and turned to leave the mall.
Chu Tingyun: “……..”
He stood there holding a dozen shopping bags, stunned for a few seconds, before quickly chasing after him.
“Hey… Yan Xun!”
Yan Xun was walking slowly, so Chu Tingyun caught up after running a bit.
“Don’t go, Yan Xun gege.”
Chu Tingyun leaned in close, hugging Yan Xun’s arm.
“I haven’t finished talking yet.”
With that hug, not only the weight of all the shopping bags but also part of Chu Tingyun’s weight leaned on Yan Xun.
Two grown men walking all clingy and awkward on the street looked quite strange, prompting Yan Xun to stop.
“Stand straight.”
“Oh.”
Chu Tingyun straightened up, and in the process, he handed all the bags to Yan Xun.
He had bought too much and it was heavy to carry.
Yan Xun took them without complaint: “………”
The fluidity of his actions made Yan Xun more certain that this man wasn’t really suffering from amnesia; he was just playing a part.
“Chu Tingyun……”
Stop messing around; it’s already ten at night.
Originally, Yan Xun planned to say this, but before he could finish, he was interrupted.
“Yan Xun gege, don’t be angry. There are plenty of people who send me gifts and let me spend money, but you’re the first to unconditionally give me three hundred thousand upon first meeting.”
When he said those last three words, Chu Tingyun lightly poked Yan Xun’s chest.
Yep, it was no illusion when they first met; his chest felt really good.
“…… The first one?”
Yan Xun looked at him, thinking that he was also the first to want to tie him up and spank him. But since Chu Tingyun was still in character, he decided to go along with it.
However, Yan Xun didn’t want to drag on a bunch of random topics and directly pushed the conversation forward.
“It’s getting late; I’m heading home. What about you?”
Chu Tingyun: “……..”
That was indeed a problem.
Although he had money now, he didn’t have an ID, so he naturally couldn’t check into a hotel.
Moreover, he had no idea if he could still contact the friends he used to be on good terms with after sixteen years, and most importantly, he didn’t remember their phone numbers.
Chu Tingyun was uncertain about his current situation.
He certainly didn’t want to sleep on the streets at night; he wanted to find a clean bathroom and take a comfortable shower.
Given the options of sleeping in a park, a cheap motel, returning to the hospital to face the annoying and unknown Jiang family members, or sticking with Yan Xun, he weighed his choices for a minute before arriving at a final decision.
“Yan Xun gege, you must own more than one property, right?”
Someone who could easily pull out three hundred thousand surely had more than one place.
Chu Tingyun certainly wasn’t thinking of moving in with him; he just wanted to find a decent place to stay without needing an ID as soon as possible.
“Could you temporarily rent me one? I’ll pay you double the market rent.”
Yan Xun raised an eyebrow.
Oh, so he wanted to rent a place instead of going home?
“Sure.”
Fifteen minutes later, Chu Tingyun was sitting in the passenger seat of his Lamborghini.
He had thought Yan Xun would drive a luxury car, but he never imagined it would be such a flashy and beautiful one.
While driving, Yan Xun glanced at him and asked, “Do you like it?”
“Of course!”
Chu Tingyun didn’t hide his excitement and openly admired the car.
“When I get my money back, I’ll buy one too.”
Yan Xun: “……..”
As expected, this guy liked what he originally bought!
Chu Tingyun quickly shifted his attention from the car to the new smartphone he had just bought in the mall.
Going straight from a Nokia to the latest 2023 smartphone was like a caveman who had gotten a multifunctional lighter after using a primitive fire-starting method.
However, he couldn’t show how awestruck he was in the store, so he only started to clumsily and curiously fiddle with it once he got in the car.
Although Yan Xun was focused on driving, he kept some attention on Chu Tingyun.
Seeing his current actions, Yan Xun began to sense something was off.
He wondered if Chu Tingyun really had amnesia.
As soon as this thought crossed his mind, Yan Xun quickly recalled the entire process of meeting Chu Tingyun earlier that afternoon, every word he had said, every action he had made, and all his expressions…
It indeed seemed a bit strange.
At the very least, the act he was putting on should have been performed in the hospital, not out on the street. Now that he thought about it, there were indeed various inconsistencies.
