Shrine - Chapter 32
Chapter 32
The first thing Ruan Ruan felt was a wave of dizziness.
Then came the heart palpitations. She felt as if she were about to fall ill. There was a strong smell of engine oil in her nostrils, and the rusty scent of stale cigarette smoke that seemed etched into the skin of several men. The day's heat wave had turned into road dust that stuck to her face, her hair matted into a clump.
She felt like she was sitting in a prison cell, dazedly gazing at Shi Ran. She hadn't thought the environment in the vehicle was this bad before, but then she saw Shi Ran, standing there immaculately, like a figure in another painting.
She must be sick. Her eyes were burning, as was her breath. Her heart pounded weakly and erratically. She stared in a daze for several seconds before getting out of the vehicle, her limbs feeling powerless.
She stood before Shi Ran.
After blinking a few times, the belated realization dawned on her: Was it really Shi Ran? Why was it her?
It really was. Xiao Lin was there too, handing bottles of mineral water to the driver and the few remaining colleagues.
Shi Ran watched Ruan Ruan slowly get out of the vehicle. She saw her fumble for her phone in her pocket, then just stare at her without a word, the rims of her eyes red.
When a person is in a predicament, it's like they're battling their own emotions. Grievance, helplessness, and fear are things that must be hidden away. Only when they're certain they're safe do they dare to loosen the ropes binding those bad feelings.
Shi Ran saw that her jaw seemed to be trembling and wanted to step forward, but Ruan Ruan raised her forearm, holding it at her abdomen, and gave a small, trembling, prohibitive wave of her fingers.
Her face was pale, and she was utterly exhausted, physically and mentally. She desperately needed a hug, yet she restrained herself, keeping Shi Ran at a distance as she sniffled hard.
Her colleagues were all there. She couldn't hug Shi Ran. It was best not to speak.
Bowing her head, she swallowed the bitter taste in her mouth. Ruan Ruan tried with all her might to calm her emotions within her small frame.
The ringing in her ears subsided, replaced by the thumping of her own heart and the murmur of conversation. Xiao Lin was explaining to the driver that they had originally planned to eat at the foot of the mountain. When they heard from the crew that people were stranded, they decided to drive in to take a look. Luckily, they weren't stopped, and no one was on duty at the entrance, so they called for another car.
It would arrive in about ten minutes, she said, asking them to wait a bit. Shi Ran's car was full of props and couldn't fit so many people, so they would take the girls first.
Shi Ran turned coolly and got into the car. Xiao Lin supported Ruan Ruan's back, helped her into the rear seat, closed the door, and then returned to the front passenger seat herself.
It was too late to delay any longer. The driver glanced at the rearview mirror and reversed the car, backing out along the dirt road.
The space was cramped and enclosed, but the feeling was completely different from the previous vehicle. The heating was turned up high, and the car was filled with the faint fragrance of Shi Ran's usual skincare products. There was also the scent of her clothes, which, due to their expense, always carried a kind of cool, otherworldly aloofness.
Her business van was for her exclusive use. Xiao Lin often left fresh drinks inside, so there was also a faint, almost imperceptible scent of matcha.
Clothes, cosmetics, matcha... these things picked up the stranded Ruan Ruan and brought her back, gradually giving her the tangible feeling of returning to the human world.
In reality, there were no props piled in the car; no one dared to stuff things into Shi Ran's vehicle. She sat with ample space, lounging lazily. She unfastened the coat draped over her shoulders, took it off, and casually tossed it onto the back seat.
Ruan Ruan didn't ask how they had found out, or where they had turned back from. She simply understood a few more things.
The fact that Shi Ran could come back meant it wasn't impossible for the crew to do so. They just found it too troublesome, too much of a hassle. After probably learning who was stranded, they must have decided it wasn't necessary to find a solution. They might have even absolved themselves of responsibility, thinking, They'll surely find a guesthouse, get a warm meal, and have a good night's sleep.
Perhaps both Ruan Ruan and the crew were comforting themselves. The crew used "They'll be fine" to alleviate their sense of responsibility, while Ruan Ruan used "The crew really couldn't do anything" to stop herself from overthinking it.
That was why Ruan Ruan hadn't even thought of calling Wu Mei or any other friends for help.
Of course, it was also because the experience of toughing it out on location until dawn was not unfamiliar to her. She shouldn't be so melodramatic.
