Love
At nine o'clock in the evening, fireworks exploded over the waters south of Lucerne Bay, burning for more than ten minutes. Jinnan leaned against the window, feeling a little cold from the ice wine he'd drunk.
Across from him, Xu Zhiyuan had already put down his glass. Xu Zhiyuan was like that; when he was almost drunk, he'd stop on his own. No one could get him drunk. A pair of calm eyes pierced through the haze of alcohol, and Jinnan noticed the sweater collar beneath his coat and felt a familiar look.
"The fireworks are over." Jinnan said.
"Have you had enough to drink?" Xu Zhiyuan glanced at his watch. "It's almost half past nine. Let's go home."
"Well, I called the designated driver."
Both of them seemed drunk, but in fact they were not drunk at all. Walking beside Xu Zhiyuan, the wind from the crowd whistled past, and Jinnan could not see or hear anyone clearly.
He wasn't drunk, his body wasn't hot, and the chill from the wine hadn't yet dissipated from his fingertips. Jin Nan's face, however, was red, and as Xu Zhiyuan stared at him, a crimson crept up the corners of his eyes.
There were so many people. Xu Zhiyuan grabbed his sleeve and walked all the way to the crowded elevator, where he waited for three minutes that felt like a century.
Chatting, smoking, drinking, dinner, gossip, all kinds of sounds poured into Jinnan's ears. The elevator went down, and the world outside the glass curtain wall fell rapidly. He and Xu Zhiyuan were like two shooting stars.
Boom, boom, boom.
The world is so quiet.
"Konami."
Xu Zhiyuan's voice.
"Jinnan, don't sleep."
He took the phone out of his pocket and heard Xu Zhiyuan's voice, communicating with someone about the time and place.
At this moment, another round of fireworks exploded outside the window, burning and falling with them.
Jinnan looked up, and with Xu Zhiyuan's silent consent, moved closer to him and hugged him.
I'm drunk, Jinnan thought. Xu Zhiyuan wouldn't bother with drunks; he was so generous and magnanimous that he always took them home.
What's wrong with giving me a hug before I fall asleep?
Xu Zhiyuan would not blame him.
"Konami, the elevator is here."
How could time pass so quickly? It mercilessly passes by the clock, taking away everything Jinnan has at the moment.
Jin Nan pretended not to hear, but Xu Zhiyuan pushed her hair aside and whispered in her ear: "The elevator is here. Do you want me to carry you out?"
He burned with his soul.
But he is a wave, and he has no control over where the sea flows.
Xu Zhiyuan held him in his arms, half holding, half hugging him, their body temperatures blending. Jinnan felt like the whole world was like a block of ice, with only him boiling. The cold wind that poured into his clothes couldn't extinguish it, and the rain mixed with frost and snow couldn't put it out.
In Xu Zhiyuan's arms, he grew with the rain, craving more nutrients and more sunlight.
He looked at Xu Zhiyuan's profile as he talked to someone, and tears suddenly filled his eyes.
He said, "Xu Zhiyuan, I like you."
The whole world would end at this moment. Jin Nanning doesn't want the future. He wants Xu Zhiyuan's present and he doesn't want Xu Zhiyuan to let go.
Xu Zhiyuan wanted to let him go, but Jinnan held him tightly and stared at him with his dark eyes full of lust.
"You can't leave, do you hear me?" Jin Nan stared at him. "I like you, do you hear me?"
Xu Zhiyuan opened the car door with his other hand, threw Jinnan into the back seat, and followed in.
The driver raised the tailgate, and in the enclosed space of the back seat, Jinnan could only hear breathing.
His eyes had not yet adjusted to the darkness, and he wanted to say something, but Xu Zhiyuan covered his mouth with his hand.
Immediately afterwards, the body temperature of another person came up, and Xu Zhiyuan kissed the back of his own hand. Jinnan saw that Xu Zhiyuan's lips were trembling.
