snowstorm

The taxis in Hangzhou and Hong Kong are sky blue with low roof lines.

Bai Luo consciously moved closer to the edge of the car door, keeping as much distance from him as possible.

Bo Yu's entire head sank onto the cushion in the back seat. He shrugged his shoulders and looked at her with amusement through half-closed eyelids.

The girl was on guard against him as if he were a virus.

The taxi moved smoothly through the dim winter night, the interior filled with the scent of perfume left by the previous passenger.

The driver observed the good-looking pair of passengers through the rearview mirror. No matter from which angle they were viewed, their temperaments complemented each other.

Seeing the two people's clearly distant attitudes, he thought they were a couple in a cold war, so he spoke in a kind tone to mediate.

"Did you have a fight? It's normal for couples to quarrel. Your boyfriend just needs to comfort her more. Girls are more sensitive, so boys should be more generous."

In the dim back seat of the car, a man with a cold face and a fixed gaze was looking through the car window at the moving street scene.

One of them closed his eyes, but a barely perceptible arc appeared at the corner of his lips.

The driver was used to seeing couples arguing, and when he saw that the atmosphere between them had become extremely cold, he began to try to persuade them warmly.

"As a young couple, we quarrel at the beginning of the night and make up at the end. It's no big deal. Just talk it out."

"Boyfriends need to learn how to coax their girlfriends. Look, there's a cake shop down the street. Don't you know how to buy a cake to coax your girlfriend?"

Suddenly the steering wheel turned slightly and the car slid into the street.

Shops are lined up on both sides of the old street, and the neon lights of the cake shop signs are flickering.

"Go buy it, young man. I'll stay here for a while."

The emergency brake caused Bai Luoyin to lean forward due to inertia.

The words "We are not lovers" were still lingering on his lips when Bo Xi pushed the door open and disappeared into the endless night.

The dusk was intoxicating. The silhouette of the young man in the backlight made Bai Luo lose his mind.

He is nearly 1.9 meters tall, but his back looks so frail and lonely.

During the time they lived together, he always controlled the worldly affairs.

The figure cooking in front of the stove was silent and focused, but would call her name when the dishes were served.

After the meal, he insisted on taking away the dishes and chopsticks, just because he was afraid they would fall.

She felt that he was not as cold and indifferent as outsiders thought, and he was not someone who would keep strangers away. He just used loneliness as a protective color.

He clearly has a soft side, but he refuses to show it to others.

The street lights cast shadows of dead branches on the asphalt road. The wind blew through the empty streets, blowing away his messy bangs and revealing a pair of eyes soaked in darkness.

Bai Luo watched him push the door open and walk in, but his eyes were caught by the object in his hand.

This cake features a dancing crystal blue butterfly. Thin chocolate sticks outline the wings, and the top is dotted with sugar beads, making it look lifelike.

The driver glanced sideways in the rearview mirror, a smile crinkling his eyes.

"Hey, girl, don't be angry anymore. Look how thoughtful this guy is. He bought such a beautiful cake. Eating sweets can really make you feel better. Just forgive him this time."

"We're not actually a couple."

Bai Luo pursed his lips and finally forced himself to clear up the misunderstanding.

The driver's expression paused slightly, but was immediately smoothed by a gentle smile, and he changed his tone to a mature one.

"Oh, so you're not a couple. I see you two are both so good-looking, so you must be brother and sister."

He talked about his family's past.

"My family also has twins, a boy and a girl. When we were your age, we often quarreled, but now they have both started their own families and careers."

"The girl is a younger sister, right? Only a brother would pamper his sister like this."

The streets were deserted, and the sounds of sporadic vehicles speeding by were diluted by the night.

Bo Yu leaned against the back seat, forced a faint smile on his lips, and pushed the cake in front of Bai Luo's eyes.

"No, sister, brother shouldn't be so mean to you."

"My fault."

There is no sincerity at all.

“…”

The driver looked at them frequently, and Bai Luo could only pull the corners of his lips, forming an arc that was colder than the night.

"Thanks."

But the evil water in Bo's eyes kept rising.

"Thank whom?"

“…”

The car window was misted over, reflecting Bai Luo's stubborn and cold face.

He gritted his teeth and finally squeezed out a single word from between his frozen lips and teeth.

"elder brother."

The black earrings flashed in the night, and the smile that had been suppressed at the corners of Bo's lips for half a day finally disappeared.

"Be good, sister."

“…”

He is so infuriating.

The driver saw the undercurrent of reconciliation and happily drove into the deeper night.

Nanfeng Lane was bleak in the dead of winter, with only a dim lamp on at the entrance.

The two could not see the dim street lights, nor could they see the way out of life.

