As soon as the words left her mouth, Xu Zhi recklessly kissed him. Just as they were about to speak, the bathroom door unexpectedly clicked open. The two suddenly came to their senses – was someone else in the house? Chen Luzhou let out a low “hmm,” and they quickly detached from each other. When it came to feigning innocence, these two were true experts. Their gazes were as pure and guileless as could be.
“What are you two up to?” Zhu Yangqi emerged, pulling up his pants and mercilessly exposing them. “Drop the act. I could hear you two smacking away in there. Even my 80-year-old grandmother doesn’t make that much noise eating oranges. What, is your saliva extra sweet or something?”
Chen Luzhou: “…”
Xu Zhi: “…”
Zhu Yangqi leaned against the wall, adopting an interrogative stance. He stared intently at the two of them, focusing mainly on Xu Zhi as he said, “Come clean. You started it, didn’t you? I know this dog Chen Luzhou too well. He wouldn’t dare mess with you at a time like this.”
Before Xu Zhi could respond, Chen Luzhou leaned back on the sofa with a weary, dispirited air. He glanced up at the ceiling helplessly, looking rather frustrated and unsatisfied. “Don’t you ever get tired of this? How is it any of your business?”
Zhu Yangqi’s tone dripped with sarcasm: “So my brother’s fooling around with some girl at home and I can’t even ask about it—”
Before he could finish, Chen Luzhou clicked his tongue. His Adam’s apple bobbed a couple of times as he drawled lazily: “Right, you’re just so curious. Did you forget about that time your dad beat you?”
He was referring to an incident when one of Zhu Yangqi’s father’s colleagues came to visit. Zhu Yangqi thought the colleague’s son looked nothing like him, and assumed he was adopted like Chen Luzhou. Being young and naive at the time, he bluntly asked, “How come you two don’t look alike? Are you his dad?” The colleague’s face turned from green to white. He went home anxious for days and even took the child to the hospital for a paternity test. As it turned out, the child wasn’t his.
Zhu Yangqi got a severe beating from his father at that time. He ran away from home for three days. When the police finally found him, his father was nonchalantly smoking a cigarette as he said to the starving boy in the officer’s arms, “Oh, you’re still alive?” From then on, Zhu Yangqi learned to behave himself.
Leaning against the wall, Zhu Yangqi fell silent for a moment. “…Fine, I’ll leave. Happy now?”
This was the first time Xu Zhi had seen such tension between the two of them. Zhu Yangqi was acting strangely tonight. Usually, he wouldn’t be so confrontational. It seemed he was upset about Chen Luzhou’s impending departure and didn’t want to make a fuss.
“Should I go home?” she suggested.
“So you came to see me just because of him?” Chen Luzhou glanced at her coldly from the sofa. His neck seemed a bit stiff from her earlier assault. He shifted, tilting his head back as he said coolly, “Do what you want. Leave if you’re going to.”
Xu Zhi said, “Call Zhu Yangqi back. Don’t fight because of me after so many years of friendship. Besides, you’re about to leave. If you board the plane angry, the rift between you might only grow. It’s not worth it.”
Zhu Yangqi had been acting odd these past couple of days. Chen Luzhou probably understood why. He remembered when he went to study in another province in middle school, Zhu Yangqi had behaved similarly – picking fights over every little thing. He knew Zhu Yangqi just wanted an excuse to have it out with him, to berate him for leaving without a second thought for his brother.
Zhu Yangqi would always ask recklessly, “Can’t you stay? Aren’t Old Chen and Lian Hui good to you? Just beg them, I’m sure they’d agree if you begged. My parents always talk tough, but whenever I kneel and plead with them, they give in.”
What Zhu Yangqi didn’t understand was that the love he received from his parents and the love Chen Luzhou got from the Chens, though seemingly similar, were fundamentally different. Mr. Zhu was stern on the outside but warm-hearted. During those three days when Zhu Yangqi ran away, he hadn’t slept a wink, yet still greeted his son coolly with “Oh, you’re still alive?” when he returned. Lian Hui, on the other hand, always fussed over Chen Luzhou, worried he wasn’t eating or dressing warmly enough. But that night when Chen Luzhou called her at 3 AM from the police station, she didn’t pick up. She wasn’t in a meeting at the TV station as she claimed; she was getting her beauty sleep. Even if she saw the call, she would have hung up. Her routine was always strict.
