Chapter 4141. My dear, I can't stop you from smoking a cigarette

Xie Kang stood there in a daze for a while, maybe a second, or maybe ten minutes, then rushed over and hugged Zhuang Yongyuan.

Zhuang Yongyuan's breathing was rapid. Xie Kang held him for a long time and said hesitantly, "I'm sorry, I was too angry just now. I didn't mean to leave."

Zhuang Yongyuan broke free from his embrace, squatted down, covering his face, and began to tremble. As soon as Xie Kang approached him, he grabbed a handful of sand and threw it at him, making Xie Kang's face covered in dust.

"I'm sorry, I won't do this again." Xie Kang dodged the sand thrown by Zhuang Yongyuan while trying to pull him to his feet. "It's too windy here. Can we find a place to sit down and talk slowly?"

Zhuang Yongyuan looked at him, but it was dark, and Xie Kang couldn't see his eyes clearly. Zhuang Yongyuan's voice calmed down, as if he was recounting something that had nothing to do with him: "What's the future of you and me?"

Xie Kang wiped the tears that had not yet dried on his face. The tears mixed with sand and dust felt sticky to his hands.

"Zhuang Yongyuan." Xie Kang cleared his throat. "I wasn't joking when I said I'd go back with you."

The purple-red glow faded, and the sky became dark blue, heavy and deadly blue.

"Zhuang Yongyuan, take me away, take me away from Pingnan." Xie Kang said.

"Then what?" Zhuang Yongyuan asked seriously, as if he was really starting to plan their future.

"Take me back to Shanghai. If Lily Heart doesn't disband, I'll accompany you in making songs, practicing, and even traveling to relax."

Zhuang Yongyuan sat down on the beach and lit a cigarette: "Can you still do it?"

Xie Kang kissed the minty smoke from his exhaled cigarette and said, "I downloaded some music arrangement software last week and tried it out. It's not the same as before. I'm not as good at it as before, but I can learn. I'm a fast learner."

His expression was a little smug. Zhuang Yongyuan laughed and said, "The last time you spoke like this was in high school."

"Really? It's been so long?" Xie Kang turned his head to look at Zhuang Yongyuan and asked him, "You didn't use any of the songs I wrote in college. Is it because I'm not a good writer?"

"fine."

In college, Zhuang Yongyuan wasn't very good at arranging music, so most of Lily Heart's songs were written by Xie Kang. These songs helped them gain a small reputation in the Shanghai band scene, but after Xie Kang left, Lily Heart's official albums were completely devoid of these songs.

While these songs may be a bit immature, given the level of talent Zhuang Yongyuan displayed on his first album, he's fully capable of adapting them into versions suitable for a full album release. This is a highly cost-effective approach, and if Zhuang Yongyuan is willing, he won't have to suffer the pain of not being able to produce a second album.

But Zhuang Yongyuan was unwilling.

Xie Kang asked again, "Are you worried about copyright issues?"

"no."

"Then you really hate me, so much so that you don't want Lily Heart to have anything to do with me."

Zhuang Yongyuan suddenly said, "I want you to come back to Shanghai with me right now. Leave now, start from here, and follow me directly to the high-speed rail station."

A moment of surprise flashed across Xie Kang's face. After hesitating for a moment, he said, "Shall I go home and get my ID first?"

Zhuang Yongyuan leaned closer and asked him, "Are you really leaving?"

Xie Kang nodded firmly: "Really go." He hugged Xie Kang tightly in his arms, kissed his face, and said: "I love you. I miss you very much, all these years."

He was so close that Zhuang Yongyuan could see him clearly. Xie Kang's eyes were crystal clear, and every word he said was without any falsehood.

Even if Zhuang Yongyuan could see through a little of the disguise, he wouldn't be in so much pain. He couldn't breathe smoothly, and his heart felt like it was being squeezed dry, dripping with water.

How can someone be 28 and yet look 17? How can he be so straightforward and frank?

Zhuang Yongyuan could hear something breaking inside him, and tears welled up in his eyes. He pushed Xie Kang away, shaking his head and crying, "You can't do this, Xie Kang, you can't do this..."

"I..." Zhuang Yongyuan's mood suddenly changed. Xie Kang stood there at a loss. "What can I do?"

Zhuang Yongyuan cried breathlessly: "You can't be the same as before."

"I didn't lie to you. I will really go with you."

"Have you ever considered my feelings, Xie Kang?" Zhuang Yongyuan tried hard to open his eyes wide and look at him. Even though he tried his best to hold back, big tears kept rolling down his cheeks.

"You can't be so nice to me like before and then walk away. Once is enough. I can't stand it. I can't stand it again."

