BSS - Chapter 63
Chapter 63
Pei Qingyu blinked but didn't reply. She picked up a small, freshly cut ring of onion from the side and took a crunchy bite.
She chewed for a moment, then nonchalantly held the half-eaten onion ring to Deng Chuan's mouth. "You try it."
Deng Chuan didn't usually like onions, but since it was offered right to her lips, she took a bite from Pei Qingyu's hand. "...It's so spicy."
Pei Qingyu flashed a triumphant smile. "Tastes awful, right?"
"..." Deng Chuan frowned, swallowed it whole, and took a sip of the lemon water on the table. "It really is awful." She paused, then added, "Too bad Su Mian isn't here."
Pei Qingyu laughed uncontrollably for a while, then raised her glass of lemon water and lightly clinked it against Deng Chuan's, toasting to their lifelong spirit of mutual pranking. "I'm full. The rest is up to you."
Deng Chuan nodded and moved the remaining meat from the grill plate to her own.
She had always been good at finishing up the food at the table.
Deng Chuan didn't eat quickly, but every bite was substantial, and she had a sense of rhythm and order that was quite pleasant to watch. Just like now, as Pei Qingyu played on her phone while watching her delightfully nibble on a baked flatbread.
After the last bite of bread was down, Deng Chuan took the napkin Pei Qingyu handed her, wiped her mouth, and stood up to pay the bill.
Pei Qingyu followed closely behind her. Deng Chuan grabbed her by the shoulders and turned her toward the restroom. "Did you just touch the onion with your hands? Go wash them."
"Alright, alright." Pei Qingyu came out after washing her hands and held her dripping hands up to Deng Chuan's face, only to be stopped by Deng Chuan grabbing her sleeve. "Dry your hands."
She took the tissue Deng Chuan offered and asked while drying her hands, "Where are we going this afternoon?"
"My classmate gave me two tickets to a national opera," Deng Chuan said. "Want to go?"
The tickets were from Li Mingtang. She had originally planned to go with Zhou Zhi, but the second round of interviews for the Student Union was scheduled for Sunday afternoon. Since Deng Chuan was going out anyway, the tickets naturally ended up in her hands.
Pei Qingyu asked, "What's the show?"
Deng Chuan looked down at the tickets. "Yimeng Shan."
The two of them followed the navigation to the theater. Commutes in Beijing easily started at one or two hours. By the time they finally got off the subway and walked around the theater to find the entrance, the security check was already ending.
There was hardly anyone at the security checkpoint besides the staff. The two of them passed through and hurried into the hall.
Luckily, they found their seats just before the show started. Li Mingtang had bought good seats, directly facing the stage, not too far and not too close. Even though it was an afternoon performance, the theater was full. Perhaps due to the nature of the show, the audience skewed older. Deng Chuan and Pei Qingyu, being late and young, received some stares and glances.
The people around them were holding programs that had been handed out at the entrance, which had red cardstock covers. They had arrived too late to get one. Deng Chuan felt a little regretful. The grandmother sitting next to them noticed Deng Chuan looking at her program and kindly offered it to her. "They didn't give you one outside?"
Deng Chuan quickly thanked her, took it with both hands, and replied, "We were too late, they might have run out." The program contained a synopsis of the opera, a list of the cast, and the names of the arias, all in order.
She and Pei Qingyu huddled together, using the pre-show lighting to quickly browse through it before intending to return it to the elderly woman.
The grandmother waved her hand generously, pushing it back. "It's yours."
She pointed a thumb at the grandfather sitting next to her. "I've seen it before. I'm just keeping my old man company for another viewing."
The gray-haired grandfather also smiled and nodded at them.
It was hard to refuse such kindness, so Deng Chuan and Pei Qingyu accepted gratefully. The four of them chatted for a bit in the short time before the show began.
Once the live orchestra was in place, the performance officially began.
