Chapter Twenty

Just a minute before receiving Li Tiancheng's call, Teng Zhi had finished organizing the photos and chat logs from the past three days on her phone.

Ye Yin's number was saved as a tiger emoji in her WeChat contacts. The chat page was empty, and she could swipe again to temporarily remove his name from the chat list.

I didn't take many photos, but they were all quite meaningful.

The bustling port at four or five in the morning, sampans with their waterlines lowered, a dazzling array of seafood, a golden sunrise, and the fading sunset at the end of the highway...

Ye Yin also appears in some of the photos, sometimes as a finger, sometimes as an arm, sometimes as half a body, and sometimes just as a shadow.

Reluctant to delete them completely, Tengzhi uploaded the photos to a cloud drive before deleting them from the album.

Li Tiancheng called, saying he had two more red lights before reaching the station. Teng Zhi's voice was sweet and gentle, saying she was already waiting by the passenger pick-up lane, and he would see her as soon as the car turned in.

The air was stuffy and humid, with no sign of autumn approaching.

The shuttle bus lane was bustling with traffic when suddenly a black BYD drove past. The somewhat familiar model startled Teng Zhi. She followed the car's path, but quickly realized that Ye Yin had already returned the BYD...

She took a deep breath, telling herself to calm down, and composed herself before the white BMW pulled up in front of her.

Li Tiancheng got out of the car and walked around the front of the car toward her.

Teng Zhi put on a gentle smile, her lips even curving upwards slightly, and called out softly, "Husband."

"Are you tired? Get in the car." Li Tiancheng bent down to pick up his suitcase, then suddenly looked at his wife, his gaze sweeping over her from top to bottom before finally settling on her face with a hint of surprise. "How come you look even more beautiful after just a few days apart?"

Teng Zhi suppressed her pounding heart, raised her hand to scratch the flesh on the back of her right neck, and asked shyly, "How come you've become so sweet-talking after just a few days?"

Her tone was light and airy, but her nails dug deep into her flesh, scratching so hard that the skin burned with pain.

—She went to the mall's restroom just now, washed her face, and noticed a small, light red mark on the skin of her neck below her right ear. It was a mark left by Ye Yin's last outburst.

With no other option, I scratched it even redder to cover up the product of my momentary impulse.

Li Tiancheng turned his head and pointed at her neck: "Why is it all red?"

"I don't know what kind of insect bit me, but it's getting itchier and itchier."

"There's some anti-inflammatory drops in the car, go get them and wipe it off."

"Yes, I see."

While Li Tiancheng walked to the back of the car, Teng Zhi used the same trick again. When she put her schoolbag on the back seat, she took out the watch face, which had already run out of power and turned off, from the storage bag and stuffed it deep into the schoolbag.

She glanced at the carpet and seats in the back. Li Tiancheng must have had the car washed; the carpet was much cleaner than the day she left.

However, she no longer needed to do the troublesome task of "looking for any long female hair." She only needed to wait for Li Tiancheng to return to the car, twist her body, tug at her seatbelt, and then mutter to herself, "Has my seat been adjusted? It feels so weird sitting here."

Then, with an innocent and feignedly suspicious look, he asked Li Tiancheng, "Has anyone ridden in your car these past few days?"

With a slightly heavier press of the accelerator, the car lurched forward. Li Tiancheng tightened his grip on the steering wheel and shook his head, saying, "No, it was probably turned around by the car wash worker."

Tengzhi "accepted" this statement: "Oh, that's possible."

In fact, the angle of the chair back and the position of the steering belt adjustment buckle are the same as the one she used before, with no changes.

Li Tiancheng took the initiative to talk to his wife, saying that when he went to his parents' house for dinner that night, his mother asked how Tengzhi's health had been recently improved.

—When they were newly married, Tengzhi really wanted a child for a while, but after trying to conceive for six months without success, the couple went for a medical check-up.

Teng Zhi was diagnosed with mild polycystic ovary syndrome, while Li Tiancheng's physical examination results were also not good, with low sperm motility.

They told their parents-in-law the truth about this, and Li's mother even seemed open-minded, saying that science is advanced now and there are many ways to get pregnant, so take it slow and don't rush.

But he still dragged Tengzhi to seek medical treatment, and Tengzhi obediently brewed Chinese medicine every day, one bowl each at noon and evening, and even the bitterest taste tasted sweet.

I feel so disappointed every morning when I looked at the single-line pregnancy test on the toilet, and now I'm so grateful.

After confirming Li Tiancheng's infidelity, Teng Zhi started taking Yasmin as a precaution.

If there were another child, she wasn't sure if she could still be so heartless as to leave so easily.

Outside the window, the lights flickered, and as the car turned a corner, the sparks swayed like a swing.

Teng Zhi had walked this road home from the East Station many times over the years, and it should have been very familiar to her, but at this moment, a sense of unfamiliarity arose spontaneously.

She came back, yet it's as if she didn't.

Teng Zhi thought that this change in mindset might also be related to the fact that the people around her had become strangers.

Even her own front door felt unfamiliar, even though the couplet for "May your family be safe and healthy" on the door was one she had commissioned to write half a year ago.

Li Tiancheng took his luggage into the house and turned around to find Teng Zhi still standing at the door, looking up at something.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

Teng Zhi blinked her sore eyelids and went inside: "It's nothing."

