60 Chapter Fifty-Nine

◎I felt it myself; there were only two pockets. ◎

The music inside the room continued, but it had automatically switched to the next song, a Chinese song from a very popular band in China.

Li Yingqiao sang this song at the elementary school's New Year's Eve party, but she refused to sing it again after that. She didn't know why she insisted on competing with Yu Jinyang back then. Yu Renjie enrolled him in a street dance training class, and Li Yingqiao would secretly go to the audio-visual store at the entrance of Xiaohua City after school and save up the breakfast money that Li Shuli gave her for half a month to buy a cassette tape to learn.

Originally, she planned to showcase her talents at the New Year's Eve party the following year. After listening to her sing, Liang Mei asked if she was sure she wanted to go up. Li Yingqiao nodded vigorously; she had to go up and compete with Yu Jinyang. Liang Mei didn't stop her; after all, their class didn't have any other performances, so she reluctantly let Li Yingqiao go on stage. However, after she finished singing, all the teachers and students fell silent. In stark contrast to the enthusiastic applause after Yu Jinyang's dance, Li Yingqiao was met with complete silence.

The students, who were usually impossible to quiet down no matter how much the teachers scolded them, were eerily silent under the dominance of her singing. But Li Yingqiao didn't care at all; she did what others dared not do, and she wasn't afraid of others' opinions. An ordinary person's life is about finding a window to their own through walls that seem impenetrable; at least she had eliminated one beforehand. But she didn't really understand; her mother clearly said she sang quite well. Later, when Li Yingqiao grew up and learned the term "information cocoon," she finally understood.

Of course, she still heard some scattered applause. The person leading the applause was standing in front of her, and the speaker was still playing the song "Thorn Bird" that she had sung back then.

—Who pushed aside the wind in the sky? Your warm hand is my love.

Like the fate of the thornbird, tragic yet courageous.

—The sky is clear, my mood is blue, and I will never let go of your tightly clasped hands.

...

She could still recite the lyrics perfectly, and almost hummed them as she listened, but seeing Yu Jinyang's half-smiling expression, Li Yingqiao held back and just quietly looked at him.

She had considered waiting until he calmed down, and until she herself had calmed down, before talking to him. But he was right; if she calmed down, she might find him troublesome again and leave him. The ups and downs she had experienced at Convey over the years had exhausted her. The constant anxiety and the constant brand propaganda battles had left her with little room for expectation; she only hoped for a peaceful and uneventful life. She had no energy left to deal with anything extra, and Yu Jinyang was the most troublesome man she had ever met—too many unpredictable factors.

Then she switched to another song, a foreign song she'd never heard before. It was blues, the melody like a subtle, teasing caress flowing from a lover's fingertips, the rhythm seemingly tinged with sexy breaths, enhancing the atmosphere. They gazed at each other, quiet yet passionate, a fire burning brightly and subtly. The music in the room entangled them in desire, love, and hate, muddying the atmosphere to a murky turbidity.

“Do we?” she asked, looking at him. “I do this all the time in Beijing.”

He didn't answer, his gaze slightly averted. He was still half-sitting on the armrest of the sofa, his hand still around her, but the grip was much looser. He didn't dare to hold her too tightly, afraid of really hurting her.

Li Yingqiao tried to pull away, her wrist twitching. Yu Jinyang, like a trap, almost instinctively tightened his grip, his dry palm nearly completely enveloping her wrist. The physiological differences between men and women remained; if he didn't allow it, she couldn't easily pull away. Trapped between his legs, she could only raise her wrist and say in a low voice, "Yu Jinyang, are you going to act all high and mighty all night? Do you want to stay in bed with me tonight?"

The person whose name was called finally looked up, his eyes calm, like the deep sea under the night sky, where you could not see the waves crashing, but only hear the sound of the tide and a vast expanse of surging blackness: "What if I say yes?"

"No more offers after the expiration date," she said.

He was speechless.

The two remained locked in this stalemate for twenty minutes. Li Yingqiao moved like an ant, inching her way from the sofa to the TV cabinet, and then slowly making her way to the wooden wall in the entryway. Yu Jinyang held her wrist tightly, refusing to open the door no matter how much she struggled. His palm felt like a pair of handcuffs warm to the touch; with each struggle, his skin grew hotter.

She said helplessly, "Where's my phone? Stop messing around, I want to go home."

Yu Jinyang opened his arms open without hesitation, looked down at her and smiled, saying, "Feel it yourself, there are only two pockets."

Li Yingqiao glanced at his only two pockets and turned her head away: "I won't touch them, take them out yourself."