The cold light of the payment interface flickered the two people's fiery hair colors.

They both opened the door and got out of the car at the same time.

A wisp of warm fragrance wafted from somewhere at the entrance of the alley and hit my nose with the wind.

The wind was biting cold. Bai Luo sniffed and glanced at the person beside him whose hood covered most of his face.

"How much is the cake? I'll tell you later."

The street lights and shadows intertwined on Bo's face, half bright and half dark.

He stopped, tilted his head and looked at her, his clothes slipped off, and his cold white jaw was sharp and dangerous in the light and dark.

"The cake is free. Give me something else as compensation."

“…”

Today she had let Bo Yi take the initiative and was unwilling to let him get what he wanted.

Feign confusion and twist the subject.

"Would you like to accompany me with a cigarette?"

Without waiting for his next words, she took out a half-pack of cigarettes from her pocket, took out two and handed them to him.

Because of holding the cake, her slender white fingers were frozen and turned red.

"Give."

The cigarette was exposed right under Bo Xi's eyes.

The two of them had strolled around the grocery store, and the old light bulb above the door cast their shadows at an angle.

As if his eyes were stung by the thin white cigarette, Bo Xi suddenly lifted his clothes and hat, and the boy's whole face was suddenly exposed to the cold light, with heavy dark shadows under his eyes.

"Do I need your cigarette?"

“…”

There is indeed no shortage.

Just as I was about to ask "What are you missing?", a young tenor suddenly interrupted from the side.

"Beautiful sister."

Bai Luo turned around in surprise. The high school boy in the grocery store came into view.

His fingertips roamed across the screen, but he didn't forget to ask a question.

"Are you two a couple? Why did you come back together so late?"

“…”

Can't we be friends?

Seeing the evil intent in Bo Qi's eyes, Bai Luo spoke up to explain first.

"Brother and sister."

Pseudo-siblings with different fathers and mothers.

She really couldn't define their relationship.

They are strangers, but they are closer than strangers.

Although they are friends, they lack openness and freedom.

They say they are a couple, but they don’t like each other.

These two words made the boy's hands tremble while playing games, and he looked up from the screen in disbelief.

"Are you brother and sister? Seriously? You even have different last names."

“…”

It’s really hard to fool high school students nowadays.

"It's a bit complicated."

Bai Luo gritted his teeth and tried to half explain and half evade.

The boy nodded, not quite understanding, and looked cautiously at the depressed boy.

The more silent something is, the more it tends to make people think.

He shrank his neck and finally scratched the back of his neck embarrassedly.

"Okay, okay, I got it. I'll go check out the store."

Before entering the store, he couldn't help but glance at the two of them.

One of them is dangerous enough, and the other is broken enough.

The more dangerous something is, the more it can’t be stopped. The more broken something is, the more it can’t be picked up again.

When Bai Luo turned around to find Bo Qi's gaze, he smiled so hard that his shoulders shrugged.

In the damp night, a bit of desire emerged and slowly lingered in people's hearts.

"Sister, call me brother again. I haven't heard enough."

"Don't use single-syllable words, use reduplicated words."

Don’t want “brother”, want “brother”.

“…”

It's really infuriating.

He bent over and smiled so wildly that his collar fell, revealing the cold white skin below his collarbone.

In the dim light, a dark red tattoo caught a glimpse.

"Lamour ne perit jamais"

Translated into Chinese, it means "Love never fades."

There are two letters below.

BL.

BL again.

His WeChat name, the name of his bar.

The more hidden the mark, the more it makes people feel moved.

In her trance, the night wind carried the smiling voice into her cochlea.

"Just teasing you."

"It's freezing cold."

Bai Luo slowly came back to his senses and tightened his grip on the cake ribbon.

The open-air staircase creaked, and the wind blew away the silver-gray hair of the person at the end, revealing a pair of damaged eyes under the moonlight.

Suddenly, he pulled the white hood of the figure in front of him.

This caused the person who was walking steadily to stumble, almost losing the cake box, and even his clothes were pulled askew.

She turned around subconsciously, but unexpectedly the person behind her seemed to have planned it in advance and stood on the same step as her.

As the distance between them got closer, Bai Luo's forehead rubbed against his hot chest.

Intentional.

The faint smell of mint tobacco invaded her nose. She looked up dizzily and met a pair of seemingly innocent eyes.

But he took the initiative to spread out his palms unreasonably, as if surrendering, but also as a provocation.

"The wind is so strong that your hat is about to be blown away. I'm just holding it for you."

“…”

Bai Luo was too lazy to argue with him and continued to climb the stairs in the night.

Bo Yi followed her closely.

