It was the simplest of sentences, yet it froze Ruan Yan where he stood. He stared with wide, round eyes, looking at Jiang Tingnan in disbelief.
Ruan Yan’s eyes were very round, and when he opened them wide at someone it was all too easy to soften their heart, but Jiang Tingnan stayed cold from beginning to end. He was much taller than Ruan Yan, and when he looked at someone, his eyes lowered, lending him a faintly condescending air.
“How could you……” Ruan Yan murmured. “Don’t tell me you didn’t……”
It couldn’t be. They had clearly been in that crash together.
Ruan Yan bit his lip. Every bit of the worry, the tension, the anxiety he’d carried since coming back surged up at once. The worst possible outcome had become reality. He found it hard even to breathe, his heart skipping a beat, his voice trembling before he could stop it. “Jiang Tingnan, don’t play this joke on me, all right?”
Jiang Tingnan was quiet for a few seconds, his gaze resting a moment on the redness rimming Ruan Yan’s eyes, then said mildly, “You really do have the wrong person.”
He didn’t linger, but turned back and started stacking bricks again.
Ruan Yan stood there all alone, as though he’d been cast aside. Watching Jiang Tingnan’s bent back, he sniffed, and the tears he could no longer hold in rolled down with a plop.
Jiang Tingnan kept his back to him, the rough brick grinding across his fingers, though he seemed to feel nothing at all. It was noisy all around, voices, machinery, and against all that Ruan Yan’s crying was barely audible, but Jiang Tingnan could hear it regardless. Every faint sob lashed his heart like a whip. Every tear pressed down on it with its full weight.
There was almost nothing in this world Jiang Tingnan feared, except Ruan Yan’s tears. He had fought his way through the business world barehanded, and no hardship, however great, ever drew more from him than a frown and a flicker of irritation.
But he couldn’t stand the sight of Ruan Yan’s tears.
Except in bed.
Making Ruan Yan cry.
That only meant he, Jiang Tingnan, wasn’t capable enough.
He repeated the same mechanical motions, bending, hauling bricks, and stacking them. He had no idea how long it went on before he turned around and found the space behind him empty. Ruan Yan had gone.
He lowered his head and looked at the spot where Ruan Yan had been standing, trying to find, somewhere in all that sandy dirt, the tears Ruan Yan had dropped.
.
Ruan Yan sat on his suitcase, peeled the egg he’d saved for Jiang Tingnan, and ate it while calling Lin Dong.
“A job?! Sure. I happen to be doing the accounts here, I’ll get my uncle to find you something in the office too, we can go to work together.”
Lin Dong agreed on the spot, and when he heard Ruan Yan was already at the site, he added that he’d have the manager sort out a room for him to stay in, and he’d come over tomorrow.
Ruan Yan said quietly, “Thank you, Dong.”
“Don’t get polite with me. Hanging up.”
Lin Dong got things done fast. Before long the manager came looking for him, pressed a small key into his hand and pointed him toward one of the metal shed rooms.
Ruan Yan hopped down off his suitcase.
The sun was out today, and there wasn’t a scrap of shade anywhere on the site. Ruan Yan’s face burned from the heat of it. It was only noon, yet he already felt worn through in body and mind, his head a terrible mess.
Winding this way and that, Ruan Yan half thought he’d faint from the baking sun before he finally found the room corresponding to the number on the key. As he opened the door, the door beside his opened with a sound too.
Jiang Tingnan came out, seemingly back from taking a shower, a towel slung around his neck. He froze for an instant when he saw Ruan Yan, his steps faltering.
But Ruan Yan behaved as though he hadn’t seen him at all: key in the lock, door open, inside, door shut, all in one smooth motion.
He stood panting with his back against the door, his chest heaving hard, his hands curling into fists as he cursed inwardly.
Jiang Tingnan.
You think that act of yours is convincing!
.
Ruan Yan didn’t go out again until evening.
The room was tiny, with nowhere to unpack most of his luggage, but he was too exhausted to care. He simply made up the bed and dropped straight into sleep.
All these days he hadn’t had one good night’s sleep for fretting over Jiang Tingnan, and now that he’d finally found the man, Jiang Tingnan wouldn’t even claim to know him.
Cursing Jiang Tingnan in his head all the while, Ruan Yan drifted off in a haze. He slept a long time, as though making up for all the sleep he’d missed over the past few days.
It was dark out by the time he woke.