He remained silent, his back against the wooden wall as he looked down at her, unusually shameless, as he exposed his broad chest, insisting that she touch it herself.

Li Yingqiao reached into his left pocket, found it empty, then reached for his right, only to have his hand caught by the other man. As their fingers intertwined, he smiled and said, "Okay, okay, I'll open the door."

Li Yingqiao glanced at him and said, "Hurry up."

"My phone is in the bedroom. I'll go upstairs to get it. Wait a minute." Yu Jinyang straightened up, making a move to loosen their clasped hands, but as he looked down at her, he suddenly picked her up in his arms.

The sudden loss of balance caught the woman off guard, causing her to gasp in surprise.

"Yu Jinyang!"

Someone was punched twice in the back, the muffled thuds sounding like someone beating a drum to protest. But he still seemed unsatisfied, demanding a slap to vent his anger. Whether she had calmed down or not, she unceremoniously bit his shoulder and neck hard, her warm breath like that of a goldfish gasping for air, biting him repeatedly into the crook of his neck, as if gasping for breath after surviving a catastrophe. Only then did the commotion stop. The tense atmosphere instantly turned into a scalding silence.

For a long time, no one spoke, nor were any footsteps heard. Yu Jinyang stood in the middle of the living room, holding her in his arms. Moonlight streamed in through the window, but he didn't dare move an inch, standing there for a long time.

The only sound came from the living room, a barely audible whisper from a man and woman in a compromising situation.

Are you scared?

"What?"

"I really went up the stairs, and I already had one foot out."

"You'd better step out with both feet at the same time."

"That won't do, you'll fall. Li Yingqiao, I'm asking you one last time, do you want to go upstairs?"

"You're so annoying. Take it or leave it. Why all the callbacks?"

"Who started first? Who said it wouldn't be valid after the deadline?"

"..." She was speechless.

Brother Siyi's romance is truly everywhere; there are even speakers embedded in the ceiling on the second floor. Right now, the song has switched back to the lazy melody of "wait a minute baby".

As soon as Yu Jinyang pushed open the bedroom door, Li Yingqiao tilted her head back and kissed him. His reaction was not surprising at all; he even made a low "hmm" sound. His hand unconsciously gripped the back of her head, and he mumbled, "Wait a minute, I'll draw the curtains."

In fact, the two of them weren't idle while drawing the curtains. Yu Jinyang was being pestered for a kiss, and he didn't dare to dodge, afraid that she would get angry. So he turned her back to kiss her, dealing with her restless hands and feet while pulling the curtains. At first, he only responded lightly, but once the curtains were completely closed, he cupped her face and deepened the kiss without hesitation. Finally, he simply picked her up and placed her on the desk from their childhood, and they kissed slowly.

Li Yingqiao was completely out of breath, but he wasn't. He kissed her for a while, then leaned on the edge of the desk to let her catch her breath. When she calmed down, he lowered his head and kissed her again without any hesitation. After a few entanglements, his breath became erratic too, and he picked her up and carried her to the bathroom.

Then they remembered that the water was cut off today.

Li Yingqiao leaned on his shoulder and laughed: "What did I come here for today?"

"It wasn't a wasted trip." Yu Jinyang whispered in her ear, words that made her blush and her heart race.

Li Yingqiao felt like a scarecrow; he had only casually splashed a few sparks, and she was burned to ashes, surrendering completely.

Yu Jinyang's ears were almost completely red, so red they were practically bleeding, yet he still asked in a hoarse voice, "Want to? I can try."

There were no other sounds in the room except for some sticky noises—

It was as if the moonlight, dampened by rain, was being smashed onto a secluded bluestone slab, and someone was using their fingers to push aside the wet lake surface and climb ashore, dripping wet.

***

Li Yingqiao didn't sleep a wink that night.

From the moment she grabbed Yu Jinyang's hand and pressed it against her waist, and from the moment he grasped her waist in return, she nestled in Yu Jinyang's arms, desperately suppressing her breathing, like a fish thrown ashore by the tide, panicked yet waiting for the waves to crash down. Until she stopped panting, covered her eyes with her hands, and buried herself in his arms again.

Only after experiencing it did she realize just how absurd it all was. In truth, she, like him, didn't know how to maintain this type of relationship. Even more absurdly, from the moment she left, her eyes never met Yu Jinyang's again; they both looked away quickly.

[Author's Note]

Let's keep going tomorrow, we've finally made it through!

(Trembling) Help me up, I can still do more tomorrow!