After meeting Shi Ran, she had gained a sense of security, but a weakness had also begun to grow within her. On the surface, she had never tried to contact Shi Ran, but the cowardice and fear that came flooding in were not necessarily unrelated to her. Because she had tasted something good, and because she was certain she would get something even better, she was more afraid than ever of loss, of change, of getting hurt.
When she had nothing, she hadn't even feared death.
Ruan Ruan silently turned her head to look out the window, remembering the little girl who had been blinded by a blow but still sat at the crossroads on a stool, smiling as she coexisted with the darkness.
"Are you still cold?" Shi Ran's cool, clear voice sounded by her ear.
"Not anymore."
"Your phone is dead."
"Yes," Ruan Ruan took out her phone, cupping it between her thighs with both hands. "I brought a power bank. I charged my phone once during the day, then lent it to Xiao K, and then it ran out of power."
Her voice trailed off as she spoke. Xiao K had taken her power bank with him. When he told her via WeChat, Ruan Ruan learned that he had left in the fourth car.
Shi Ran didn't speak again, and they didn't discuss where they were going. Ruan Ruan rested her forehead against the window, watching the mountain scenery gradually disappear as the road widened. They went from desolate wilderness to bustling traffic, from deep shadows to dazzling prosperity. It was as if she had experienced a long urban evolution.
Everyone on the street was a stranger, yet everyone was also familiar.
It was as if the scene had a sound. The bustling crowds of the night market were noisy to Ruan Ruan's eyes. Then the crowds thinned, replaced by silent high-rises. The business van drove into the familiar hotel's underground garage and stopped in front of the foyer for the suite's private elevator.
Ruan Ruan followed Shi Ran upstairs and swiped the card to enter the room. Shi Ran gave her half a glance, and Ruan Ruan went to the bathroom to shower.
She was too filthy. She didn't even want to speak until she was clean.
Women are always so easily redeemed by water. After washing away her exhaustion, Ruan Ruan let out a sincere breath of relief. She applied her face cream and came out. Before she even entered the bedroom, she and Shi Ran were kissing in the hallway.
They hadn't turned on the lights, silently exchanging only their breaths. She felt that Shi Ran had also changed into a silk robe and had used the same shower gel as her. Her hair was half-damp, like a natural diffuser. Ruan Ruan crossed her wrists behind Shi Ran's neck, using her fingers as a comb to slowly stroke through Shi Ran's long hair, and to sort through her own messy emotions.
When Shi Ran had kissed her fill, she pulled back slightly. Only then did Ruan Ruan whisper, "Today was very tiring."
She thought Shi Ran must be too, after a full day of shooting and more than ten hours of travel back and forth.
"Thank you," she added, her voice hoarse.
"Mm," Shi Ran accepted her thanks, her eyelashes fluttering. It had been a day of ups and downs. In the morning, the energetic Little Bread had come to get in her shot, standing obediently by her side. By evening, she had been abandoned in the mountains, without a single thought of calling her.
What kind of connection could they really be said to have? They were intimate enough to know each other's sexual pleasure points, yet distant enough that she wasn't Ruan Ruan's first point of contact.
"After today's shoot, you've wrapped up, right?" Shi Ran asked slowly.
"Yes."
"Will you come back to the set after this?"
Ruan Ruan touched the skin on the back of Shi Ran's neck. "Probably not, unless there are reshoots... Oh, there's one more event, an online one. Next month there's a joint livestream with Da Meng and the others. We'll be mentioning this drama."
"They'll be livestreaming some behind-the-scenes tidbits from the set. The crew said we can talk about interesting stories from filming and things like that."
Knowing that a chat session with the supporting actors wouldn't generate much buzz, the crew spoke cryptically, implying that they should tactfully steer the conversation toward the main characters. The marketing accounts could then push a few clips as a warm-up.
Shi Ran leaned in close, reaching out to pinch her earlobe as she lifted her eyes to observe Ruan Ruan's expression. "You could talk about today."
"Today?"
"You could say that I went to pick you up. That would generate a lot of buzz."
If Ruan Ruan uttered just half a sentence about it, it would be more effective than getting into a proxy photographer's shot ten times.
Ruan Ruan looked at her softly, her breath brushing against Shi Ran's cheek, and shook her head.