In the cold wind, two people were walking one in front and one behind, their shadows stretched out long. One of them ran away quickly with his back tensed, and the other followed behind with his shoulders swaying lazily.

The fog was too thick, and the rental house with the lights on was still dim, with the shadows of the lights and the dark gray swallowing each other in the corners of the wall.

“Snap!”

A cake was placed on the table.

"Do you want to eat?"

The cake was so huge that Bai Luo couldn't finish it all by himself.

Bo Xi, who was heading straight for the bedroom, glanced back. The moonlight leaked through the gaps in the clouds, illuminating the alienation in his eyes.

"I'm sleepy."

The figure gradually melted into the unknown night.

The people at the table were left silently swallowing the cake in small bites.

It's clearly sweet and appetizing, but there's a bitter taste on the tip of your tongue.

A suffocating silence fell in her heart.

I absentmindedly got up and went to the cramped bathroom. The faucet was gurgling and beeping.

Immerse your palms in the water, scoop up a handful of cool water, and gently pat it on your cheeks.

The fogged glass mirror was blurry, and she couldn't tell which was the illusion in the mirror and which was her true self.

Do you want to leave?

Why do I suddenly feel reluctant?

The bathroom was dimly lit, and a small piece of night light penetrated the glass window and fell right into the pupil.

In an instant, the mirror surface suddenly brightened, the water vapor evaporated, and the outline of the human figure in the shadow became clear.

She was so frightened that her spine shuddered.

The young man in the mirror was slumped against the peeling door frame, his eyes filled with a lingering hostility, as if he was trying hard to endure and restrain something.

I don't know when he changed into a sleeveless black T-shirt, and the evening breeze blew up the hem of his clothes.

Bai Luo stared at him with wet eyes for a long time and realized that he probably needed to use the bathroom.

When I was about to pass by him, a thin arm stretched out.

Blocked her way.

The faint jasmine scent of soapberries wafted over the sink, neutralizing the strong bitter taste of nicotine.

He just smoked.

"Don't you need the bathroom?"

The surroundings were dark, and the person in front of me had aggressive eyes and eyebrows, and his pupils were extremely aggressive when focused.

Bai Luo pointed his finger at the boundless night behind him.

"I won't bother you anymore."

Just as she was about to lean over and escape from his arms into the shadows, she was punished the next second.

"Must we go to-night?"

A pair of eyes quenched by ice.

Bai Luo's whole body stiffened instantly.

In the mirror, he saw a figure wearing only a thin T-shirt in the middle of winter, burying his cheek dejectedly in her sensitive neck.

The lights outside the floor-to-ceiling windows were dim, and the figures were blurred.

Bai Luo couldn't make out his expression, his hot and rapid breathing disrupted his breathing rhythm.

The winter night's humidity rose silently. Every breath they took was filled with the intoxicating scent of the two.

"Not really. We can leave tomorrow."

Seconds later, a self-deprecating sneer burst out in the dark night.

The weight on her shoulders disappeared, and Bo Xi slowly raised his head from the side of her neck.

He did not approach her eyes, but just stared with his eyelashes lowered, his pupils hidden in the shadows.

"Then you might as well just fucking leave now."

There was a deadly coldness in the hoarse voice.

A face filled with hostility appeared right in front of Bai Luo. She didn't know if it was her illusion, but the corners of his eyes were red and wet.

He had an aura of desolation and defeat, but that couldn't hide the sad red in his eyes.

Like a broken jar, he raised his eyes dejectedly and met the icy eyes that looked at him like a mad dog.

"Pack your things and leave quickly. Remember to delete WeChat as well."

But it made Bai Luo dazed for a moment.

When she was five years old, she was sent to live with her stepfather because her father was away for a long time.

But what awaited her was endless disgust and indifference.

At that time, her mother stood in the cold night, twisting a cigarette butt between her fingertips. Her words, "Hurry up and pack up and go find your dad," were like cold rain, extinguishing her last hope for warmth.

At three o'clock in the morning, she went to the police station alone and asked her father's friend to make her a bowl of hot noodles as she had not eaten for a day.

Keren was a loser after all, and later she got in touch with her mother again.

She gave her mother money, just hoping that her mother could give her a little false love.

She longed for maternal love so much.

Through the mist of tears, I could hardly see the bitter eyes of the person in front of me.

She couldn't grasp the ethereal love in her mother's palm.

But she also didn't want to hurt the young man in front of her who was as kind to her as her father.

In an instant, my heart began to bleed for no apparent reason.

The pain is so real, it's suffocating.

"sorry."

Stay away from her, a cold-blooded, cold-hearted person.

She doesn't deserve his kindness at all.