Mainly, Chu Tingyun had a troubled past, and the fact that his memory had regressed to eighteen was quite rare; Yan Xun hadn’t taken it seriously at all.
Five minutes later—
Yan Xun tentatively asked him, “Chu Tingyun, you’re not lying about your amnesia, are you?”
“No.”
“Then swear it.”
“……?”
Swear?
Chu Tingyun hadn’t expected Yan Xun’s method of verification to be so naive, so without thinking, he casually replied, “Okay, then I swear if I’m not suffering from amnesia, I’ll be struck by lightning.”
That’s how people swore in TV dramas.
Yan Xun: “……..”
He looked deeply at Chu Tingyun and confirmed that this person really had amnesia.
Because back when Yan Xun had fasted for five days in the snow mountain villa, Chu Tingyun had eventually relented and agreed to let him go. But by that time, Yan Xun had already lost trust in him.
“Yan Xun… what would make you believe me?”
“You swear it.”
“Alright, what should I swear?”
“If you’re lying, you’ll be impotent for the rest of your life and can’t get it up.”
Yan Xun had thought that since Chu Tingyun didn’t care about money or the law, and was so obsessed with that kind of thing, such a vow might have some effect.
“……. Fine.”
Chu Tingyun agreed.
So from that point on, every time he swore in front of Yan Xun, it was always this line.
Thus, the moment Yan Xun confirmed that the other seemed to really have amnesia, it felt as if a door to a new world had opened—
If he weren’t driving, he probably would have taken a good, careful look at Chu Tingyun.
Vroom…
Just then, a green convertible supercar sped past them.
Probably seeing them driving such a flashy car and going so slow, the two young men inside laughed and mocked them, even giving them the middle finger.
Yan Xun didn’t care; he always prioritized safety while driving and didn’t retaliate or race after them, treating it as though two pigs had farted.
But Chu Tingyun couldn’t hold back; he rolled down the window, flashed them two middle fingers, and cursed in Russian.
Yan Xun frowned and rolled up the window on Chu Tingyun’s side.
“——No swearing.”
“……?”
Chu Tingyun was taken aback, his attention immediately drawn to Yan Xun.
“You understand?”
“Yeah, I learned a bit.”
Yan Xun had been learning Russian for over a year; he was quite adept at learning, and with Chu Tingyun, a native speaker, constantly around to teach him, he had made rapid progress and could manage simple daily conversations without issue.
Chu Tingyun tried asking Yan Xun a few questions in Russian and found that Yan Xun responded easily, and his pronunciation was quite pleasant. Some grammatical habits even resembled his own a bit.
In that instant, Chu Tingyun felt a certain indescribable fondness for Yan Xun. However, he still couldn’t swallow this frustration.
“Why don’t you chase after them?”
“It’s not that we can’t chase them.”
Yan Xun thought for a moment and pressed the accelerator.
Chu Tingyun became excited, thinking they were going to race, but Yan Xun didn’t speed up much; he simply followed behind the other car, adjusting the steering wheel left and right, appearing unable to overtake.
Seeing this, the other party burst into laughter, deliberately slowing down just enough to stay slightly ahead of them.
Chu Tingyun was on the verge of bursting with frustration; he knew how to drive too, and if he could just switch seats, he would have driven himself.
But just then, Chu Tingyun noticed that the other car was slowing down.
Not only that, but the previously clear road was now showing signs of traffic. Some vehicles seemed to be queued up. Chu Tingyun squinted and saw flashing red and blue lights.
Traffic police?
Chu Tingyun was startled and quickly turned to look at Yan Xun.
The latter seemed to have anticipated this moment all along and calmly explained, “During this time, with the Mid-Autumn Festival approaching, the traffic police are frequently checking for drunk driving.”
“……”
So Yan Xun’s purpose earlier wasn’t to overtake but to deliberately push the other party towards the traffic police?
“Yan Xun, how did you know they had been drinking?”
“They looked like it. Even if they hadn’t been drinking, they were speeding about 30 to 50 percent over the limit, and they were already captured on camera.”
“……”
Chu Tingyun was taken aback.
He had thought Yan Xun was just a naive rich person, but now he realized he was wrong.