"Shaking your head?"
"I don't want to talk about it."
She met Shi Ran's gaze earnestly, her own look both gentle and profound.
A small part of her heart caved in. Shi Ran felt it. She blinked, her expression complex, then quickly pressed her lips together and released them. Then, amidst a faint rhythm in her chest, she tilted her head and pressed her lips to the corner of the mouth before her.
As she kissed her, she lifted Ruan Ruan's right leg and hooked it around her waist, taking her once while they were still standing.
They didn't finish, continuing on the bed. From clinging to her body to being pinned beneath it, Ruan Ruan was always so slender. Shi Ran captured her moans of uncontrollable passion with her mouth, but her mind was filled with the image of Ruan Ruan's quietly raised hand when she'd seen her in the mountains.
She had been so helpless and wretched then, like a discarded doll. Her reddened eyes and nose were full of hope—Pick me up, pick me up. But when the person she had longed for was about to bend down, she shook her head again, shaking it with forbearance and insistence.
Shi Ran had never truly understood Ruan Ruan.
She would hide her phone, hide nutrition paste, and deliberately try to cater to Shi Ran's tastes. Yet when Shi Ran had initiated their physical relationship, she had asked calmly and rationally, "What can I get out of it?"
She would state bluntly that she wanted to be famous and wouldn't let her agency take advantage of her. She would buy a popsicle to get into a shot, pushing her luck to create an intersection amidst the dozens of proxy photographers' cameras. And yet, in the deserted mountains, she had used her eyes to tell Shi Ran, "Don't come over. Don't hug me. Don't talk to me."
Her body was so passionate, soaking the spaces between Shi Ran's fingers, which showed just how much she longed to make up for that missed hug.
But what had she been afraid of at that moment?
She was afraid of the uncontrollable—not the uncontrollable eyes or mouths of others, but the unstoppable torrent of her own heart.
Ruan Ruan's eyelids were red again, tormented half by life and half by Shi Ran. Life trampled her into the valley, while Shi Ran lifted her to the clouds. Her eyes were red with pleasure, and red with pain. The two overlapped in the darkness, and both pleasure and pain became a secret.
Only Shi Ran had seen it. She watched the shape of this secret intently, with her body, with her soul.
The moment her soul sighed, she held Ruan Ruan and began to tremble lightly.
Ruan Ruan frowned, unable to believe it. Her hand reached down but was instantly stopped by Shi Ran.
"I already came," she said coolly.
Ruan Ruan felt the rise and fall of her breathing and said, stunned and speechless, "I... I didn't even touch you..."
How could that be?
Shi Ran got up, her breathing ragged and her gaze still unsettled. Strands of her hair hung down, brushing lightly against Ruan Ruan's shoulder. For the first time, she looked down at Ruan Ruan with a commanding presence, yet her voice was as low as if she were collecting night dew. "You don't know?"
"You don't understand?" She tilted her head slightly, the tips of her hair grazing Ruan Ruan's collarbone.
"I was very turned on."
"So I came."
She cast a faint glance downward, lowered her eyelids, and kissed the still-dazed Ruan Ruan again. But her hand fumbled for Ruan Ruan's wrist, guiding her fingers into a secret, wet place that had never been entered before.
Shi Ran leaned over and held her. Her chest tightened slightly, and she took a few seconds to adjust before saying, "Move."
Then she entwined her neck with hers, burying her closed eyes in the pillow.
Many people had coveted Shi Ran, but no one had ever cherished her through refusal. She was very turned on. Incredibly so.
She wanted Ruan Ruan to be faster, for her movements in and out to have no rhyme or reason, just like her advances and retreats that Shi Ran had never been able to predict.
Ruan Ruan felt like she was in a dream. It was as if she were still trapped in that valley, where the green mountains stretched out like Shi Ran's breaths, the shimmering lake surface became the light in Shi Ran's eyes, and she herself was just a weed, feeling the shape of the valley with her tiny life.
The shape of Shi Ran.
She understood. She knew. She was very turned on now, too. She gently rubbed her ankles together, wanting to give herself over as well.
Her thoughts drifted back to the moment Shi Ran got out of the car, and she thought hazily.
If only everyone who appeared in my life cared about me. That's too much to ask, isn't it? Then... if only Shi Ran cared about me, that would be enough.
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