Is he afraid? Or disgusted? Or something else...
Does he want to escape?
Jinnan smiled with his eyes curved. He had never thought that Xu Zhiyuan would tremble like this. It turned out that Jinnan's words of love could make Xu Zhiyuan panic and at a loss.
Jin Nan thought to himself, Xu Zhiyuan, you are a coward.
Xu Zhiyuan loosened his grip, keeping a little distance between them, but still not daring to get any closer. He gripped the back of Jinnan's neck, twisting and peeking as he had done before, staring intently into her eyes.
"Jinnan," Xu Zhiyuan said, "I don't listen to drunkards."
Jin Nan raised his hand, brushed his hair out of his eyes, and took a deep breath: "Do you hope I'm drunk?"
"Xu Zhiyuan, you know how much I can drink, and you also know...I never tell lies."
There is a possibility, a very small point, like a raindrop.
A slight chill seeped into Jinnan's heart. He felt like he was about to be executed. Xu Zhiyuan was holding the knife, ready to pardon him or sentence him to death.
Xu Zhiyuan, what do you choose?
But Jinnan has waited too long, too long.
"Forget it." Jinnan whispered, "I still hate you."
The next moment, Xu Zhiyuan bit him hard on the lips.
That couldn't be called a kiss, it should be called a bite. Xu Zhiyuan seemed to feel no pain. He didn't let go even when Jinnan beat him, shouted at him, and even bit him back in revenge.
Jinnan tasted blood and whimpered and trembled in pain, but Xu Zhiyuan bit him tightly, chased him, and kissed him until he was almost dead before letting go.
He gasped for breath, and it took a long time for the burning pain in his lungs to subside. Jinnan swallowed a mouthful of blood, but new blood oozed out. Before he could swallow it, someone licked it away.
"Jinnan." Xu Zhiyuan called him, his voice hoarse, "You must not forget what we said and did tonight."
"If you forget, I will ignore you for the rest of my life."
Jinnan smiled, pulling at the wound, causing it to bleed again, and he hissed in pain. Xu Zhiyuan had no sense of guilt at all, kissing him again and again, making him forget the pain and the blood.
"But life is so long, Zhiyuan," Jinnan said. "A year, even a day, feels long to me."
He raised his hand and clasped Xu Zhiyuan's shoulder. For the first time, he knew the feeling of ear-to-ear contact. Xu Zhiyuan's bite made him remember the taste completely. He was still afraid, but he knew that if he bit it during the kiss, Xu Zhiyuan would still kiss him.
Kiss him many times.
"Xu Zhiyuan."
"I like you, do you hear me?"
Did you know?
He kept on talking, but Xu Zhiyuan covered his eyes. Jinnan heard a murmur: "You are so stupid."
Is he stupid? Well... a little stupid. He knows nothing about feelings and doesn't understand what it means to be liked by others. Jin Nan just instinctively feels that saying and doing this will make Xu Zhiyuan happy.
Jin Nan didn't know how to like someone, how to kiss someone, how to connect with someone, how to reach someone's heart. He was so stupid.
But he was stupid, why did the kiss continue to fall? Why did her hands still hold him, why did she say his name but not speak?
"Konami."
"You have to remember that."
What do you remember?
Jinnan didn't hear clearly and closed his eyes.
*
The next day, Jinnan looked in the mirror and saw the cuts and swelling on his mouth, and felt that he had forgotten something very important.
He went downstairs in his pajamas and saw Xu Zhiyuan sitting downstairs, neatly dressed and with a serious expression.
Jinnan:?
Jinnan had a bad feeling and smiled at him awkwardly, which affected the wound on his mouth and made him grimace in pain.
"What's wrong?" Xu Zhiyuan asked indifferently.
"It's okay," Jinnan said. "Mouth ulcer."