Ruan Yan sat up in bed and needed a moment to remember where he was. Rubbing his eyes, he launched into a fresh round of furious cursing at Jiang Tingnan in his head.
Jiang Tingnan was finished this time.
He really was angry.
The kind of angry that two sports cars wouldn’t be enough to placate him.
He meant to go find something to eat, but the moment he opened the door he saw a boxed meal sitting on the windowsill outside. He reached out to touch it. It was still warm.
Ruan Yan huffed, pretended he hadn’t seen a thing, and strode off.
The site did serve an evening meal, though you had to go and collect it yourself, and the food was monotonous, nothing but potatoes and cabbage as far as the eye could see.
While Ruan Yan was standing in the meal line, Jiang Tingnan came up beside him with a grim face, paused, then spoke as though it were of no importance. “I think I saw a boxed meal outside your room.”
Ruan Yan gave him an “oh” and turned to look at him. “I didn’t see anything.”
Jiang Tingnan frowned.
He immediately began wondering whether he’d set the food down too far away, whether he should have left it right at the front door.
With Ruan Yan’s turn almost up, he said in a low voice, “I really did see it. We can go back, I’ll find it for you.”
“We?”
Ruan Yan blinked. “Do we know each other?”
Jiang Tingnan fell silent.
Ruan Yan smacked his own forehead, with an apologetic look. “I got the wrong person this morning. I came here looking for my husband, and you look a bit like him.”
Jiang Tingnan’s throat bobbed, the hand at his side tightening slightly, his breathing turning heavy.
Ruan Yan spoke as if it were nothing much. “But never mind. If I can’t find him, I’ll stop looking. People have to look forward, don’t they. Time to start a new life.”
A new life.
Those few words stung Jiang Tingnan. He lowered his eyes slightly, and the brows already drawn together knit tighter still.
Ruan Yan ignored him and moved forward with the line. Just as his turn was about to come, a hand suddenly clamped around his wrist and hauled him out of the queue.
Jiang Tingnan’s face darkened slightly, his jaw pulled taut into a hard line as he strode off dragging Ruan Yan with him.
Ruan Yan frowned hard and struggled to shake him off. “Who even are you? What are you dragging me for!”
Jiang Tingnan’s voice was heavy. “Don’t eat that. It isn’t clean and it doesn’t taste good. There really is a boxed meal at your door, I’ll take you back to get it.”
Ruan Yan gave him an odd look. “What does it matter to you what I eat?”
Jiang Tingnan said nothing, but he didn’t let go either.
Only once they were back at the door of the room did Jiang Tingnan lift the meal off the windowsill and hold it out to Ruan Yan. “Eat this.”
Ruan Yan didn’t take it. He asked, “Did you buy it for me?”
Jiang Tingnan denied it at once. “No.”
“Then I don’t even know who bought it, so why should I eat it. What if it’s poisoned.”
Ruan Yan lifted his chin, and afraid that wasn’t imposing enough, climbed two steps higher and folded his arms, the picture of haughtiness.
“You don’t even know me, so why are you minding my business? Does what I eat have anything to do with you?”
Jiang Tingnan was silent.
Ruan Yan was about ready to burst.
So his mouth was going to stay this hard about it, was it?
So now the hardest part of his whole body had become his mouth, had it?
He deliberately kept his face cold, the very image of impatience. “Forget it. You’ve ruined my appetite anyway, I’m not eating!”
Ruan Yan took out his key and unlocked the door, pausing a few seconds on purpose, but Jiang Tingnan stood behind him, silent as a stone.
Furious, Ruan Yan stamped his foot, went inside and slammed the door hard.
Once it was shut, Ruan Yan pressed himself against the crack of the door, trying to catch any sound from outside. Unfortunately the rooms here were too crude to have so much as a peephole, and Ruan Yan could neither see nor hear a thing.
In his fury Ruan Yan ran through an entire set of military boxing exercises in his head.
Not even ten minutes later, a knock came at the door.
Ruan Yan ran to it in a few strides, adjusted his expression, and opened it with a slightly cool face. Sure enough, there stood Jiang Tingnan again.
He frowned. “What do you want now?”
Jiang Tingnan held out a bag. “You can’t skip dinner. Put something in your stomach.”
Afraid Ruan Yan wouldn’t take it, he added in a deep voice, “I made you miss getting your meal just now. This is to make up for it.”
Ruan Yan glanced at him, said nothing this time, and reached out to take it.