She looked around and saw that a cleaning lady would come every Sunday afternoon; the floor was clean and everything was in order.

She quickly packed her luggage, put her dirty clothes in the washing machine, and then went into the bathroom to take a shower.

There was no hair tangled in the drain cover, and the shampoo and shower gel looked normal, but the thought that these toiletries might have been used by Liu Ni, Yang Jiawen, or some other unknown woman made Tengzhi feel nauseous and gag.

She found a new bottle of shampoo and quickly took a shower.

As she bent down to wash off the last bit of foam, the bathroom door lock suddenly clicked, startling Tengzhi, who instantly tensed up.

Li Tiancheng, standing outside the door, asked in confusion, "Wife, why did you lock the door?"

Previously, when only the couple was at home, Tengzhi often left the door open when she went to the toilet or took a shower, so locking the door was indeed a bit unusual.

Teng Zhi pretended not to hear and shouted, "Huh? What did you say?"

"Never mind, it's okay, you go ahead and wash."

Tengzhi soaked in water for a while longer before stepping out of the shower.

Above the bathroom vanity are three mirrored cabinets. One cabinet holds Tengzhi's skincare products, another is used by Li Tiancheng, and the third is used to store miscellaneous items.

After washing up on Friday morning, Tengzhi, being cautious, opened several mirror cabinets and took pictures.

Then open her mirrored cabinet and compare it with the photo.

Sure enough, the placement of the lotion, cream, and moisturizer had changed subtly.

Tengzhi remained silent for a moment, then took down the face cream jar and unscrewed the lid.

She gets milia when she uses face cream in the summer, so since the return of humid weather, she only uses water and lotion for skincare and hasn't used face cream for two or three months.

At this point, there were obvious signs that the paste in the black jar had been scooped out.

Despite being mentally prepared, witnessing this demonstration, whether intentional or unintentional, still felt like thorns were growing wildly in Teng Zhi's chest, making her furious and wishing she could rush out of the bathroom and confront Li Tiancheng face to face.

But it wasn't the best time yet, so Tengzhi gritted her teeth and put the face cream back in its place.

She took out a sanitary napkin, unwrapped it, stuck it to her underwear, and then put it on.

Hong Kong dramas were playing on the living room TV. Li Tiancheng was on the sofa, pressing his phone, as if he was texting someone. But when Teng Zhi came out, he spun his phone around, assuming a gaming posture.

Teng Zhi pretended not to see and walked over while drying her hair: "What did you say outside the door just now? I didn't hear you clearly."

The classic theme music from the game's opening screen played from the phone. Li Tiancheng's eyes were a little ambiguous: "It's nothing, I was just thinking that we haven't showered together in a long time."

A chill crept up from the soles of her feet. Tengzhi suppressed the rising nausea and pretended to be annoyed, telling her husband to hurry up and take a shower after finishing his game so she could start the washing machine with his clothes.

The small balcony connects to the kitchen, and Tengzhi went over and threw the bath towel into the washing machine as well.

She glanced towards the living room and saw that Li Tiancheng had put his phone up again.

Tengzhi finally entered the kitchen.

The kitchen's "restoration work" was done quite well this time. Teng Zhi guessed that Liu Ni might have felt that the "kitchen protest" was far less effective than the "bathroom protest," or it might have been Li Tiancheng who cleaned it up.

Recalling Li Tiancheng's blatant innuendo, Teng Zhi couldn't help but tremble.

Both physically and psychologically, she was disgusted and afraid of Li Tiancheng getting close, let alone having sex with him.

She was afraid that if Li Tiancheng asked her to suck his penis, she would be overcome with anger and bite it to pieces.

"Wife, I'm going to take a shower," Li Tiancheng called from outside.

Tengzhi responded with an "okay".

Hearing Li Tiancheng's footsteps enter the bedroom, she breathed a long sigh of relief, took a bottle of unsweetened tea from the refrigerator, and walked to the sink to turn it on.

She took two sips, the coolness calming her anger, and subconsciously looked out the window.

Across several lanes was the building; many apartments were dark, including the small cubicle she had been eyeing for a long time.

Memories are like a scalding spring hidden underground, flowing out whenever it finds a crack.

Many scenes remain vivid in my mind.

Hot, lingering, and unrestrained.

Immoral, insane, outrageous.

Black, white, red.

Tengzhi shook her head, trying to dispel the lingering romantic thoughts.

Just as I was about to leave, a spark suddenly lit up in the middle of the dark, small square opposite me.

Extremely fine, extremely faint, the size of an ant, it disappears in a flash.

Teng Zhi, whose eyesight was poor, thought she was seeing things. She leaned forward, braced her hands on the edge of the sink, and squinted, staring intently at that spot.

My heart is pounding, thump, thump.

A few seconds later, the spark lit up again.

This time it lasted quite a long time, long enough for Tengzhi to confirm that this was not her hallucination.

Like a fire ant, it bit her eye, and a tingling, numb sensation instantly spread throughout her body.

She took her phone out of her pocket and quickly found the tiger emoji.

The chat window displays "The other party is typing."

————Author's ramblings————

Bad news: I can't finish writing 70,000 words (helpless).