Chapter 109 I'm used to it...
I'm used to it...
Did her presence leave any weight in his heart over the years?
That night, Ye Yuying fell asleep very late, and that feeling of confusion returned. She thought she would see her aunt again.
But after passing through the thick white fog, she did not see her aunt or her grandmother. Instead, she saw the tightly closed gate of the Cheng family from many years ago.
She looked down and saw that she was clearly wearing that dress from that year that had a very sculpted back; it looked glamorous, but you could tell at a glance that it was cheap.
Her figure had shrunk, and she was completely covered in cheap clothes from a street stall. Her back was still covered in abrasions from the clothing tags, which were itchy and painful.
But Jiang Xinxue, who was beside her, wouldn't allow her to raise her hand to scratch.
With a click, two heavy red lacquered wooden doors were opened by an invisible hand. Jiang Xinxue took her hand and led her through one open door after another into the seemingly endless courtyard.
At the far end of the courtyard, a sleepy-eyed, listless young man in white stood on the terrace.
That was how she looked when she first saw him; his temperament was exceptionally clean, his figure tall and upright, like a gentle, sculpted figure from white jade.
When she opened her eyes again, she suddenly found herself lying on a small bed in the attic, her legs were a little wet. When she lifted the blanket, she saw a scene of blood, like a murder scene.
Her dream of her first period filled her with terror.
She frantically tried to tidy up the sheets, feeling utterly helpless, but the blood had soaked them completely, and there was nothing she could do.
The next second, everything in front of her distorted, and a scene of her high school life appeared. From God's perspective, she looked at herself in bed in the middle of the night, twisted and contorted with the blanket, her mind filled with filthy thoughts.
No! This is clearly not her! Stop! Don't continue!
She was more terrified than if she had encountered a crime scene during her first period, as if she had faced a catastrophe.
She scratched her head by the bed, trying to stop "Ye Yuying" on the bed, but the other party ignored her and continued to maintain her ugliness.
The scene was terrifying; she was almost driven insane by it!
This kind of liking is a monster banished to the depths of one's heart.
In my dream, the monster in my heart jumped out. It was strangely huge, as tall as half a hill in the vast plain of my consciousness. It was completely black, and I had to tilt my head back almost to its limit to see a single whisker.
The next second, the monster in front of her suddenly shattered into dust, which drifted in the air and then turned into a thick red mist that re-entered her body.
It felt as if there was a branding iron inside her, burning her until she was like a rubber doll, melting and dripping...
She admitted that she was terrified when her twisted desires became a reality.
Ye Yuying woke up with a start, her chest heaving violently, her whole body almost soaked in cold sweat, as if she had been pulled out of the water.
As dawn broke, the lake outside the window shimmered with a silvery light. She reached out to touch her forehead; it was icy cold, and her fingertips seemed bloodless.
She stared blankly at the ceiling, noticing the unfamiliar stickiness on her body, and suddenly a strong sense of shame swept over her.
How could such a dream, such a disgusting dream, appear in her mind? It was clearly all the things she feared most and tried hardest to suppress.
She rolled over in bed, curled up, put her knees under her chin, and covered her face tightly with her hands. The heat seeping through her fingers touched her cheeks, making her even more confused.
But her body seemed to be separated from her soul; her soul was saying no, but her body was desperately breathing.
As soon as she closed her eyes, Cheng Mingdu's features, though not clearly visible in her consciousness, would appear in her mind. His every gesture, so sacred and inviolable in her eyes years ago...
In my own eyes now, however, it has given rise to a destructive force within people.
I wanted to try biting him to see if he would still be perfectly intact.
*
Ye Yuying didn't leave her room until dawn. Cheng Mingdu, as always, got up early. The basement was his private gym, and his personal trainers would arrive promptly at 6:30.
By the time the aunt had finished preparing breakfast, Cheng Mingdu had already showered and dressed, with a cup of coffee in front of him, and began replying to emails.