The chatter of the audience quieted as the orchestra took their positions. After a second or two of silence, all the lights in the theater went out at once. The sudden darkness was as if heaven and earth had blown out a candle. A moment later, beams of light gradually brightened, focusing on the orchestra. The place was the same, but this momentary shift from light to shadow made it seem as if one had entered a new world.
The conductor bowed to the audience, turned his back, and raised his baton. The gentle, soothing clarinet gradually came in, followed by the murmuring flow of the strings. The musical phrases repeated, the emotion building progressively. The opening overture contained a basic summary of the plot, and the orchestra's ensemble filled the entire space, growing from delicate to full, from gentle to tense.
After the narrative-rich overture, a basic background introduction to the entire opera was projected onto the screen behind them.
The live orchestra would play from the overture to the final act. As the introduction on the screen finished, the first act began, and the lights on the stage slowly brightened. Deng Chuan instinctively held her breath-
An overwhelming presence washed over her. Deng Chuan was confronted with a set that was several stories high, with the chorus standing atop a backdrop of rugged, craggy mountain ridges. The orchestra's ensemble and the chorus were powerful and magnificent. And when the soloists began to sing, she was even more astounded-their voices were rich and bright, piercing through the orchestra's wall of sound, carrying powerful resonance and abundant emotion. They danced gracefully throughout the theater, yet also pinned her firmly to her seat.
It was her first time experiencing a national opera. Whether it was the singing style or the performance form, the spoken lines or the sung phrases, the mezzo-soprano or the tenor, the solos or the chorus, not to mention the ensembles-everything was incredibly new to her.
The play unfolded act by act on stage, and Deng Chuan listened with wide, transfixed eyes. Her young heart trembled before this form of national art. The warmth and sacrifice amidst blood and fire were vividly expressed through the music. The actors moved among the magnificent stage sets, stirring up storms with a wave of their hands, and calming thunder and lightning with a nod. Every line they sang tugged at the audience's heartstrings.
On that stage was a vast world, a great story, and a fine show.
As the performance drew to a close, the applause was thunderous. Amidst the thunderous applause, the actors took their curtain calls in groups. Deng Chuan felt the applause in front of and behind her was like waves, pushing her forward. She was speechless for a long time, the shock in her heart resonating with the tide of applause, creating a slight ache, as if something were swelling up, about to break through the soil.
Life needs art. The thought flashed through her mind like an electric shock. Like a fledgling swallow returning to its nest, the fatigue and helplessness brought on by sleepless nights and social interactions since arriving in Beijing finally found a place to land. Just as Beijing had bared its fangs at Deng Chuan, it now also exposed its soft underbelly to her.
Deng Chuan realized the necessity and significance of further cultivating her artistic appreciation. Art is complex, and people are complex, but between one complexity and another, all that's often needed is a simple encounter.
Li Mingtang would never have guessed that a ticket she casually gave away would lead Deng Chuan to see national dance dramas, plays, concerts, and recitals throughout the rest of her university years. Beijing's rich cultural and artistic resources were like water to a fish for her, providing her with much comfort in the life that followed.
Of course, the Deng Chuan of this moment didn't understand that yet. She was simply deeply shaken and deeply captivated, unable to speak even after the show ended.
Pei Qingyu noticed her strange behavior and asked, "What's wrong?" As she asked, her gaze was unconsciously drawn to the flower baskets at the entrance. "Wow, the signatures on these are so over the top…"
It turned out that today was the Beijing premiere of Yimeng Shan. It had also come from another province, and after being designed and perfected by the people of its birthplace, it was finally beginning its national tour, starting with the Beijing stop.
Deng Chuan thought to herself that she would look it up later. If its tour passed through her hometown, she would go see it again with Xu Wei.
It was sunset, but the sun was still hanging brightly in the sky. The two of them took another long and tedious commute, had dinner near Pei Qingyu's university, and then parted ways.
Deng Chuan sat on the subway back to school. The car was packed, squeezing her into a corner. The crowd finally brought her dazed and drifting mind from the afternoon back to its place. She sighed and shifted to the side a little more.