Zhu Yangqi, who had grown up alongside Chen Luzhou, couldn’t understand these nuances. But Xu Zhi seemed to grasp them.
After a while, Zhu Yangqi came back, muttering something under his breath. “I’m going to buy some fried chicken strips. You two want them spicy?”
Chen Luzhou was unsurprised. He lounged back casually, tilting his chin towards the empty bottles on the coffee table. “Not spicy. And bring back a couple of bottles of fruit wine while you’re at it.”
Once the door closed again, leaving just the two of them, Xu Zhi noticed how empty the place looked. Many things had been packed away – the easels and models that used to clutter the corner were gone, as were the books that had been piled on the coffee table. Only a few empty wine bottles remained. Soon, all traces of his presence here would be erased without a mark.
She asked, “All packed up?”
“Mm,” he continued resting with his eyes closed, seemingly uninterested in talking to her. His Adam’s apple bobbed occasionally.
“Chen Luzhou,” Xu Zhi turned to look at his clean-cut profile, her gaze lingering on his Adam’s apple. Some words slipped out unbidden: “Actually, the first time I saw you weren’t at your doorstep that day.”
“When was it?” he asked. Opening his mouth, he found his voice hoarse. He coughed lazily, cleared his throat, and asked again more articulately.
The curtains were drawn, the TV was off, and all the lights were out. Only the air conditioner hummed quietly in the background, creating a peaceful, cozy atmosphere.
Xu Zhi looked at the clock on the wall, still ticking away, and said, “It was in our first year of high school, during the basketball tournament. Our first preliminary match was actually against your school, in your gym. Our class’s guys weren’t very good, I guess. By the time I got there, we were losing pretty badly. As class president, I was in charge of bringing water to the team. But that day, Teacher Qu held me up in a meeting, so by the time I arrived, it was halftime. The court was surrounded by so many people. It was my first time seeing so many spectators for a boys’ basketball game. At our school, hardly anyone plays basketball, so your school seemed incredibly lively in comparison.”
“And then?” he prompted.
“Then I happened to see you standing at the edge of the court, talking to some girls from your class. But I couldn’t squeeze through the crowd. I saw our class’s sports rep standing next to you, so I tapped you on the shoulder, hoping you could call him over for me. When I tapped you, I was holding two water bottles, remember? You probably thought one of the girls from your class was bringing you water. You took it, drank some, then turned and walked away before I could say anything.”
“Come on, I never chat with girls during games. You must have mistaken someone else for me.”
Xu Zhi looked at him thoughtfully: “If you don’t believe me, fine. But you were talking to that girl at the time. What was her name again? I even saw her that day we recorded the show. She’s quite pretty.”
Chen Luzhou gave her an intriguing look, his expression suddenly a bit smug. He couldn’t help but shake his leg as he said, “Don’t tell me you’re jealous.”
“I didn’t have any feelings for you back then,” Xu Zhi said firmly. Her eyes wandered around the room. “You’ve cleaned up so thoroughly. I’m dying of thirst. Got any water?”
“Zhu Yangqi went to buy some,” Chen Luzhou passed her his half-finished bottle from the coffee table, casually asking, “So when did you start having feelings?”
Xu Zhi unscrewed the cap and took a drink, then countered, “What about you?”
Perhaps prompted by her question, his gaze was unexpectedly frank and direct. “I was attracted from the first glance.”
Chen Luzhou stood up, intending to take a shower. He hadn’t expected Xu Zhi to come over today; his hair was almost matted. He grabbed a clean T-shirt from the bedroom and slung it over his shoulder, then leaned against the bathroom door with his arms crossed, speaking candidly to her—
“But I don’t believe in love at first sight. I thought you had a boyfriend back then, so I didn’t let myself think too much about it.”
With that, he went in to shower.
About ten minutes later, he emerged wearing a hoodie, his hair still damp. He roughly toweled it off a couple of times before tossing the towel aside. He sat down next to her, legs sprawled. Xu Zhi noticed that handsome guys seemed to dress for style regardless of the season. She asked curiously, “Aren’t you hot, Mr. Popular?”
Chen Luzhou ignored her. He leaned back, not bothering with his still-damp hair, and casually pulled up his hood. Lounging on the sofa, he mysteriously beckoned to Xu Zhi.
Xu Zhi leaned in.
With his hood up, he looked down at her and said, “Let me ask you something. If you had called out to me back then, and I’d asked for your name, would you have told me?”
