Male hand modeling is already quite an established profession both domestically and internationally, but the requirements are rather high—not too many palm lines, no scars, and fair skin, among other things. Sister Li had seen many who barely qualified before, but someone with naturally excellent conditions like Li Jin Yu made her feel like she’d found a treasure. Without hesitation, she slapped the contract on the table for him to sign.
But Li Jin Yu was still hesitating, wrestling with his inner turmoil.
Sister Li made another grand gesture, wielding her pen decisively as she doubled the price. “The rate I’m offering you is what international supermodels get. Don’t believe me? Ask around in the industry. Last time there was a rather handsome young man, and I only gave him 500 yuan per day.”
His inner struggle surrendered. Li Jin Yu took the pen without hesitation and signed his name with a flourish.
Sister Li collected the contract with satisfaction. Recalling that Qiao Mai Mai had mentioned something when introducing Li Jin Yu to her, she casually asked while sealing the contract envelope, “Is this money enough to treat your grandmother’s illness?”
It was not enough, but at least it could cover the first round of chemotherapy. As for future expenses, he would have to figure that out later. In his current situation, he could only take things one step at a time.
“Not enough,” Li Jin Yu told her truthfully.
The small-town café wasn’t too crowded; in fact, it was quite empty.
Sister Li nodded as expected and spoke frankly without reservation: “Then you’ll need to find other solutions. This price is the highest payment I can offer you—any higher would be ridiculous. Usually, payments are settled monthly, but since you need it urgently, I can give you an advance payment first so your grandmother can get her first chemotherapy session. An elderly person’s illness shouldn’t be delayed.”
Sister Li was the town’s formidable single wealthy woman—divorced, passionate, with a preference for young men. She always pursued men with real determination. However, she preferred muscular macho types and wasn’t very interested in excessively handsome guys like Li Jin Yu, because if they stood together, her wealth would be too obvious. If she were to keep him as a lover, she was afraid Li Jin Yu might die in bed. Offering advance payment was her greatest act of compassion for a handsome man.
Before leaving, she gave him a bottle of hand masks: “Although your hands are in very good condition, you should also take care of them. Soak them in milk occasionally and apply plastic wrap.” Then, Sister Li’s gaze fell almost imperceptibly on his thin wrist. “I suggest you get a tattoo to cover that scar on your wrist. Otherwise, it’s troublesome to edit it out in post-production every time.”
Li Jin Yu thought about it seriously and replied, “Alright.”
Sister Li was twisting her waist preparing to leave when she suddenly remembered something. She turned back with a sensuous look and said to him, “If you don’t mind, I have a friend looking for underwear models. Sister can introduce you.”
“…Thank you.”
Li Jin Yu’s mouth twitched, and his inner turmoil resurfaced.
After Sister Li left, Li Jin Yu didn’t get up immediately. He sat on the sofa for a while before coming out to find them.
Ye Meng had been staring intently at his hands since he walked out, thinking his hands were suitable for modeling. She hadn’t noticed before that he had manga-like hands—long, fair, with distinct knuckles.
Li Jin Yu, probably feeling embarrassed or genuinely annoyed, coughed once and stuffed his hands into his pockets, not letting her see them. He asked irritably, “Why did you kidnap my grandmother?”
“I wouldn’t dare,” Ye Meng explained calmly. “I ran into her at the entrance of my residential community. Just a coincidence.”
Li Jin Yu lowered his head to glance at the old lady in the wheelchair. The old lady kept winking at him meaningfully. He looked away with a helpless smile, realizing that the old woman had an ulterior motive—she wanted Ye Meng to be his girlfriend.
“Let’s go. I’ll take you back,” he said to Ye Meng.
“Huh?” Ye Meng was startled. “What about your grandmother…”
Li Jin Yu acted as if he couldn’t be bothered. His long legs walked around the old lady’s wheelchair, and he left without looking back, saying lazily, “She’s so capable, what would she need me for?”