"I don't hate you, I just hate you..." Zhuang Yongyuan covered his face and cried for a while before continuing, "I hate you for provoking me. It was you who said you wanted to leave. I finally got used to being without you, and you come to me again and again. Can't you see that I don't want to be with you? You're not stupid. You know it, but you still come to me."

"You know perfectly well that as long as you keep coming to me again and again, I won't reject you."

"Xie Kang, I just like you. Is it wrong to like someone? Why do you treat me like this?"

"Why on earth did you agree to come with me? You'll regret it later anyway and come back anyway, so why did you agree to come with me?"

Xie Kang clenched his fist, and the veins on his wrist bulged.

He had never seen Zhuang Yongyuan so broken down, as if pain was coursing through his veins. He felt so sorry for Zhuang Yongyuan that he wanted to hug him tightly and tell him that no matter what, he would stand by him.

But Xie Kang knew that promises are disposable. He had already broken his promise once, so he couldn't make another one. He was about to blurt out to Zhuang Yongyuan that he wouldn't leave him again, but the words slipped back into the emptiness in his heart.

He didn't know when it started, but Xie Kang no longer had the confidence he had when he was eighteen. He was afraid that he would really run away again as Zhuang Yongyuan said.

The words Zhuang Yongyuan said while crying made him doubt whether he had really done something wrong. Was he really too selfish to push Zhuang Yongyuan, who had just finally escaped, back into the abyss of uncertainty?

But Xie Kang had no choice. He couldn't do it. He couldn't pretend to be indifferent even if Zhuang Yongyuan appeared in front of him. When you are thirsty, you need to drink water. When you are hungry, you need to eat. How can a person resist his instinct?

Xie Kang wanted to speak, but he was speechless and could only keep wiping Zhuang Yongyuan's tears.

Zhuang Yongyuan cried harder and harder, until he couldn't even speak. He cried for an unknown amount of time. When he opened his eyes and saw the dark sea before him, a thought suddenly popped into his mind.

No matter how many tears you shed, they are nothing in front of the sea.

Thinking of this, he took a deep breath, slowly stopped crying, lit another cigarette, and gave one to Xie Kang. Xie Kang also looked very painful, and he didn't want Xie Kang to suffer. He held the half-smoked cigarette in his hand and kissed Xie Kang's face.

He grabbed Xie Kang's hand and put it into his shirt, speaking in a wanton voice. With his other hand, he untied Xie Kang's belt and leaned over to please him. Xie Kang responded immediately.

Xie Kang was startled, and the cigarette ash fell on the back of Zhuang Yongyuan's hand. Zhuang Yongyuan raised his hand and licked it off.

He was about to speak when he looked down into Zhuang Yongyuan's red, swollen, and wet eyes. Zhuang Yongyuan said, "Let's do it."

There was no one around, a rough-surfaced boulder standing alone on the seashore. Xie Kang carried Zhuang Yongyuan over, listening to his broken, sharp cries, which sounded like both crying and sneering, and he moved even harder.

Only this kind of joy between them now is pure and real. At least at this time, he can give Zhuang Yongyuan instinctive happiness.

What lust and waves have in common is their distinct scent. As the two scents collided, Zhuang Yongyuan lay weakly in Xie Kang's arms, sucking on his lower lip with reluctance.

After putting on their clothes, they sat back to back on the rocks, their hair blown by the wind and scratching each other's necks.

In the distance, the fishing lights on the squid-fishing boats lit up, emitting a faint green glow. Zhuang Yongyuan pulled out the last two cigarettes from his pack and put them between his teeth. With a crisp click of his lighter, Xie Kang turned and snatched a cigarette from Zhuang Yongyuan's lips.

Xie Kang stared at the fishing lights in a daze while smoking. If the world had an end, if the end of the world was behind these waves, he would walk in without hesitation.

Zhuang Yongyuan said, "I've never been to the beach before. The time you took me here on your motorcycle was my first time seeing the sea."

He added, "I really miss the days when the four of us skipped classes to practice and sang in the school radio room late at night. Back then, I thought we'd be happy once we grew up and left Pingnan, and became famous in our band. Now I realize that the happiest and best times are already in the past."

"I miss Li Xiuyu very much, and I also miss the former Du Jiahao."

Xie Kang asked, "Do you miss my old self?"

Zhuang Yongyuan turned around and looked at Xie Kang seriously: "Do you miss your old self?"

"I don't know." Xie Kang shook his head. "After leaving Pingnan, I realized there were so many things I didn't know."

Zhuang Yongyuan laughed and said, "Have you come to see our performances several times?"

Xie Kang remained silent, and Zhuang Yongyuan added, "You've been to every tour, standing in the last row."