Living under the same roof with Xu Zhiyuan was like living under two degrees of cold. Jinnan went into the kitchen to get breakfast, and when he came out, Xu Zhiyuan was still there. Jinnan even saw the faint flicker of a bug in his front jacket pocket.
The bodyguard hasn't come to work yet, and this thing was... put in by Xu Zhiyuan himself.
"I helped Gao Min cut the ribbon at Lucerne Bay this morning. I'm supposed to have Ely's for lunch, but I haven't decided yet. I'll be doing some shopping in the afternoon." Xu Zhiyuan said calmly, "I'll be home by five at the latest."
There had been times when they'd reported their schedules like this before, but back then, Jinnan couldn't see their expressions or hear their voices through the screen of their phones. Xu Zhiyuan opening up his entire day to him right in front of him felt like a private moment to Jinnan.
"Okay, be careful." Jinnan said dryly, touching his lips with one hand and feeling that they were cracked again.
The cut on his mouth didn't look dry, but more like a bite. The culprit was nowhere to be found, or perhaps Jinnan had been taken advantage of outside and had come back to piss Xu Zhiyuan off. Xu Zhiyuan was such a self-disciplined person, with clean men and women around him. Even his assistant, Claire, who he interacted with the most, was a lesbian.
Jinnan still remembers the playful wink Ms. Claire gave him when she joked that her name read backwards was "Rela Ke".
Jinnan didn't care that he might be taken advantage of. What he cared about was what Xu Zhiyuan thought of him.
"There is an event tomorrow, remember to ask the housekeeping to iron your suit." Xu Zhiyuan said.
He didn't care. He put on his watch, adjusted his collar, checked with the butler, and then picked up his car keys and left. He didn't even say goodbye to Jin Nan.
When passing by Jin Nan, Jin Nan took a quick look and saw that Xu Zhiyuan also had a cut on his mouth.
"What's wrong with your mouth?" Jinnan subconsciously asked with concern.
Xu Zhiyuan, who had walked to the door, suddenly looked at him and said with a firm tone, as if his suspicions had finally been confirmed, "You don't remember."
That glance almost pinned Jinnan to the wall like a butterfly specimen. Jinnan instinctively recalled some pain, but he couldn't remember when, where, or how it happened. Perhaps it was related to Xu Zhiyuan.
What happened last night?
Xu Zhiyuan didn't continue, and turned his back hastily: "I'll come back to deal with you."
Xu Zhiyuan left after saying this, leaving Jinnan alone in the living room, unable to swallow the bun in his mouth.
"Butler, how did we get back yesterday?"
Butler Guo appeared behind Jinnan like a ghost, fiddling with his phone for a moment before quietly handing him his phone. It contained surveillance footage from the night before. Jinnan and Xu Zhiyuan had arrived home a little after ten o'clock. Jinnan had fallen asleep, so Xu Zhiyuan put his arm around his shoulders and helped him out of the car. Later, seeing that Jinnan couldn't walk at all, he simply carried him on his back.
Jinnan didn't feel drunk at all. Those cocktails couldn't have knocked him out. No, he thought about it carefully. It seemed like they were all Vodka specials, four or five mixed together...
It’s hard to say.
Jinnan has grown up and has been in this family for eight years. Xu Zhiyuan is like a smiling Buddha. Even if Jinnan is unreasonable or behaves arrogantly, Xu Zhiyuan has never been angry with him.
But the situation today was different. Jin Nan had never seen that look before. It was gloomy and cold, as if without any emotion, yet with a hint of angry forbearance.
Before today, Jinnan once thought that Xu Zhiyuan, who laughed so often, might develop crow's feet too early.
What on earth had he done to make Xu Zhiyuan so angry?!
Jinnan recalls and Jinnan splits apart.
It seemed as if he remembered some details about the kiss. He remembered it was soft, he remembered biting Xu Zhiyuan, and... he grabbed Xu Zhiyuan and wouldn't let him leave!
He kissed Xu Zhiyuan forcibly!
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