Back at the university, Deng Chuan threw herself back into her intense and busy academic life. Compared to her roommates who spent all day in the dorm shipping CPs and watching dramas, she was so busy she barely touched the ground, and pulling all-nighters was a common occurrence. But that's how university was; you could choose your exhaustion. All choices were up to you.
Such is life.
By Thursday, the initial draft of her group's project proposal for the Innovation and Entrepreneurship Competition was finally submitted. She could finally catch her breath and start planning for the upcoming eight-day-long National Day and Mid-Autumn Festival holidays.
She opened her suitcase in the dorm and began to pack for home.
Li Mingtang's guild battle had just ended in victory. She turned to watch Deng Chuan pack and chatted with her idly.
The fan overhead whirred. As Deng Chuan filled her suitcase with clothes, she was calculating in her head. They had been together for three months now. She wanted to give Xu Wei a gift. With the money she had saved up, plus what she earned from the part-time job with Gu Ninglu, she had a good amount of liquid funds on hand, enough to buy Xu Wei a significant present.
But what should she get? Deng Chuan was stumped. She had never seen Xu Wei have any particular material desires. Books seemed too rigid, flowers too ordinary, and she might not accept expensive clothes or necklaces.
Watching from the side, Li Mingtang thought Deng Chuan looked particularly troubled as she furrowed her brow in thought. She snapped her fingers at her to get her attention and asked, "What are you thinking about?"
Deng Chuan said, "What do you think… would be a suitable gift that's both meaningful and won't be rejected?"
Li Mingtang said, "That depends on who you're giving it to."
"Um… it's for a friend." Deng Chuan hesitated for a moment before saying, "My girlfriend."
Li Mingtang wasn't surprised, just thoughtfully continued the topic of what to give. "Then you should… give her something that's meaningful to both of you?"
"What counts as something meaningful?" Deng Chuan looked up at her.
"Clothes? A bag? A necklace? A book?"
Deng Chuan said with difficulty, "I'm afraid not."
The items Li Mingtang suggested were all things Deng Chuan had already considered. She explained her reasoning for each one to Li Mingtang. Li Mingtang was stumped by her questions, and both of them fell into thought. The room was silent for a while.
By the time Deng Chuan finished packing and closed her suitcase, standing it upright, Li Mingtang was still deep in thought. Deng Chuan couldn't help but interrupt her with a smile. "Alright, stop thinking about it. I'll think more about what she likes. If not, I'll just take her on a trip."
Li Mingtang said, "Taking your girlfriend on a trip during National Day? You'd better not."
Everyone in the dorm was going home except for Xie Yao. Xie Yao, who was playing on her phone nearby, chimed in, "Deng Chuan, you can take me out. I don't mind."
"Forget it. Why don't you come home with me? Big sister will treat you to good food and drinks, and show you the sea of people at the Forbidden City during National Day week," Li Mingtang invited enthusiastically.
Zhou Zhi asked, "Are you going to see the Forbidden City or the people?"
"The people, of course," Li Mingtang said matter-of-factly. "Because you won't be able to see anything else besides people."
Xie Yao mimicked her, trying to roll her tongue. "So that's how an Old Beijinger treats me? I'd rather just stay in the dorm." The next second, she exclaimed, "Hey- Deng Chuan, why don't you get this? The new ring from G-brand. Look-"
The three of them gathered around to look at her phone screen. It was a pair of simple, plain rings engraved with G-brand's iconic double-G pattern, without any other flashy designs. "Is this a couple's ring?" Deng Chuan found it a bit strange. It was clearly a pair, but the two rings were about the same size, making it hard to distinguish between a man's and a woman's.
"Yeah, it's unisex. The design concept seems to be about blurring gender and loving bravely. What do you think? Doesn't it fit your requirements perfectly? And it's super meaningful."
Li Mingtang acted as the hype man from the side. "Wuhu!"
Zhou Zhi also commented, "It's quite nice."
Deng Chuan was tempted. "Okay. Send me the picture. I'll check it out on the official website later."