This person was clearly very capable and leaned more towards being cunningly open about it.
He was not simple.
While Chu Tingyun felt a bit exhilarated, he suddenly became somewhat anxious.
What if this person had ulterior motives?
As he pondered these thoughts, their car smoothly passed the police checkpoint, while the green supercar was pulled over.
The driver had failed the alcohol breathalyzer test.
But now Chu Tingyun had no time to pay attention to that; he started to subtly inquire about Yan Xun’s age, profession, family background, and so on. Earlier at the dinner table, he had been entirely focused on the three million, and later in the mall, he was preoccupied with shopping. It was only now that he remembered to ask.
“Hmm, Yan Xun, how old are you this year?”
“Twenty-five.”
Chu Tingyun immediately calculated and realized that Yan Xun was actually nine years younger than him.
Nine years!
“……”
With such a big age gap, he had been calling him “gege” since they met. At this moment, Chu Tingyun finally felt a twinge of embarrassment.
He instinctively glanced at his reflection in the car window. In fact, he had looked closely at himself when buying clothes earlier, and he noticed how much he had changed over the past sixteen years.
He had grown taller, gained some muscle, completely shed his youthful naivety, and had become a handsome mature man. Overall, he still looked great and very charming!
In terms of appearance, Chu Tingyun was confident. After all, Yan Xun had never expressed any discomfort with being called that, so he decided to keep calling him “gege.”
—He quickly prepared himself mentally.
“So, Yan Xun, since you’re out so late, don’t your parents ask about it?”
“I don’t live with my parents.”
“You live alone?”
“No, I’m married.”
“……”
At the moment he heard this response, the smile on Chu Tingyun’s face vanished immediately.
“You… you’re married?!”
Yan Xun replied casually, “Yeah, I’ve been married for four years.”
He answered as if it were completely normal.
“……”
Chu Tingyun didn’t understand why learning that Yan Xun was married made him feel so furious and depressed.
He had never imagined that Yan Xun was already married.
After all, the guy looked way too young, and he had been inexplicably nice to him on their first meeting—clearly, he liked him!
But unexpectedly, he was married! For four years!!
Now, thinking back to how Chu Tingyun had asked Yan Xun if he liked him, and Yan Xun hadn’t responded, he thought it was just Yan Xun being shy.
If he was married, then what was he trying to provoke him for?! Not only had he given him so much money, but he had also willingly accompanied him to shop all night and even helped him with his underwear!
Damn!
Because of Chen Wanqing and Jiang Shenghai, Chu Tingyun hated people who were careless about relationships the most, especially men who cheated and mistresses! Just thinking about it made him sick.
Only now did he notice the ring on Yan Xun’s ring finger.
That must be a wedding ring…
A wedding ring!!!
“……”
Before Chu Tingyun could start cursing, he suddenly heard Yan Xun ask:
“Are you married?”
“No!”
Chu Tingyun’s tone was far from pleasant. If he weren’t in the passenger seat of the car, and if they weren’t speeding down the road, he would have turned around and left immediately.
This Yan Xun was clearly married, with a family and a wife—so what was all this nonsense they were doing tonight?!
Scumbag!
Damn!
Chu Tingyun grit his teeth and cursed Yan Xun a hundred times in his heart, while maintaining a cold expression as he replied, “I’m an anti-marriage advocate.”
“…… Oh.”
Yan Xun nodded, showing no surprise.
“An anti-marriage advocate, huh.”
The tone was a bit subtle, and Chu Tingyun couldn’t help but glance at him.
“Why, don’t you believe me?”
“It’s not that, but weren’t you the one with amnesia? How can you be so sure you’re in your thirties and still unmarried?”
Chu Tingyun nearly replied immediately, “Of course!”
Yan Xun glanced at him. “What if you’re married too?”
“……”
This thought had never occurred to Chu Tingyun; he suddenly found himself at a loss for words and finally managed to stammer out, “There’s no ‘what if’; it’s impossible!”
“……”
Yan Xun raised an eyebrow and smiled, not pressing further.
But ending the topic this way made Chu Tingyun feel like he had lost something. It was just a few lines of dialogue, but it felt like a debate between an adult and a child.
