Since they had bought couple outfits yesterday, Su Jingyan and Lu Yichen were both wearing cream jackets with black jeans. The only difference was that Su Jingyan’s jacket was short and Lu Yichen’s was long.
The two also had very different temperaments. If they hadn’t been standing next to each other, it would have been easy to miss that they were wearing a matching set.
Su Jingyan panted slightly as he jogged toward Lu Yichen.
Lu Yichen didn’t even blink. His eyes slowly followed Su Jingyan’s movements, like a living statue showing no signs of life.
Su Jingyan’s heartbeat stuttered and quickened.
When he was only about ten meters from Lu Yichen, Su Jingyan’s steps slowed.
Sweat was still slowly dripping down his jaw.
Su Jingyan blinked, a great many questions in his heart. He opened his mouth, a bit unsure where to start.
He stepped forward, nervously took Lu Yichen’s right hand, and asked, “When I went to your classroom to find you just now, why did your classmates say you weren’t in their class…?”
At that moment, Su Jingyan still wondered whether he had simply remembered Lu Yichen’s classroom wrong.
But when he heard this, Lu Yichen’s eyes flickered slightly. With his other hand, he brushed back the stray strands of hair on Su Jingyan’s forehead and wiped the sweat away with his sleeve.
Su Jingyan suddenly realized that the hand he was holding was very cold, colder than an ordinary person’s. Ever since he had met Lu Yichen, the other boy’s body temperature had always been like this.
Lu Yichen wore a white shirt similar to Su Jingyan’s. With one hand, he unbuttoned it button by button, staring at Su Jingyan with a blank look.
When most of the buttons were undone, Su Jingyan froze, his eyelashes quivering.
Patches of dark red spots were scattered over Lu Yichen’s body. Almost his entire chest was covered with the marks.
Su Jingyan’s hand trembled slightly, and then he touched them cautiously. His pupils shrank, and his Adam’s apple bobbed. His voice shook a little as he asked, “What are these?”
Lu Yichen’s hand slowly slid to Su Jingyan’s nape, his ice-cold fingers stroking lightly. His movements were very tender and affectionate, but if he pressed a little harder… the lover’s touch would turn into a threat of death. Their gazes met. Su Jingyan’s eyes were as bright as ever, and Lu Yichen’s pupils were still like a pool of lifeless, stagnant water.
Livor mortis. Two words. Lu Yichen said only two words.
But those two words struck Su Jingyan’s heart.
Lu Yichen pulled the hand he was holding to his chest and placed it directly over his heart.
“…” It was quiet. There should have been a heartbeat inside that chest.
Su Jingyan was in slight disbelief. A suspicion slowly formed in his mind, but the answer was too bizarre. He couldn’t process it fast enough and even tried to comfort himself.
Could it be that Lu Yichen’s body is rather special, and his heart is on the right side of his chest?
But when he touched Lu Yichen’s right side, it was still cold and silent. He couldn’t lie to himself anymore.
“This is… how?” Su Jingyan’s eyelashes quivered again.
Lu Yichen’s expression was very calm, and if it hadn’t been for the chilly hand tapping on Su Jingyan’s nape, one would have thought him dead.
The look in Lu Yichen’s eyes became more cryptic. Finally, he opened his mouth. “I’m not human.”
Something struck Su Jingyan’s soul with a thump, and his heart bled a little.
“What… what do you mean?” Su Jingyan took a breath, the rims of his eyes red, and stared at Lu Yichen’s face.
Lu Yichen said nothing. He suddenly pulled him tightly into his arms. His teeth were clenched, and his head was buried in Su Jingyan’s neck, rigidly pressed against his skin.
Su Jingyan could feel only a strong grip. His whole body was being crushed, so hard that he was almost out of breath.
Suddenly, Su Jingyan caught a whiff of blood, and his pupils contracted. He tried to break out of Lu Yichen’s embrace but was held even tighter.
The smell of blood in the air grew stronger.
Lu Yichen held Su Jingyan in place with one hand on the back of his neck while his teeth bit wildly into his own wrist. No one knew how much force he used, but blood poured out of the wound at once… Even so, he bit harder and harder, as if he truly wanted to tear off a whole piece of flesh.
Su Jingyan sensed that something was wrong when he smelled the fishy stench of blood. The person hugging him was still gripping him tightly against his body, as if he wished the two of them could merge into one.
The posture was very uncomfortable, and Su Jingyan found it a little hard to breathe.
Su Jingyan put his hands on Lu Yichen’s chest and pushed hard, but the boy seemed provoked by this and used even more force.
