The gathering didn’t break up until late into the night. After seeing the others off, Zhu Ji returned to the private room to check for any forgotten belongings. Seeing the two brothers still waiting for their ride, he took out his phone and sent a message to Shen Tangmo.
[It Is I: So, how was it? Pretty effective, right? Your brother even hugged you!]
[Old Shen, You’re Hopeless: Mhm.]
[Old Shen, You’re Hopeless: Thanks.]
[It Is I: Ah, come on, don’t be so formal with me.]
[It Is I: This was probably the last birthday I’ll get to celebrate with you guys. I’m really happy about it.]
[It Is I: I passed the Watchtower exam. I’ll be heading there in the second half of the year.]
Shen Tangmo stared at the messages on his phone, typed a few words, deleted them, and finally sent: [Which Watchtower?]
[Zhu Ji: Mengzhou Tower. I’m off to the northern grasslands!]
[Zhu Ji: [Animated Sticker]]
[Zhu Ji: I’ll come back to visit you guys during holidays.]
[Puzzle Dan Eats Poison: Let us know before you leave. We’ll see you off.]
[Zhu Ji: K.]
The young man put away his phone and slung an arm over Shen Huaiyun’s shoulder, feeling the muscles tense for a moment before quickly relaxing.
“Zhu Ji is going to Mengzhou Tower later,” he said, his voice slightly hoarse from singing a few songs and drinking a few glasses of wine earlier.
“We’ll go see him off then?”
“Mhm.”
After returning home, Shen Tangmo, disliking the smell of alcohol on himself, went into the bathroom first to shower. When he came out drying his hair, he saw Shen Huaiyun flipping through that thick notebook with the dark blue cover and remembered that the two days he’d mentioned were up.
Before he could speak, Shen Huaiyun took the initiative. “I’ll tell you tomorrow. We’ve been up all night having fun; let’s rest first.”
Perhaps emboldened by the alcohol, Shen Tangmo not only held Shen Huaiyun as they fell asleep that night but also let his mental tentacles slip out and wrap around the person in his arms, leaving the boy who had just realized his own feelings unable to sleep for half the night.
They didn’t wake up until nearly noon the next day. After an early lunch, Shen Huaiyun pulled Shen Tangmo to lean against the headboard of the bed. His fingers curled slightly as he handed over the notebook, flipping to the page where he had started reorganizing everything from the beginning.
“The dreams I’ve had have always been fragmented, and the timeline is jumbled, so starting from this page is my reordered version,” he explained.
Shen Tangmo’s fingers rested on the edge of the page. Written clearly and firmly on the paper were the words: “Father lost his job. Little Yun was beaten by both parents.”
“In the dreams, whenever they appeared, they were always hitting. Little Yun, or tearing into each other with insults and blows,” Shen Huaiyun said, his tone surprisingly calm. By now, he could completely separate the beasts from his dreams from his real parents. Shen Yue’an and Yuan Qing’an had never laid a hand on anyone, let alone a child.
He glanced sideways at Shen Tangmo’s expression and reassured him, “Little Yun left them when he was fourteen and was taken in by his aunt.”
“How did he leave?” The young man had some guesses, and his furrowed brow didn’t relax at these words.
The next sentence held the answer: “Sirens and police officers. His aunt came to pick up Little Yun and even took him to visit his parents at the detention center. Their attitude was poor, so his aunt didn’t bring Little Yun back again.”
That day was Little Yun’s fourteenth birthday. For once, his mother hadn’t spent the day drowning in alcohol. It seemed she had picked up a fragment of maternal love she’d long discarded, and she cooked Little Yun a bowl of longevity noodles.
That bowl of noodles was just half a handful of pasta with two pieces of greens, but when his father saw it, he flew into a rage, hurling a stream of vile curses. Xiao Yun wanted to finish the noodles quickly he knew such a normal dinner was far too rare but before he could react, the bowl was knocked over, and he was pinned down on the broken porcelain shards and beaten savagely.
His mother, who had been shouting back at his father, also kicked him several times. After beating him, they resumed their arguing and fighting, leaving Xiao Yun alone lying on the cold floor. His forehead and body were cut by the shards, and the arm he had used to shield his head throbbed with an intense pain, as if half of it had been broken.