The former already knew the correct answer, while the latter provided an overly naive yet absurd conclusion.
And that smile from Yan Xun made Chu Tingyun feel like that child.
It was quite frustrating!
Chu Tingyun couldn’t take it anymore; he felt miserable.
“Pull over right now!”
Yan Xun didn’t stop, not even slowing down.
“What? Didn’t you say you wanted to go home with me?”
At this point, Chu Tingyun hadn’t noticed that Yan Xun said “home” and not “to rent a place.”
“…… You’re taking me home? What about your wife?”
Yan Xun responded casually, “Oh, my wife isn’t home. She ran away.”
“…….？？？”
Ran away?!
Chu Tingyun’s mind went blank for a moment as he gradually understood the implication of “ran away”—
Cheating? Eloping??
His expression was one of shock as he instinctively glanced at the top of Yan Xun’s head, as if there were a hint of green there.
“Ha…”
He chuckled in schadenfreude, no longer mentioning the idea of pulling over, and comfortably settled back in the passenger seat. He even reclined the seat a bit, lazily leaning back.
“The person has run away, so why haven’t you divorced yet?”
“I planned to divorce last year, but it didn’t happen.”
“Why not?”
Chu Tingyun’s eyes suddenly showed a bit of frustration,
“The person has already run away! You still haven’t divorced? Yan Xun, is there something wrong with your head?”
Yan Xun, whose head might be the problem, didn’t get angry. Instead, he laughed.
“Chu Tingyun, are you really hoping I would get a divorce?”
“……”
The man sitting in the passenger seat didn’t answer immediately.
He slightly came back to his senses from his emotions, realizing that he had been overly focused on Yan Xun’s marital status, as if he liked the guy.
“You just borrowed three million from me; if you have any property disputes with your ex-wife, I don’t want to get into trouble.”
Ex…wife?
Yan Xun held back a laugh, trying not to smile too obviously.
In any case, he now completely believed that Chu Tingyun had amnesia, so he continued to go along with the way Chu Tingyun referred to him.
“You don’t need to worry about that; my ex-wife doesn’t care about this small amount of money.”
Chu Tingyun: “………”
The anger that he had just suppressed surged back up.
Right now, he really wanted to throw that three-million-yuan bank card in Yan Xun’s face, but after thinking about it, he held back.
He’d just endure for two more days.
After he figured out the situation with the Jiang family and his own circumstances and had a handle on his current assets, he would immediately throw that card back!
Ha!
What’s three million anyway?!
Chu Tingyun wouldn’t even care!
As they talked, the car drove into the community parking lot.
Yan Xun brought Chu Tingyun home, opening the door, changing shoes, and washing hands and disinfecting.
This ritual of coming home made the germaphobe feel very comfortable!
After entering, he quickly scanned the house’s decor style and furniture layout, discovering that nearly every detail perfectly matched his preferences and aesthetics.
He loved it at first sight!
Yan Xun said to him, “Go take a look inside.”
Until Chu Tingyun walked in and saw the wedding photo hanging on the living room wall.
The wedding certificate photo that Chu Tingyun had edited was no longer there; instead, it was replaced by one taken after they had a second wedding ceremony.
In that moment, Chu Tingyun almost thought he was hallucinating. He actually saw himself in the photo.
“Um… what is that…?”
“Oh, that.”
Yan Xun stared at him and couldn’t help but smile,
“That’s my wedding photo with my ex-wife; isn’t it pretty nice?”
Chu Tingyun: “………”
???
His mind seemed to have rusted, grinding away for a long time before he realized what that wedding photo meant.
So… Yan Xun’s wife who ran away is him?!!
How ridiculous is that?!
At that moment, the other person suddenly walked over and took his hand.
Chu Tingyun felt a chill at his fingertips and looked down to see Yan Xun putting a matching wedding ring on his ring finger.
At the moment it fit perfectly, Chu Tingyun even felt as if his heart was being encircled.
At that moment, Yan Xun ruffled his hair and pulled him into his arms, holding him tightly.
The other person softly said to him, “Tingyun, don’t run away again next time.”
Chu Tingyun: “……”
So the wife who ran away was actually me?!