This relationship between grandmother and grandson was truly a love-hate dynamic. Ye Meng didn’t know whether to go or stay. Seeing her standing there motionless, the old lady anxiously stamped her foot and urgently signaled to her, nearly sending her dentures flying: “Silly girl, hurry up and follow him!”
After the two had walked some distance, the old lady revealed her triumphant expression. The caregiver had observed everything and teased her while pushing the wheelchair back to the hospital: “Old madam wants to hold a great-grandson, doesn’t she?”
Dong Ju Hua sat in the wheelchair, shaking her head. She looked back with some concern, gazing affectionately at that tall but somewhat dejected figure, and said, “I just want to find someone to keep him company.” After confirming that Ye Meng had caught up with Li Jin Yu, she relaxed her gaze and sighed with a smile, “Otherwise, when I’m gone, he’ll be alone for his entire life.”
The caregiver looked surprised and smiled, “That won’t happen. With your grandson’s looks, there must be plenty of girls who like him.”
“You don’t understand.” Dong Ju Hua waved her hand dismissively.
The street lamps in the small town remained capricious, some lit and some not, casting a dim glow over the road. The path was quite lively, filled with townspeople heading to Lake Ning Sui for a stroll. This eye-catching pair stood out, particularly in the crowd, and even from a distance, Ye Meng could feel the impressed gazes of several schoolgirls and boys.
Students’ gazes are bold and intense, unlike mature adults who would conceal and avoid. So even though Ye Meng traced those burning gazes to their sources, they didn’t shy away but stared directly at the two of them, their eyes unable to hide their envy.
Ye Meng understood that kind of envy. When she was in school, she had also been particularly curious about the adult world, envying their rationality and nonchalance, as well as their ability to openly hold hands and kiss the people they liked.
Humans are contradictory creatures—in youth, they envy the rawness and openness of adulthood; in adulthood, they envy the innocence and ambiguity of youth.
“Where did you get your tattoo?” Li Jin Yu suddenly asked.
Ye Meng instantly pulled her thoughts away from those students, momentarily confused: “What tattoo?”
Li Jin Yu walked in front of her with his hands in his pockets. He turned around, walking backward while talking to her, and nodded toward her: “The one on your collarbone.”
Ye Meng instinctively covered her collarbone: “When did you see that?”
“Why are you covering it?” he snickered, casually saying with his hands still in his pockets: “I’ve already seen everything.”
“Seeing everything means you have to marry me,” Ye Meng seized the opportunity to say.
Li Jin Yu laughed, “Come on, how about I get a collarbone tattoo later to show you? Then we’ll be even.”
He was truly difficult to deceive. Ye Meng asked, “Where are you getting yours?”
He made a sound of agreement, stopped smiling, and extended his wrist while walking backward: “Sister Li said this scar is too noticeable.”
“Are you short on money again?” Hand modeling—she couldn’t believe he’d come up with that. She said resentfully, “Be careful not to get taken advantage of.”
“When am I not short on money?” He put his hand back in his pocket, turned around, and continued walking forward, smiling as he said, “If Sister Li were willing, I wouldn’t mind, but unfortunately, she’s not interested in me.”
Ye Meng looked at him coldly: “Oh, so Sister Li is acceptable, but I’m not, is that it?”
“Mm, anyone would do, except you.” Li Jin Yu said casually, as if teasing her, but not quite.
Ye Meng angrily led him to a tattoo artist she knew well. The tattoo shop had a narrow front, with a door shorter than Li Jin Yu’s height, though Ye Meng could easily walk through. She leaned against the doorway like a human trafficker and asked with a smile: “Would you take this little brother?”
The two women were acquainted, as the tattoo artist calmly scrutinized Li Jin Yu for a while, cracking sunflower seeds and clicking her tongue: “What wind blew you in here?”
Ye Meng entered the shop with familiarity, browsing around for a while before pointing her chin at Li Jin Yu standing in the doorway. “He wants a tattoo.”
