On December 22nd, the world did not fall into an apocalyptic disaster as predicted by the Maya people, and the sun did not fail to rise. It was like an orange gem, diligently rising, hanging on the edge of the world and the morning glow reflected, making half of the sky red.
Jin Fubai seemed to have forgotten the phrase “you are not my boyfriend”. He took Xiang Yu to breakfast as usual, he helped her dip the delicate shrimp dumplings in the fermented soybean sauce and then fed it to her lips.
Many business elites had breakfast at the hotel and occasionally, there were leisure lovers who sat side-by-side, having a heart-to-heart talk. They were obviously the most loving couple in these 300 square meters of the restaurant.
Xiang Yu also seemed to have forgotten the awkward silence last night. She bit the shrimp dumplings placed in her mouth, with chewing cheeks she asked vaguely, “Will Guangdong shrimp dumplings taste better than the hotel’s?”
Jin Fubai wiped off the sauce from the corners of her lips, “The Cantonese cook in this hotel is from Guangzhou, not much worse off.”
“Oh.”
The shrimp dumplings tasted really good, the crystal skin was smooth and tender, and the shrimp tender. However, on this warm morning, Xiang Yu felt her heart collapse a little bit. Like the landslide mentioned in the news during the summer rainstorm in Changsha. Shattered and collapsed.
Of course, she and Jin Fubai were not a normal couple. He was silent when he heard that she did not regard him as a boyfriend.
How should a normal couple react?
Will they ask her back, “If I am not your boyfriend, then who is your boyfriend”?
It was also from that day that Xiang Yu didn’t answer Jin Fubai’s phone calls. Sometimes when he called during the day, she would just say that she was busy. She doesn’t often eat with him at night and rarely spent the night at the hotel.
Xiang Yu couldn’t say that she was angry, but when she thought of Jin Fubai, she always felt stuffy in her chest for a bit.
Jin Fubai did not seem to feel her deliberate indifference. The voice on the phone was as gentle as usual, and the flowers in the opposite office building were also changing as usual. Recently, there were peonies and tulips. The more he didn’t care about her various behaviours, the more angry she became.
The year 2012 was full of reveries. Her peeved mood slowly passed, and it was another brand-new year. In 2013, there was no end of the world from the Maya people’s prophecies, there was only countless unknowns.
On New Year’s Day, the company had a three-day holiday. Xiang Yu had no reason to refuse Jin Fubai’s invitation but whether she drove with him next door to see the snow scenery or they went to eat at the mountain top restaurant in the suburbs, she had an indifferent facial expression and it was difficult to obtain happiness.
In the last morning of the holiday, they drove back to the city from the outskirts. The weather was fine, she went home, changed her down jacket and wore a light hazy blue long coat. When she left the house, Aunt Chen asked her, “You’ll not stay at home today?”
Xiang Yu didn’t expect that she would be so angry she said to Aunt Chen, “There’s no one at home, why would I come back?” After she finished speaking, she paused for a few seconds, walked over and hugged Aunt Chen, “I’m sorry Aunt Chen, I shouldn’t have said this to you.”
Aunt Chen patted her on the back, “Are you in a bad mood? Why don’t you talk to Auntie?”
Xiang Yu shook her head. She hasn’t figured these things out yet, and they can’t be solved by making complaints. Besides, Jin Fubai’s car was still parked downstairs.
Xiang Yu put on the knee-high boots, carried her bag and went downstairs, Jin Fubai threw away the cigarette butt to help her open the car door. There were two unread messages in her phone placed on the car seat which were sent by Tang Yuchi.
It was strange to think about it. Tang Yuchi disappeared for a bit too long this time and even his Moments did not have any movements.
Xiang Yu fastened her seat belt, clicked on the message, and frowned slowly.
What Tang Yuchi sent was a short video and a sentence:
[Video]
[Xiang Yu, you should watch this.]