Xie Yao quickly sent her the picture. Deng Chuan went to the G-brand's official website and saw that the price was higher than in physical stores or through personal shoppers, but it offered custom greeting cards and next-day delivery with gift packaging.
Deng Chuan happily placed the order for the sake of the greeting card.
The holiday started tomorrow, so everyone in the dorm tacitly agreed to stay up late. Li Mingtang was playing games with Zhou Zhi, and Xie Yao was watching a documentary. Deng Chuan organized the things she needed to take with her tomorrow and said goodnight to Xu Wei on WeChat.
It was already past midnight. Xu Wei had a very regular schedule and didn't like Deng Chuan staying up late. Knowing she had just finished a busy period, she urged her to rest soon.
Deng Chuan kept her secret, said goodnight as usual, and typed: Going to sleep.
Xu Wei replied: Okay.
And added another instruction: Go to sleep right now.
Deng Chuan sent back a sticker of a kitten saluting: Roger!
There were no more messages from Xu Wei's side; she had probably really gone to rest. Deng Chuan put her phone away and snuggled under her covers.
But she couldn't fall asleep that night.
Tossing and turning, it was the same kind of insomnia as the night before a school field trip as a child. Deng Chuan lay in bed quietly counting her own heartbeats. The lights outside her bed curtain went from on to off, but the excitement in her chest didn't diminish in the slightest.
Deng Chuan thought: I've already filled my backpack with snacks.
She couldn't help but smile.
The next morning, Deng Chuan was woken by the sound of Zhou Zhi closing the dorm door as she left for home. She had been sleeping lightly, and after being woken up, she couldn't get back to sleep. So she got up and did most of the group topic selection work required for her Situation and Policy course. When her group members woke up and saw the progress, they flooded the group chat with stickers thanking the "big boss."
Deng Chuan asked them in the group chat: Take a look, do you have any other suggestions?
Everyone chimed in: Nope, none at all. It's perfect.
Her behavior of doing homework on the first day of vacation earned her strong contempt from Li Mingtang and Xie Yao. Li Mingtang had been too strictly controlled by her family before, so she didn't even want to go home for the holiday. She really did drag Xie Yao off to experience the Forbidden City on National Day.
The two of them left noisily, and the dorm finally fell quiet.
Deng Chuan did her homework, read for a while, and then said good morning to Xu Wei, who woke up punctually at nine. Xu Wei asked if Deng Chuan had gone out to have fun. Deng Chuan thought for a moment and sent Xu Wei all the photos Pei Qingyu had sent her.
Pei Qingyu had gone to Shichahai with her new roommates early in the morning. She didn't see the sea, nor did she get to row a boat, but she did see circles and circles of people. Even the old men who usually came to fish had completely closed up shop for National Day week, leaving the place to the tourists.
Xu Wei was shocked by the number of people in the photos. She couldn't directly tell Deng Chuan to stop having fun, so she just tactfully suggested that since the weather was so hot, it might be better to stay in the dorm to avoid heatstroke.
Deng Chuan didn't forward Xu Wei's original words to Pei Qingyu. She simply and crudely summarized the main point of Xu Wei's message and told Pei Qingyu: Wouldn't it be better to go wherever it's cool?
Beneath her message of advice, Pei Qingyu angrily sent another photo from a cat cafe, indicating that she wasn't foolish enough to wander around outside under the hot sun. Su Mian, who had stayed up all night, spammed a long string of "hahaha"s in response.
They joked and bantered until noon, when Deng Chuan went downstairs to get her takeout. The corridor was silent, and time seemed to be stretched into a thin veil of gauze, descending like the first snow, covering Deng Chuan's brow and shoulders.
Tracing the marks of time, Deng Chuan suddenly remembered the snow from half a year ago-that was also a first snow. To be honest, she could no longer fully recall or experience the feelings of that time. Human memory cannot defeat time, just like a faded old photograph. But she had truly walked out of that period, and she would never forget how she had once run through the first snow, her heart and eyes filled with nothing but the desire to see Xu Wei. The sense of contrast brought by time is the most profound experience. Deng Chuan felt an involuntary sense of loss amidst forgetting and remembering, while also thinking with a sigh, Fortunately, I still love her.