The doorframe blocked Li Jin Yu’s face, revealing only his neck with a scar at his Adam’s apple. In the night, it looked like a forbidden yet sexy kiss mark. The tattoo artist nudged Ye Meng’s shoulder meaningfully and said, “Wow, a boyfriend? This one’s exciting.”
Ye Meng smiled without denying it and called Li Jin Yu in.
The man bent down to enter, fully exposed under the light—fair-skinned and youthful, like a celebrity. The tattoo artist looked at him with envy and whispered in Ye Meng’s ear: “Damn, you’re lucky. Another young guy?”
Ye Meng ignored her and said to Li Jin Yu: “Tell this lady what you want to tattoo. Just call her Sister Shi. ‘Shi’ as in lion. Sister Shi’s skills are excellent; the swelling will go down in two or three days at most.”
“Snap!” Sister Shi turned on the light of the tattoo station and gestured for the man to sit down. “What do you want to get tattooed?”
Li Jin Yu placed his wrist on the table: “Just cover this scar.”
Sister Shi had seen all kinds of scars and calmly glanced at them before confidently suggesting: “How about an EKG line? The length is just right.”
He didn’t care much about the design: “Whatever, as long as it covers it.”
“Alright then.”
Sister Shi was very efficient, without unnecessary talk, and got straight to work. Li Jin Yu had wanted to cover the scar with a tattoo before, but couldn’t stand how chatty tattoo artists were, always curious about his scar and about him as a person. He found it too annoying, so he never went through with it.
But unexpectedly, this Sister Shi, despite seeming like a gossip, was serious and efficient when working.
She stared at his hand without moving for two or three hours, her gaze never straying from the spot, showing her genuine passion for her craft.
“Sister Shi.”
Perhaps not expecting the man to speak, Sister Shi looked up at him with some surprise, then continued working. “What is it?”
“What does Ye Meng’s collarbone tattoo mean?”
Sister Shi smiled and gave him a meaningful look: “You want to know if it’s related to an ex-boyfriend, right?”
Li Jin Yu coughed: “Just curious.”
“Don’t worry, she’s outside and can’t hear us. She’s probably asleep by now,” Sister Shi explained. “She used to bring young guys here for tattoos often, but don’t misunderstand—she was just helping my business. That tattoo is her mother’s name, not some ex-boyfriend, so relax.”
“Her mother’s name is Wyatt?”
“Your English is pretty good. When I heard that pronunciation, I thought it was from some American TV show I watched,” Sister Shi looked at him with surprise, then continued, “Everyone has an English name these days. This name translates to something like ‘smart’ or ‘mysterious.’ Ye Meng gave it to her mother. She liked a movie at the time, and coincidentally, there was a mysterious and powerful character with this name, so she tattooed it on herself.”
After finishing, Sister Shi returned him exactly as he was to Ye Meng, who was sound asleep on the sofa.
Ye Meng could truly sleep anywhere. Half her face was imprinted with marks from pressure. She sat up and collected herself for a moment before standing up and saying to Li Jin Yu: “Let’s go. Did you pay?”
“Sister Shi wouldn’t accept payment. She said it’s on your account.”
Ye Meng sighed, not bothering to argue. “Let’s go then.”
Outside the door, there was a bandage wrapped around Li Jin Yu’s thin wrist, giving him a somewhat yandere look. He unwrapped a milk candy for himself, chewing it casually as he took out his phone and said to her: “Add my WeChat, I’ll pay you back.”
Ye Meng reflexively refused: “Forget it, it’s just a small amount. Keep it for yourself.”
Ding—
The trees stood motionless, and everything around was exceptionally quiet. Several small birds perched on the eaves, leisurely looking down at them in a row. Perhaps disturbed by a fleeting thought in Ye Meng’s mind, a cat on the wall was startled. Like a flowing shadow, it swiftly leaped onto the eaves, frightening the birds into spreading their wings and flying away.
A loud rustle.
Ye Meng, like a startled bird herself, looked at him, trying to grasp that fleeting inspiration: “What did you say? Add your WeChat?”