She stared at the screen a few times but did not click to open the video. For a moment, she felt that the time and space around her was flowing backwards as if she was returning to the night scene at the end of 2012 in that debauched and corrupt environment, Tang Yuchi said, “I heard he used to…”
The stilled video showed the back of a man who wore a trench coat and was very tall. You wouldn’t have to click to know that it was Jin Fubai.
Jin Fubai glanced at Xiang Yu while driving. He didn’t sense her indifferent attitude these days, and he knew why after thinking about it. It was his fault that day, he was distracted for a while, and he didn’t even refute a little when she said that he was not a boyfriend, which made the girl angry for many days.
He knew that Xiang Yu had a little temper, and he was willing to step back and coax her. Wasn’t it all because of him that made her angry, what couldn’t be coaxed, Jin Fubai would eagerly coax her.
The premise of this was that her emotions were due to him.
After driving through two intersections, Xiang Yu was still staring at her phone, the screen had been automatically turned off, and she was still in a daze. Later, she turned on the screen again, deleted the message, and held the phone tightly in her hand.
It was within those few seconds that Jin Fubai saw the profile picture of the message clearly. The picture of the white porcelain vase that has the word “ugly” on it. Not unfamiliar, he has seen it before.
It was the man who went to the nightclub with Xiang Yu when he was abroad. So now she is frowning because of other men?
She was originally going to accompany Jin Fubai to a networking event. But when the car was halfway there, Xiang Yu suddenly changed her mind. She turned her head slowly, and said in a very firm tone, “Jin Fubai, I’m not going to dinner. At the intersection ahead, can you drop me off?”
Jin Fubai didn’t ask her anything, he just turned his head and cast Xiang Yu a deep look.
The car stopped on the side of the road, he didn’t get out of the car to help her open the door, the only sound in the car was that of the door being unlocked. Xiang Yu said goodbye to him lightly and then walked to the right with her bag.
Jin Fubai coldly watched her stop a taxi, pressed hard on the accelerator, and the car sped away. Hearing the sound of a motor behind her, Xiang Yu stepped into the taxi and did not stop.
Caring for her for half a month, regardless of Jin Fubai’s temperament in being a gentleman he would feel tired of her and there was no shortage of women around him, so there was no need to be angry.
Xiang Yu closed her eyes, maybe this was it.
After that day, Jin Fubai did not contact her again. Succeeding more than ten days without contact, Xiang Yu took a taxi every day, went home, washed and then fell asleep on the bed. She had never felt such an uncontrollable emotion when she broke up with Zhao Yanmo.
On a weekend in mid-January, during the Laba Festival, Xiang Yu drank half a bowl of Aunt Chen’s congee in the evening and nestled in the quilt before 9 o’clock. Outside the window, the sound of the wind stirred in the night, and she fell asleep unknowingly while playing a documentary.
- Laba festival is celebrated on the 8th day of the 12th month according to the lunar calendar. It is a custom to drink congee on this day
At 11 o’clock in the night, Xiang Yu was awakened by her phone. It was Mother Tang.
Couldn’t tell if there was any disappointment the moment she saw the caller ID. Xiang Yu sat in the dark, cleared her throat, and answered the phone after her drowsiness was relieved, “Godmother, are you looking for me?”
“Yuyu have you had dinner?”
Don’t know if it was an illusion but Xiang Yu felt that Mother Tang’s voice was not the same as usual. She frowned sensitively, “Godmother, did Tang Yuchi do something wrong?”
Tang Yuchi was a “bad boy” when he was in school, his grades were so poor that he would score a single-digit in a single subject, and it was common to skip class and fight. At that time, Mother Tang would always call Xiang Yu, and Xiang Yu would lead the person home from the billiard venue or the basketball court of the internet cafe.
Tang Yuchi had been abroad in these past years, and it had been a long time since she last received such a call at night. Mother Tang was very anxious, but still gentle, “Yuchi has been reluctant to come home for many days. I don’t know what happened to him recently. I just called him to tell him to come home and unexpectedly it was quiet. Yuyu, do you know where he is?”
Xiang Yu thought for a while and she hadn’t heard anything from Tang Yuchi recently too. Except for that day when he sent her a video about Jin Fubai.