Time flew by, and soon it was evening.
Flights before National Day were popular, so she could only get a late-night one.
Deng Chuan wasn't sleepy. She found her seat and stared out the window in a daze.
Outside the window was the dim yellow tarmac, the faint lights sketching out the massive shape of half a wing. It was the pre-flight inspection phase. Ground crew and maintenance vehicles came and went, but through the window, looking down from above, Deng Chuan couldn't hear the noise. She could only glimpse a busy world, silently unfolding beneath her eyes.
On a flight just before National Day, most of the passengers were young people returning home. As soon as they sat down, everyone uniformly pulled out their various electronic devices, lingering in the online world for the last ten-odd minutes before takeoff, rushing to type, work, chat, browse websites, and scroll through information.
No one chatted idly, and no one cared about the moon tonight.
Tomorrow was National Day, and also the Mid-Autumn Festival. This late-night flight was taking off for that very reason. The night was black as ink, but the destination was a sea of household lights, making even the moonlight seem particularly dim in comparison.
That made sense. Tomorrow was the moon's main event.
Only Deng Chuan was thinking about it.
She had been thinking for a while now. From the sleepless night before, to the quiet afternoon, to leaving in the evening, from the subway to the airport and through security and waiting at the gate-whether consciously or not, she had been thinking.
The closer she got to Xu Wei, the more she thought.
Even after the plane climbed into the stratosphere, and the world outside the window was pitch black, with only the warning lights on the wing flashing, she was still thinking.
This line of thought continued for a long time and completely deviated from her usual way of thinking. It was neither focused nor efficient, and could probably be loosely classified as random wandering. From the dorm to the subway to the plane cabin, the moonlight along the way went from concentrated to sparse, extending vertically into a curtain of thin mist, causing her thoughts to scatter along with it. Through the window, the night was too close, making Deng Chuan's heart tighten, a dull feeling, as if something was about to happen. The cabin lights were still off, leaving only the faint glow of the emergency lights above the passengers' heads, which fell on her eyelids, just like tonight's moonlight.
And so, the moonlight from inside and outside the window sprinkled all over her head and face. The moonlight was gentle, gazing at her in the darkness. The night, in turn, gave the moonlight a vast, cosmic expansiveness, making it like a long firework, burning all the way from Beijing to the flight's destination, its embers still warm.
Just as distant as her gaze cast out the window.
Lost in such boundless contemplation, Deng Chuan couldn't perceive the passage of time. Or perhaps, this contemplation was itself a way of killing time. It wasn't until the plane landed at the airport of her familiar city and taxied along the runway that she dazedly came back to her senses.
She followed the crowd onto the shuttle bus. It was very crowded, an unavoidable crush of people. Standing next to Deng Chuan was a young mother with her child. The little girl hugged her mother's leg tightly and asked in a small, soft voice, "Are we home yet?"
The child's voice was particularly clear in the crowd, and for a moment, more than half the people on the bus were paying attention to their conversation.
The mother said, "Yes- we're here. Once we get to Grandma and Grandpa's house, we'll take a bath, and tomorrow you can play with them. Are you happy, Niu Niu?"
The little girl answered loudly, "Happy! I like Grandma and Grandpa!"
The little girl looked up at Deng Chuan and tentatively reached out to touch her pants, but her mother quickly grabbed her hand and said apologetically to Deng Chuan, "I'm so sorry."
Deng Chuan nodded at her, indicating it was fine.
She heard the mother quietly telling her child, "You can't just touch the big sister."
"Why not?"
"Because the big sister is going home too. You're not family with her, so you can't just touch her."
The little girl nodded blankly. After a moment, she spoke to Deng Chuan again in a small voice, "Big sister…"
Deng Chuan looked down at her, waiting patiently for her to continue.
The little girl held it in for a moment, then asked, "Are you about to be home too?"