Su Jingyan blushed and shouted, “What are you doing? Are you biting yourself? Let go!”
Lu Yichen didn’t let go, nor did he have the strength to.
Su Jingyan got angry. He pushed and growled, “I never said I wouldn’t be with you anymore. Is it necessary to bite yourself like a madman?”
After saying that, Su Jingyan couldn’t hold back any longer. Tears flowed down his face and fell onto Lu Yichen’s shoulder. His soft sobbing turned into loud crying.
Lu Yichen’s eyes trembled, and he let go of his wrist. His lips were still stained with blood, and his body was rigid.
Su Jingyan felt the arms restraining him loosen and immediately took the opportunity to push Lu Yichen away. Before the other boy could react, he grabbed the injured hand and held it in his own. Seeing the bloody tooth marks on it, he took a breath, feeling wronged, and wept uncontrollably. “What are you doing? Are you crazy?”
It was the first time Lu Yichen had truly lost control. His face held undisguised panic and nervousness, and his movements were extremely anxious.
He cupped Su Jingyan’s face with both hands and kept wiping away the tears with his thumbs.
“Don’t cry anymore! Don’t cry anymore!” Lu Yichen repeated in a hoarse voice.
Su Jingyan seemed to have suffered some great grievance. He cried harder and sobbed louder, hammering on Lu Yichen’s chest with his hands, and said angrily, “If you keep doing this, I’ll really ignore you and leave!”
After hitting him a few times, Su Jingyan calmed down and stopped crying. Instead, he looped his arms around the other boy’s neck and, burying himself in Lu Yichen’s arms, said pitifully, “Don’t ever lie to me again! If I find out you lied to me again, I’ll bite you to death!”
Lu Yichen’s hands holding Su Jingyan’s face froze, and his fingers trembled slightly.
Finally, as if he had confirmed something, he hugged Su Jingyan’s waist tightly.
Senior…
My senior…
You must!
You must never leave me…
I’ll go crazy!
You must never!
In the empty, abandoned classroom, there was a thudding sound and small voices. The door was tightly shut, and no one knew what the people inside were doing.
With a loud bang, the door was forced open.
A little boy who looked like a doll stood at the door. He stared into the room with his beautiful doe eyes and shouted, “What are you doing?!”
The people inside were startled and trembled all over, and they turned to look at the little boy.
The children instantly recognized the person who had opened the door, and their mouths fell slightly open in surprise.
It was Su Jingyan, their school’s flower.
In elementary school, there wasn’t much awareness of gender between boys and girls, so almost everyone liked whoever was good-looking.
Su Jingyan was already fair and tender, with two small ponytails on his head, and no matter how you looked at him, he seemed like a very cute girl.
There was no student in the whole school who didn’t know him, and every day various children would go to his class on purpose to give Su Jingyan small biscuits and cakes.
The leader of the group scratched the back of his head in embarrassment. “We didn’t do anything.”
Su Jingyan didn’t believe him. He curled his lips. “Nonsense, I clearly saw you bullying him!”
As he spoke, he walked in on his short legs, pushed aside the boys blocking his view, straightened up, and looked down.
On the ground lay a dirty little boy, smaller than Su Jingyan and looking malnourished.
Su Jingyan got angry. “You’re actually bullying your classmate here. Believe it or not, I’ll tell the teacher!”
At that age, telling the teacher was strongly frowned upon among children.
The few boys present looked at one another and ran away in fear. As they ran, they couldn’t help thinking that the school flower was still cute even when angry.
Su Jingyan crouched down, looked at the boy lying there, and reached out to help him up. But when his hand touched the boy’s clothes, the boy recoiled as if greatly shocked. He hurriedly got up, knelt on the ground, and shrank back.
Only then did Su Jingyan see the boy’s face. The boy’s eyes were very gloomy, without the brightness that should have been there at his age.
His nose, chin, arms, and all his other exposed skin were covered with swollen scars.
It dealt a heavy blow to young Su Jingyan’s heart, and his eyes turned red. “Does it hurt?”
The boy didn’t answer.
Su Jingyan wasn’t discouraged and slowly moved closer to him. His little doe eyes blinked, clean and pure. “My name is Su Jingyan. What’s your name?”
The boy moved his mouth but didn’t speak.
This was Lu Yichen meeting Su Jingyan for the first time.
This was the beginning of the story.
Livor mortis: the last stage of the changes that occur in a dead body. Without circulation, gravity causes the blood to pool in the lowest areas, turning them purplish.
Flower: the most beautiful girl in the school (a boy, in this case, usually called a “school grass”), admired by most.