He's not working in his study at this time.
Ye Yuying usually ate breakfast before taking a shower and went out feeling refreshed, but today she rushed to take a shower as soon as she left her bedroom.
Water vapor lingered on the mirror's surface. She glanced at herself in the mist out of the corner of her eye, paused for a moment, and then walked in barefoot to take a closer look.
She rarely looked at herself; in fact, she almost never did.
She knew what she looked like. In her memory, her chest was flat and her legs were all muscle, firm and slender, not weak and thin. During puberty, she had some acne scars on her face, which would turn red, especially when she was excited.
She disliked the acne scars that always exposed her worries and wished to have a flawless, fair complexion like Cheng Mingdu's, without ever feeling red or flushed.
The person in the mirror was different. Her appearance was the same as that of an adult she knew, not like when she was a child. Moreover, this body had just gone through an undignified struggle last night.
She reached out to wipe the mirror, but no matter how she wiped it, the moisture kept obscuring it.
That dream was like a sin. She washed for a whole hour, until her skin was scalded red, but she still couldn't wash away the shame that had nowhere to go.
She lingered in the bathroom for an hour before slowly making her way downstairs—she felt like a thief who had just robbed someone's house, but she wasn't a repeat offender.
When she finally came downstairs, sunlight streamed through the French windows onto the floor, and the bitter aroma of coffee filled the air.
Cheng Mingdu sat at one side of the dining table, his shirt sleeves rolled up to his arms, looking down at a document.
His fingers were long and slender; he twirled the pen between them once, then stopped. Hearing footsteps, he looked up.
"How did you sleep?" The voice was as steady and calm as ever.
She knew this was Cheng Mingdu's usual greeting, but today she felt a little flustered and didn't even dare to touch the cup, afraid that the trembling water would reveal her thoughts.
She almost instinctively avoided his gaze, pretending to be nonchalant as she sat at the other end of the table.
"fine."
She picked up the spoon, scooped up a mouthful of porridge, and moved cautiously.
"You don't look too well." He looked up from the documents and lightly swept his gaze across her face.
"It's nothing, I probably ate breakfast late and my blood sugar is a little low."
Cheng Mingdu hummed in agreement, without pressing further. He got up and poured her a glass of milk near the refrigerator. Halfway there, as if remembering something, he took the milk to the microwave to heat it, and finally placed the warm milk next to her.
His action was extremely natural, even carrying a hint of habitual care.
But Ye Yuying was almost breathless from that moment of closeness. He had probably changed his perfume; the juniper was mixed with the bitterness of black tea, and it also exuded a warm and nostalgic scent, which always reminded people of the cashmere suit jackets worn by gentlemen in the last century.
She tried to stop herself from backing away, but by the time she came to her senses, Cheng Mingdu had already gone upstairs with the documents.
Looking up at his back, she felt that she must have undergone a genetic mutation, because she could model the muscle texture of Cheng Mingdu under the exquisite fabric without any instruction, even though he always dressed formally and only occasionally showed his wrists on very formal occasions.
But isn't this precisely the underlying logic behind the allure of asceticism...?
*
In the afternoon, Cheng Mingdu was late in leaving for the company. Ye Yuying glanced at her phone and realized that he was working from home today.
The soundproof glass exterior wall provides excellent natural light to his study. Outside the study, the world is peaceful, with the occasional sound of his aunt watching TV in the kitchen while she works.
But inside the study was a remote meeting, a business negotiation spanning the entire Pacific Ocean.
He remained calm and spoke at a steady pace, almost without any extraneous emotional fluctuations. However, he wore a subtle and perfectly polite smile, making it easy to imagine that his tone was also composed when he spoke a foreign language.
Ye Yuying was just passing by and was about to turn around and leave, but she inexplicably lingered for another second.
In that instant, she saw him close his laptop and loosen his tie.