“Godmother, I don’t know, but I can look for him, and there will always be a friend there.”
Mother Tang urged repeatedly on the phone, saying that if you find Tang Yuchi, you don’t need to take him home. “They are all the same age. How much is there to talk about between friends, isn’t it more useful to talk to those of us who have generation gaps.”
Before hanging up the phone, Mother Tang said again, “Yuyu, godmother brought a skirt when shopping a few days ago, it suits you well, I bought it for you. Come and try it when you have time.”
This was probably the warmest words Xiang Yu has heard these days. She smiled and said, “Thank you godmother.”
Hanging up, Xiang Yu started to contact Tang Yuchi’s mutual friends. It was only after contacting them she found out that Tang Yuchi and An Sui had some problems, he was cheated on and these days had been living in nightclubs.
Xiang Yu made many calls to Tang Yuchi, but they were all hung up. She frowned and picked up a down jacket, took the keys to her father’s old car and ran out.
She had never been to that nightclub, and it looked different from ordinary nightclubs. The location was not in the bustling downtown area but in the suburbs. There was a feeling of “not a good place”.
When Xiang Yu arrived, it was 12 o’clock at night. There were scraps of paper flying all over the ceiling, and everyone drew their birthdate characters on the dance floor, with hands making peace signs and heads shaking in the party. She got out of the car in a hurry, hugging her thick cropped jacket in her embrace, not wearing it. She only wore a big V-neck tight-fitting sweater and a low-rise wide-legged jean. She took a look and it truly seemed that he had come here to dance.
In the booth, she found a drunk and unconscious Tang Yuchi, his shirt was crumpled, his legs spread open, and he was still begging for a drink in a dazed state. She threw her jacket at him and became very angry, “Tang Yuchi! Get up!”
Li Chi put ice in the Chivas Regal glass in front of Jin Fubai, “Wait, it’s almost 12 o’clock, tonight there will be stripping in the venue! Clothes! Dancing! F*cking stunning!”
Jin Fubai looked dispirited with a cigarette in his mouth, it was a mystery as to what he was thinking about.
He didn’t speak, and others didn’t dare to speak. Only Li Chi, who was wearing a rose pink suit leaned forward, “What’s the matter? Since you came back from New Year’s Day you never contacted her again?”
Jin Fubai’s face was calm and he didn’t say a word.
Speaking of Xiang Yu, he felt annoyed for a while, remembering that she was in a daze looking at the WeChat message that day. That kind of tangled look must mean that there was some sort of feelings between them. Does she have such deep feelings for another man?
It was such a f*cking coincidence, Jin Fubai swept his eyes, and suddenly caught a glimpse of a familiar figure. He frowned, looked over and saw Xiang Yu hugging a thick fluffy jacket. Then she hurried past him not that far away looking anxious.
In the twelfth month of winter, she wore a short sweater and low-waisted pants, showing a tight and slender waist.
Having not seen her for a while Jin Fubai fixed his eyes on her, and the first thought that popped up in his mind was: her period pain is so bad, she should wear her jacket.
But Xiang Yu threw her jacket on a man and then helped him up. The man put his arms on her shoulders, borrowing her strength, his footsteps weak and unstable as he leaned into her ear and said something.
When they passed by Jin Fubai, Xiang Yu didn’t see him. She only raised her voice amidst the noise and said to the man, “Do you know how many times I called you?! I was so anxious!”
No one noticed when Jin Fubai lowered his face and stood in front of Xiang Yu. He said in a deep voice, “Xiang Yu, follow me.”
Author: 殊娓
http://www.jjwxc.net/onebook.php?novelid=5163285
Note:
I have a novel reccomendation for those that are interested. It is basically like the combination of The Truman Show and quick transmigration. Not translated yet sadly 😦 and I don’t think anything like this has been translated yet, maybe there have been similar BL stories but most of them are horror and mystery which I don’t read. As a fair warning though, it does not have romance as its main focus like Long Street but it is still a genre there.
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