Jiang Tingnan noticed the plastic basin and towel in Ruan Yan’s other hand and frowned slightly. “You’re going to bathe? The public bathhouse over there is communal.”
Ruan Yan tilted his head. “So what.”
So what?
If he bathed there, wouldn’t every single person be able to see Ruan Yan.
Just the thought of it was enough to drive Jiang Tingnan out of his mind.
His eyes went dark. “Don’t go there. Wash in your room, I’ll bring you hot water.”
Ruan Yan blinked up at him. “Oh, I couldn’t possibly trouble you.”
Jiang Tingnan said nothing more, turning and going out.
The metal shed room was very small. With the door standing open, Jiang Tingnan carried in bucket after bucket of water, his arms bare, the muscles of his forearms bulging.
Ruan Yan couldn’t help remembering how, before, Jiang Tingnan had loved to hold him. In front of the mirror, when Ruan Yan was trembling and barely conscious, he could see the muscles and veins standing out along Jiang Tingnan’s arms, and there was no describing how sexy it was.
He propped his chin in his hand and watched at his leisure as Jiang Tingnan poured the water for him.
Once the water was ready in the basin, Jiang Tingnan was just about to turn away when Ruan Yan spoke up and stopped him. “Scrub my back for me.”
Jiang Tingnan went still.
Ruan Yan’s tone was perfectly natural, ordering people about with practiced ease. “I can’t reach it myself.”
Jiang Tingnan’s fists clenched and unclenched. It took him several breaths to steady himself before he turned back and gave a low word of assent.
Ruan Yan immersed himself in the water until only his head showed. He blinked and asked in an earnest tone, “Since I can’t find my old husband, forget it, I’m thinking of getting a new one. Do you have any good suggestions?”
Jiang Tingnan pressed his thin lips together, and it was a long while before he spoke, his voice slightly hoarse. “You look like you’ve only just started university. You should study properly and not let your mind wander to other things.”
“So what. Being at university doesn’t stop me from looking for a husband.” Ruan Yan draped himself over the edge of the tub, smiling brightly.
“I’ve never had a husband in my whole life, so I definitely have to find one.”
Jiang Tingnan was silent.
Ruan Yan rose up a little and turned his back to Jiang Tingnan, ordering him, “Put some body wash on me.”
The body wash was one Ruan Yan had brought from home, peach scented. Jiang Tingnan worked up a lather and spread it over Ruan Yan’s skin.
Too thin.
It made Jiang Tingnan’s chest ache.
Ruan Yan was a picky eater who cared little for food, and their household went through chefs faster than anything else. For that reason Jiang Tingnan had even brought a master chef in to teach him, and whenever he had the slightest bit of free time he tried to cook for Ruan Yan with his own hands.
If Ruan Yan put on so much as a pound, Jiang Tingnan would be pleased about it for days.
His fingertips traced that thin back, unwilling to use even a little more force. He knew Ruan Yan’s body inside out, knew where there was a small mole. He had kissed it, licked it.
In the instant his mind drifted, Ruan Yan suddenly turned around and rinsed the suds off. “I don’t want to soak anymore. Get my towel for me.”
Jiang Tingnan gave an “mm” and turned to fetch it.
Behind him came a “splash.” Ruan Yan had already stood up out of the tub. The bulb in the room burned a dim yellow, and where it fell across Ruan Yan it seemed to bathe him in a layer of light, making him as beautiful as a piece of jade.
He lifted a foot to step straight out, water sliding down his body, from the dip of his waist to the roots of his thighs. What ought to be seen and what ought not, Jiang Tingnan saw all of it clearly.
Since they’d married, he had never once been apart from his wife this long.
Unable to see Ruan Yan’s face, without so much as a single piece of clothing that carried his baby’s scent, Jiang Tingnan was a string drawn to its utmost limit, and in this moment it snapped clean through.
Even with that scene filling his head, Jiang Tingnan’s body still moved on instinct. He strode over, and not wanting Ruan Yan’s feet to touch the floor, he supported him and let Ruan Yan step onto his feet.
Before he could get the towel wrapped around him, Ruan Yan suddenly pressed up against him and reached up to hook his arms around his neck.
Jiang Tingnan’s breath caught.
Ruan Yan asked him in all seriousness, “Jiang Tingnan, you don’t even remember me, and you can still get hard for me?”
Jiang Tingnan, “……”