It was a very subtle movement, but in her eyes it seemed like some kind of fatal signal, especially his Adam's apple, which occasionally bobbed up and down.
You can't watch anymore, run!
She turned around abruptly and bumped into a vase in the corner of the wall, which nearly scared her to death. She quickly caught it and put it back in its place, but her elbow twisted into the corner of the table, and the pain brought tears to her eyes.
She could no longer get too close to Cheng Mingdu, even though his profile was sharply defined by the cold light, making him look incredibly handsome.
His presence became increasingly strong day by day.
A few seconds later, the door was pushed open.
"What's wrong?" he asked, his voice clear, like a sound peeled from the bottom of a still lake.
Ye Yuying paused for a moment, then reacted very quickly, her words a little jumbled: "It's nothing... I just bumped into something by accident."
Cheng Mingdu's gaze swept over her indifferently, as if judging whether what she said was true or false. A few seconds later, he took two steps closer.
But her legs made the decision for her first, and she went upstairs without looking back, closing the door behind her with a guilty conscience.
*
She had truly mutated; her sense of smell and touch had become exceptionally sensitive, allowing her to accurately remember the woody or cool scents lingering on his different clothes.
She could remember his micro-expressions, his habitual movements, his tone and voice, the curve of his fingers and the slight furrow in his brow when he flipped through documents.
Her admiration for him from many years ago turned into attachment, and eventually became a self-consuming obsession.
Obsession is a kind of transparent toxin, slowly infecting her.
The air around Cheng Mingdu carried his scent, which would seep into her relentlessly, as if trying to corrode all the armor on her body, leaving only a real, bloodied woman stripped of her reason.
She tossed and turned until late at night, unable to fall asleep.
The room was so quiet that only the ticking of the digital clock could be heard, each tick like a countdown to her sanity.
She picked up her phone and turned on the screen.
My fingertip hovered over the input box for a long time before I finally typed a few words:
What should I do if I fall for someone I shouldn't?
Asking a question anonymously.
Someone replied very quickly:
[It'll get better with time; time heals all wounds (laughing and crying emoji)]
Find a therapist
Imagine what he looks like when he poops (doge emoji)
What does it mean to fall for someone you shouldn't? It's a natural, instinctive human emotion—pure, beautiful, and sacred! It's not controlled by any external system. Liking someone is one thing; whether it's reciprocated is another. This is the relationship between theory and practice. My final advice is: minimize regret, but accept the consequences of your actions and take responsibility for them.
I feel a little ashamed that I like a younger brother who is 10 years younger than me...
What does "shouldn't like them" mean? Does it mean they're married? Or that you're married...? If you're both single, then go for it!
[It'll be better if we keep busy...]
After browsing through them, I realized that she understood some of the things said, while some of the replies were both funny and exasperating.
The comment section was quiet for a while.
Then someone replied to her:
This means you haven't completed the "psychological desensitization" process. The more you avoid the stimulus, the stronger it becomes.
If you really want to move on, face him, confront that impulse, until your heart stops reacting.
She stared at that reply for a long time.
Desensitization?
It sounds scientific, and it makes some sense.
*
The house was quiet the next evening.
Auntie was on leave, and Cheng Mingdu had just finished a long meeting and was taking a shower in the bathroom of his bedroom on the third floor.
Ye Yuying sat in the downstairs living room, holding her phone, lost in thought, seemingly oblivious to the television programs.
The person wrote:
Desensitization is like this: you have to approach your fear again and again, completely opening up the wound and exposing it to the air, letting the air erode it. At first, it will be extremely painful, but you will get used to the pain until your body learns not to tremble in pain anymore...
She stared at that sentence, feeling greatly pleased.
Night slowly crept in, and the lake outside the window was deathly still.
Ye Yuying put away her phone, stood up, went upstairs, and walked all the way to the third floor where Cheng Mingdu was taking a shower...
-----------------------
Author's note: 50~
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com