Deng Chuan nodded and heard herself reply, "Yes, I'm about to be home too." She paused, then added softly, "I like her very much too."
The little girl's eyes widened, perhaps not fully understanding what she meant, but Deng Chuan's heart felt lighter.
The shuttle bus took them to the baggage claim hall. Deng Chuan got her luggage and walked out through the exit. It was late, and there were plenty of empty taxis in the arrivals lane, with not many people in line. She got into a car quickly.
The streetlights along the way flickered on and off. The night should have been colorless, but the moonlight and the city lights were too dazzling. Staring at the flashing scenery outside the window, Deng Chuan suddenly had the illusion that none of this was real.
The taxi stopped at the entrance of the familiar residential complex. Deng Chuan scanned the code to pay, said thank you and goodbye to the driver, and then pulled her suitcase into the complex.
She had the entry code to Xu Wei's complex. The beeping sound of the keypad echoed far in the late night. The security guard in the booth gave her a few extra glances-an uninvited guest in the dead of night.
She walked faster than she thought, faster than she had imagined. When she came to her senses, she was already standing at Xu Wei's door.
It was the middle of the night. Opening the door directly might scare Xu Wei. Deng Chuan leaned against the door and thought for a moment, then decided to call her.
Before meeting, Deng Chuan had thought about how to surprise her, how to coax her into opening the door. But in the silent hallway late at night, everything was quiet. When Xu Wei's voice came through the receiver, there was a sense of everything falling into place.
Deng Chuan simply said, "Open the door."
Xu Wei didn't say anything on the other end, but the call remained connected, not hung up.
Deng Chuan waited quietly for a moment, and soon, she heard a soft click from the lock.
Xu Wei opened the door and looked at Deng Chuan from across the threshold.
The lights in the apartment were off, the hallway light was out too, and only the moonlight spilled in from the balcony. Xu Wei was wearing a nightdress, standing before her, her exposed skin as white as pure snow.
Deng Chuan suddenly understood what she had been pondering all along the way. In that instant, she grasped the connection between the three: "moonlight-night-Xu Wei."
It was a purely intuitive discovery. Only a romantic lover would connect all these things. This conceptual realm was a world no one else had entered. She was the only Peter Pan in this world.
Everything was silent, only the moonlight in the night flowed over Xu Wei's body. Deng Chuan's heart was trembling, but her face showed no sign of it. She just smiled and opened her arms to Xu Wei.
Without a hint of hesitation, Xu Wei uncharacteristically took the initiative to rush forward and hug her. Deng Chuan saw her bare feet dance and land innocently on the floor a few times, like a bird, flashing past her eyes in an instant.
She hugged her back tightly and asked her:
"Why aren't you wearing shoes?"
Xu Wei hugged her, tilted her head up, and murmured an answer that was beside the point right next to her ear, "I guessed."
They both laughed, their laughter and warm breath spraying intermittently into each other's ears. Deng Chuan held her for a while, then took the initiative to let go. "I'm all dirty," she said softly. "I'll go take a shower first."
Xu Wei didn't let go. With her arms around her neck, she moved closer and enunciated each word, "You're hugging me even though you're dirty."
The way she said it sounded so much like she was pouting that Deng Chuan's heart immediately started to race. She mumbled defensively, "I just want to hug you," and wrapped an arm around her to lead her inside.
The two of them walked into the apartment, wrapped in each other's arms. The suitcase was pushed only as far as the balcony and then forgotten. It was Xu Wei who brought it in for Deng Chuan later.
The air conditioner was on in the bedroom. The cool air that greeted them was mixed with Xu Wei's scent, and Deng Chuan felt almost tipsy. The light hadn't been turned on yet. Hearing the door open, Zhou Liu scrambled off the bed and came over, weaving around their feet.
Xu Wei reached out to turn on the light, kissed the Little Friend's travel-worn cheek, and went to run a bath for her.
Deng Chuan crouched down and reached out to pet Zhou Liu, who was fawning all over her. Zhou Liu rubbed against her hand, meowing with a rare coyness, then rolled over to expose his soft belly, looking at Deng Chuan expectantly.