“Yes, and I would have added you on WeChat too.”
“Why?”
“I would have made you pay me back for that bottle of water,” Xu Zhi said.
“…”
Chen Luzhou leaned against the sofa, staring at her in speechless exasperation for a long moment. Then he reached out and pinched her cheek hard, his eyes sparking with helpless frustration. Through gritted teeth, he said, “Do you have any idea how many senior girls used to ambush me in the hallways when I first started school?”
Xu Zhi buried her face in his chest, laughing uncontrollably. Her head pressed against his firm, broad chest as her muffled laughter vibrated through him. “Do you know how far back the line of boys who’ve pursued me stretches?”
He chuckled. Yes, this was Xu Zhi. She never admitted defeat.
Of course, neither did he. “By the time they finish lining up, grass will be growing on your grave, you oblivious girl.”
Just as he finished speaking, Zhu Yangqi returned with a group of people. The rustle of voices came from the doorway. The two quickly separated. From the voices, Chen Luzhou could tell who had come: Feng Jin, Jiang Cheng, and two of Zhu Yangqi’s classmates from art class, Da Zhuang and Da Jun.
But trailing behind Zhu Yangqi was also Gu Yan.
Everyone except the two art class students knew about Chen Luzhou and Gu Yan’s history. Jiang Cheng had no idea who the girl next to Chen Luzhou was; this was his first time seeing her. But sensing the awkward atmosphere, he still explained, “We ran into Gu Yan at the beer shop. She said you still owed her a meal, so we thought we’d come over and eat together. We tried calling you twice, but you didn’t pick up.”
Chen Luzhou grunted in acknowledgment. “Make yourselves at home. I’ll turn on the lights.”
Gu Yan hadn’t expected Chen Luzhou to have a girl at his place, but at the time she didn’t think much of it. She assumed it must be a cousin or something because she couldn’t imagine Chen Luzhou having any kind of relationship with another girl. His behavior at school was too memorable – joking around with the guys and even bantering with teachers, but coolly indifferent to all the girls. The only girl who seemed at all special was quite ordinary-looking, but her grades were excellent. She’d heard Zhu Yangqi mention that Chen Luzhou found her interesting. Later, unable to handle the pressure of the competitive class, she dropped out in their second year.
The group split into smaller clusters – some drooling over the barbecue, some getting pumped up over beer, some singing as if they’d lost five wives. The atmosphere was disjointed.
Xu Zhi and Gu Yan sat in the middle of the sofa, with the others either sitting or standing around the coffee table. Zhu Yangqi wasn’t very lively tonight. It was mainly Jiang Cheng and Feng Jin keeping the energy up, while Da Zhuang and Da Jun acted like free resident singers, hogging the two mics and singing one song after another.
Given the mood, it seemed only right to have a drink. So Jiang Cheng volunteered, raising his glass and glancing around the room. Except for the living room, everywhere else was dark and quiet. No one else was visible. “Where’s Chen Luzhou?”
“In the bedroom,” Da Zhuang said mechanically, leaning on Da Jun’s shoulder with a sorrowful expression as he recited lyrics, not forgetting to interject.
Zhu Yangqi rolled up his sleeves and marched over, banging on the door twice. “Chen Luzhou, what are you doing in there? Come out and drink!”
A second later, the door opened. The voice was characteristically lazy: “You guys drink. Why drag me into it?”
At this point, Gu Yan still hadn’t sensed anything amiss, because Xu Zhi was still beside her, silently sipping her drink and playing with her phone. Jiang Cheng struck up a conversation with Xu Zhi: “Why do you look so familiar?”
Xu Zhi, drink in hand, barely glanced up from replying to a WeChat message. Her eyelids lowered indifferently as she responded halfheartedly, “Do I?”
Her tone was dismissive and aloof.
Jiang Cheng’s temper flared. He considered himself no less handsome than Chen Luzhou – was he so beneath her notice? Just as he was about to suggest they have a drink, Zhu Yangqi returned and kicked him opportunely. “Don’t be an idiot. Her boyfriend’s way better-looking than you.”
Xu Zhi glanced at Zhu Yangqi but didn’t contradict him. She silently accepted it, sitting there texting Chen Luzhou.
Cr: Still not coming out?
Xu Zhi: [Sighing and lighting a cigarette].JPG
Xu Zhi: The beautiful Miss Gu keeps staring at me the whole time.