From the first show of the first tour, even though the venue was very small, there were only five or six rows of people watching Lily Xin's performance. Xie Kang wore sunglasses and a hat, stood with his head down in the corner of the last row. Later on, the tickets were sold out as soon as they were released. In the crowded venue, he stood at the control desk at the back and watched the stage from afar, not missing a single show.

Xie Kang said, "I thought you didn't see it."

"It's not like you haven't been on stage before. If you want to see, every face is crystal clear." Zhuang Yongyuan tapped his cigarette ash on a stone and said, "And I asked the lighting engineer to add two sets of lights so they can slowly scan the audience below, so I can always find you."

Xie Kang remembered that he had once raised his head and noticed the two slowly wandering lights. At that time, he felt that the two lights were like a pair of eyes looking for something.

"Xie Kang, it's a good thing you didn't continue with Lily Heart. Being in a band isn't as fun as we thought." Zhuang Yongyuan touched the calluses on his fingertips and said, "I often regret it."

"What are you regretting?"

"I regret not doing that after you left..." Zhuang Yongyuan didn't finish the rest of his words.

Xie Kang said: "I am still very happy on stage."

"All the happiness I get on stage has to be repaid, hundreds of times over. It's even more terrifying than the loan sharking my mom took out."

“Isn’t it always fun when you write a good song?”

"When I write something good, I get scared." Zhuang Yongyuan paused and said, "I'm afraid I'll never be able to write something as good again."

"Do you remember that we used to like Yan Tong very much?" Zhuang Yongyuan looked at the dark sky. The moon was behind the thick clouds, and the moonlight was sparse.

"I remember. We also sent a demo to Yan Tong, and they replied with a lot of suggestions."

"The marijuana in Lily's pericardium was planted there by Yan Tong's people." Zhuang Yongyuan smiled bitterly and said, "Playing in a band is really not a good thing at all."

Before Xie Kang could reply, Zhuang Yongyuan continued, "Before I came back, I thought I'd be mad at you and ask you if you regretted it. I didn't expect I'd still love you as much as I did when I was sixteen."

He tilted his head and kissed Xie Kang's cheek, forehead, and eyelids, muttering to himself as he kissed him, "Why do I like you so much? Are you that good?"

Xie Kang also kissed his face, which was wet and salty, and their clothes were blown up by the sea breeze.

Zhuang Yongyuan was wearing earrings today, in both of his left ear holes. He suddenly ripped off one of the earrings, a plain silver one.

He pulled so hard that the piercing opened, and a few drops of blood dripped down. He placed the earring in Xie Kang's palm and said, "Music class is cancelled during finals week. My substitute teaching contract only lasts until early January, and then I'll return to Shanghai."

Zhuang Yongyuan was silent for a moment, then continued, "I was thinking of saying we shouldn't contact each other anymore after today, but after thinking about it, I can't do it."

"Don't come to see me off on the day I return to Shanghai. Then we won't contact each other anymore. We'll block each other's contact information. Don't come to my performances. I'll sell the house on Kaiping Street and won't come back."

"Zhuang Yongyuan."

"What's wrong?"

Xie Kang touched the end of his hair and asked him, "Have you ever thought about taking me away?"

Zhuang Yongyuan shrank back and said, "Xie Kang, I'll be scared."

He took a deep breath and continued, "I promise you, if one day I can't bear it anymore, I will leave you a suicide note and won't leave without saying a word."

His expression was calm as he spoke these words. Xie Kang calculated how long Zhuang Yongyuan would need to live with that constant desire to die, a feeling of being on the brink of death, before he could achieve such peace. That was Zhuang Yongyuan's life, Zhuang Yongyuan's life alone.

He's not his seventeen-year-old self, unapologetic and daring enough to blunder into another person's world and save them. He'd be afraid, he'd retreat, the prodigy in the evening paper faded and yellowed. Zhuang Yongyuan is also not the seventeen-year-old, sensitive and reserved genius who needed his own time. He shone brightly on stage. After six years of living alone, he's fully grown up, a capable frontman who swallows life's ups and downs in one breath and can even make decisions about matters of life and death.

Zhuang Yongyuan has changed a lot, but I still love him very much.

It’s not that Xie Kang doesn’t accept it, he just feels sorry that neither of them could reach the future they imagined when they were seventeen.

Xie Kang clenched the earrings in his hand tightly, and the earrings were deeply embedded in the skin of his palm, almost melting into one.

"Okay, I promise you," he said.

--------------------

I had planned a lot about the past timeline before, but when I envisioned the reunion line, it only had a starting point and an end point, and I always felt like something was missing. Before writing this paragraph, I realized it was missing a big fight and hatred! However, the fight was not as intense as expected. It seems that neither of them is the type to say harsh words to each other.