Deng Chuan decided to sit cross-legged on the floor, rubbing his belly and scratching his chin, thoroughly pampering him from head to tail.
Feeling satisfied, Zhou Liu climbed onto Deng Chuan's lap and tried to crawl up her body. The two of them were fooling around when they heard Xu Wei say softly from behind, "The water's ready. Go take your bath."
She glanced at Zhou Liu, who was snuggling in Deng Chuan's arms, but said nothing, turning to go to the balcony to get Deng Chuan's luggage.
Deng Chuan put Zhou Liu on the floor and followed her, trailing closely behind.
Xu Wei allowed her to follow, a slight smile on her lips. She only turned her head slightly when Deng Chuan got close. "Go take your bath," she said. "The water will get cold."
Deng Chuan said, "I'll go if you let me kiss you."
Xu Wei didn't speak, but Deng Chuan clearly caught the smile in her eyes and took it as a silent agreement. She moved closer, gazing into her eyes, which were just inches away, and then gently touched her lips.
Neither of them deepened the kiss. It was a light, fleeting touch. Deng Chuan's lips lingered against Xu Wei's, nuzzling her like a spoiled child. She had really missed her. Xu Wei squeezed the back of her neck, pulled back a little, and said gently, "Alright- aren't you hot? Go on now."
Xu Wei had run the bathwater for her, and a change of clothes was ready, draped over the towel rack. The hot water melted away all the tension and fatigue from Deng Chuan's day. She soaked in the bath for a good while before getting dressed and walking into the bedroom, drying her hair.
Xu Wei was leaning against the headboard, playing with Zhou Liu with a ball. As soon as she saw her come out, both person and cat turned to look at her.
"Are you hungry?" Xu Wei asked her. Before Deng Chuan could answer, she added, "Just so you know, even if you are, there's only instant noodles."
Deng Chuan said, "I'm not hungry. Are you? I can make you egg noodles."
Deng Chuan couldn't cook, but she had learned to make egg noodles during a two-day, one-night get-together with the Photography Association. She had served it to her classmates who were starving after playing mahjong all night, and it had received unanimous praise.
Xu Wei raised an eyebrow. "I'm not hungry. I'll try it some other time."
The ends of Deng Chuan's hair were still dripping. She sat down at Xu Wei's vanity and started blow-drying her hair. Xu Wei had intended to go help her, but looking at her back, she suddenly changed her mind.
The hairdryer hummed continuously. Deng Chuan focused on drying her hair in its warm blast. When she glanced up, she saw in the mirror that Xu Wei had been watching her the whole time.
She watched her back without a word, carefully tracing Xu Wei's features in the mirror-her beautiful eyes, her calm brow, her slender shoulders. Their gazes met on the mirror's surface, clear and symmetrical, a tender affection reflected in their mutual stare.
Deng Chuan finished drying her hair and, under Xu Wei's gaze, lay down beside her.
The bedding was soft and smelled entirely of Xu Wei. Deng Chuan quietly scooted closer to Xu Wei and watched her reach out to turn off the lamp.
The room instantly went dark. Deng Chuan felt Zhou Liu step over her calf. He had never seen two people in the bed before, and his usual sleeping spot had been taken by Deng Chuan, so he could only curl up aggrievedly at the foot of the bed.
Deng Chuan reached out to wrap her arm around Xu Wei's waist and felt Xu Wei's arm gently drape around her neck.
Xu Wei's warm, unguarded body fell into her embrace. "Teacher Xu," Deng Chuan called softly, feeling Xu Wei's hand respond at her neck. She closed her eyes, her long lashes resting obediently, and murmured soothingly, "It's very late, go to sleep…"
The room was pitch black, the moonlight blocked outside. Xu Wei's murmur made Deng Chuan's heart melt completely. All the long journey and stubborn persistence had finally landed in such a soft, warm embrace. "Xu Wei," Deng Chuan called out again, like a small, contented sigh.
Comments
Post a Comment