Li Jin Yu had already put his phone back in his pocket and was holding his bandaged wrist as if in pain, half-smiling as he walked away: “Too bad, big sister refused.”
Ye Meng melted at the way he called her “big sister.”
She instinctively reached out to grab him, eager to explain but accidentally caught his bandaged wrist. Li Jin Yu sucked in a sharp breath of pain and hissed, “Are you trying to cripple me?”
Ye Meng quickly apologized, but her hand seemed possessed and kept holding on, with an expression that said “How could I do that, my precious”: “I couldn’t bear to hurt you, baby.”
Li Jin Yu let out a muffled laugh, in considerable pain, his handsome face contorting unusually: “If you don’t let go, it’s going to get infected.”
Ye Meng finally came to her senses and quickly released her grip, looking concerned: “How is it, baby? Should we go back and check it?”
“Call me ‘baby’ one more time, and I’ll throw you in the lake,” Li Jin Yu said through the pain.
“Fine, if I could be held by you before dying, I’d be satisfied,” Ye Meng said shamelessly, without any sincerity.
“Are you mentally ill?”
Ye Meng looked at him directly, her expression unchanging as she said: “Li Jin Yu, I stayed here for you. If I hadn’t met you, I would probably have returned to Beijing by now.”
The pain finally subsided, and Li Jin Yu straightened up. Ye Meng had to look up at him again. He regarded her coldly and said: “Don’t think I don’t know. Fang Ya En said you couldn’t make it in Beijing anymore.”
Her sweet talk exposed, she sighed: “…Fine. There are other reasons too, like Beijing being a truly anxiety-inducing city. What about you? Why did you leave Beijing?”
Li Jin Yu was stunned, “Who told you I came from Beijing?”
Tattoos now require real-name registration, with ID verification.
“I just saw your ID card and the address—Chaoyang District, Beijing.”
Ye Meng had even memorized his ID number.
Li Jin Yu seemed lost in thought, gently twisting his wrist, as if mocking himself or perhaps avoiding something. After a long while, he said: “Because there, no matter what I did, I couldn’t gain anyone’s recognition, no matter how perfectly I did it.”
His gaze was profound but like a dead pond. This look stayed with Ye Meng for a long time, so much that later when she was in Beijing, she would often recall that there was such a person trapped in the small town of Ning Sui. A person who caused immense heartache.
“Li Jin Yu, I’ll take you somewhere,” Ye Meng suddenly said.
“Where?”
“A bar,” Ye Meng turned around to borrow Sister Shi’s car. Sister Shi threw the keys from inside the shop, and she caught them steadily. “Thanks, I’ll bring it back later.”
Sister Shi’s car was small and old, a manual transmission for running errands. It was a tight fit for a tall person like Li Jin Yu in the passenger seat. He nervously fastened his seatbelt and said, “Are you sure you can drive? Maybe we should just call a car.”
“Sit tight,” Ye Meng commanded with authority, forcing him to comply with a single order.
Li Jin Yu sat motionless, a tall guy of over 1.8 meters sitting like an elementary school student, waiting for her to start the car.
Ye Meng didn’t move for quite some time.
Li Jin Yu glanced at her and saw her frowning, lost in thought. He meekly reminded her: “I’ve fastened my seatbelt.”
Ye Meng suddenly became impatient: “Just be quiet for a moment.”
“…”
“…”
The twilight was vast and lonely, with no one around except for the cats occasionally lying on or scurrying along the walls. The only remaining living beings at the alley entrance were the two of them.
Li Jin Yu finally couldn’t bear it anymore and turned his head to look out the window. “It’s been ten minutes. If we don’t leave now, I’m going home to sleep.”
Ye Meng slowly relaxed her furrowed brow and pointed at the driver’s seat floor: “I haven’t driven a manual transmission for a long time. Is that the clutch or the accelerator in the middle?”
Li Jin Yu glanced indifferently: “That’s the brake.”