He struggled to get up and saw a flip phone that had slid nearby during the fight. Reaching for it, he dialed 110 and, amidst the fierce quarreling and fighting, weakly said, “Help me.”
After hanging up, he looked at his injuries and, with eerie calmness, gripped the unnaturally twisted front part of his arm and forcefully snapped it back into place.
Recalling this, Shen Huaiyun broke into a cold sweat at his temples, the intense pain from the dream seeming to replay on his body. But indigo-blue psychic tendrils suddenly wrapped around him, and Shen Tangmo held his arm, blowing gently on the center.
“It’s okay, it’s okay. Do you want to stop for now?” he asked with concern.
“No need.” Shen Huaiyun pulled a tissue from the bedside table to wipe away the cold sweat, his tone resolute. “It’s fine. Xiao Yun didn’t. physically suffer such severe injuries again after that.”
His aunt treated Xiao Yun very well, as if he were her own child. Xiao Yun also worked hard, got into a good university, received a desirable job offer, and rented a small apartment.
“He even adopted a cat, orange and white. I looked up some information, and I think this color pattern could be called ‘golden-backed embroidered tiger on a silver bed.'” Speaking of the lively little cat, the young man’s eyes curved slightly.
“It always meowed in a very soft, coquettish way, burrowing into my Xiao Yun’s arms and rubbing against everything around the house. It was also full of energy, so after discussing with the landlord, we installed a wall-mounted cat tree for it.”
“But dreams about it when it was alive are still too few. I really wish they’d appear more often.”
Shen Tangmo wrapped an arm around his shoulders, leaning closer. He knew that later, the little cat had passed away.
“How about we adopt one together in the future?”
Shen Huaiyun chuckled softly with a hint of apology. “Better not. I always think of that child.” and the scene of its death.
That dream, like the one about domestic violence, appeared very early on, and for some reason, it was in black and white. So, when he was knocked to the ground and saw the rag-like thing thrown in front of him by a ruffian-looking man, he didn’t know what it was at first.
It wasn’t until Xiao Yun reached out to touch it, getting his hands covered in sticky blood, the metallic scent rushing into his nostrils, that he understood. He heard the man sneer, “With so much debt, you still have the leisure to keep a cat?”
It was his cat, his little gold coin.
He had never owed anyone any debt. His little gold coin didn’t owe anyone either.
It didn’t understand the human world; it was just waiting for him to come home from hunting.
Holding his little gold coin and grabbing a piece of broken furniture nearby, he fought those thugs like a madman.
Two were seriously injured, one lightly, and Xiao Yun himself sustained minor injuries. The subsequent investigation ruled it as self-defense, and he bore no criminal responsibility.
“It could be said he avenged Little Gold Coin.” Shen Tangmo’s gaze darkened, his fingers tightening around Shen Huaiyun’s sleeve.
After winning the lawsuit against the three thuggish debt collectors, Xiao Yun walked out of the courthouse and dialed his aunt’s number, wanting to tell her the outcome.
But it was his uncle who answered the phone. He told Xiao Yun that the police investigation had revealed that the person who provided their address to the debt-collecting thugs was their own son Xiao Yun’s cousin. The scoundrel had finally confessed that he was the one who owed the loan shark money and had tried to shift the debt onto his cousin, hoping Xiao Yun would pay it off for him.
Upon learning this, Xiao Yun’s aunt was so enraged that she suffered a stroke and passed away yesterday.
Xiao Yun didn’t know how he managed to make it back home. His landlord didn’t demand compensation and instead suggested he take a break to clear his mind, assuring him that the apartment would still be there for him when he returned.
“After his aunt’s funeral, Xiao Yun set off for a mountain lodge to unwind, only to encounter a mudslide triggered by a heavy rainstorm.”
All records ended here.
Shen Huaiyun felt a weight lift off his shoulders as he closed the notebook. He wanted to say something more, but before he could, Shen Tangmo wrapped his arms tightly around him, pulling him into an embrace and patting his back. “All of that is over now. I’m here with you.”
Taking a deep breath, Shen Huaiyun buried his face in the crook of Shen Tangmo’s neck and hugged him back just as tightly. His mental energy softened and intertwined with the other’s psychic tendrils.
“I know,” he murmured.
He was Shen Huaiyun, and by his side was Shen Tangmo.