The boy’s face was as cold as ice, the corners of his mouth twisted in a threatening half-smile, and his eyes were fixed on the woman’s hand as if he wanted to burn a hole through it.
Su Jingyan’s little doe eyes blinked, looking very innocent.
The boy was still holding Su Jingyan’s luggage, his fingers clenched tightly on the handle, and he let out a sneer.
The woman seemed to be running for her life. She immediately jumped back several meters from Su Jingyan, staggering, and fled so frantically that she sprained her ankle.
The next second, the woman’s gait became very strange, but she didn’t seem to feel any pain. She grabbed her hurt leg with one hand to straighten it and then sprinted away in terror.
Su Jingyan watched the scene, a little dumbfounded and a little incredulous.
The boy narrowed his eyes at the back of the fleeing woman and slowly walked toward Su Jingyan. Su Jingyan came to his senses and turned around.
The corners of the boy’s mouth parted, and without waiting for Su Jingyan to speak, he took his right hand and held it in his palm. Then he led him in a certain direction.
Su Jingyan held his breath, confused for a moment.
The boy’s hands were very cold, but, inexplicably, they gave him an indescribable sense of security.
After a few steps, Su Jingyan realized something was wrong. “Isn’t this the wrong direction? Didn’t everyone go that way?”
Su Jingyan pointed to the other side.
The boy narrowed his eyes and laughed twice, a strange light flashing in them. “No. Your room is over here.”
Su Jingyan blinked, a little muddled, but probably out of some intuition, he didn’t shake off the hand and kept following him.
Finally, the footsteps stopped.
Su Jingyan looked at the room number. It was indeed the same as the number on his chest.
His number was 8.
Just now, the woman had handed them the room key for safekeeping, so Su Jingyan quickly opened the door.
As soon as he opened it, Su Jingyan’s mouth fell slightly open in surprise.
The room was very big, exactly like the five-star presidential suite he had once seen on the internet.
There were all kinds of appliances, floor-to-ceiling windows, and plush carpets that could be walked on barefoot. Besides the bathroom, there was a master bedroom and a second bedroom, and there was even a bar counter, a kitchen, and fitness equipment.
Su Jingyan began to explore and discovered that there was even a small swimming pool inside.
The whole room was luxurious and spacious. Many diamond-like chandeliers hung from the ceiling, and the whole room was very bright.
Su Jingyan turned around and found that the boy had already brought in not only his luggage but also his own, and had placed them together in the entryway cabinet.
Seeing this, Su Jingyan couldn’t help but widen his eyes, his tongue tripping over itself. “You… you…”
In the yellow glow of the light, the boy’s features looked very sharply defined.
His illuminated body looked dreamlike.
Su Jingyan’s face turned red again.
In this light, the boy looked attractive.
“I live here too.” The boy looked calm, as if stating something ordinary.
Hm?
Su Jingyan blinked, and it was at that moment that he suddenly noticed the number on the boy’s chest.
It’s the same as mine! It really was number eight too!
Su Jingyan’s upright, confident air instantly withered. He bit his lower lip, and his ears flushed with embarrassment.
Embarrassed as he was, he was extremely glad that the boy couldn’t see his blushing face.
The boy hooked up the corner of his mouth, put his hand on the back of Su Jingyan’s neck, narrowed his eyes, and slowly caressed it. His movements were very gentle, but on such a sensitive spot they carried an indescribable weirdness, a strange sense of trespass.
Su Jingyan didn’t pay much attention. All he could think about was whether they were too close, too ambiguous.
So, unfortunately, he missed the dangerous gleam in the other boy’s eyes.
Su Jingyan blushed, not knowing how to break the tension, and stood frozen in place like a statue.
The two of them stayed in that position for an unknown length of time, until Su Jingyan’s legs began to go numb. Finally, the boy took the initiative to let go.
Before Su Jingyan could heave a sigh of relief, the boy grabbed his hand and walked him to the dining table.
Then, while Su Jingyan was in a trance, he pushed him down onto a chair.
The dinner the hotel had prepared was very rich, with both Chinese and Western dishes as well as a variety of desserts and delicacies. There was so much that it looked like a buffet. The portions were also very large, as if the hotel didn’t worry at all about wasting food.
Su Jingyan had always had a soft spot for sweet things. As soon as he sat down, his doe eyes were full of light, shining like a sea of stars.
But if he wanted to eat now, he would definitely have to take off his mask. At the thought, Su Jingyan hesitated.
The boy narrowed his eyes. “You don’t want to eat?”
Su Jingyan swallowed. He wanted to eat very much but kept his head down and said nothing.
Seeing this, the boy was quick of hand and eye and took advantage of Su Jingyan’s distraction to tear the mask off his face.
In that swift movement, the boy’s pupils shrank, and a look of astonishment appeared.
The face behind the mask had no acne, freckles, or large scars. The skin was fair and tender, the lips red and the teeth white. It looked like a fairy stepping out of a painting.
The boy’s mouth fell open, as if something had stabbed his heart, and his whole body began to tremble uncontrollably.
This is the face!
This is the face!
The boy’s eyes turned bloodshot, and his mental state was obviously going very wrong, looking a little crazed.
With his mask taken off, Su Jingyan was so frightened that he instinctively covered his face with his hands, then tugged his hat lower and buried his head even deeper, looking terrified.
His eyes instantly turned red and began to fill with water.
There was a reason he was so afraid of being seen with this face.
He didn’t know why, but ever since he was a child, people had fallen in love with him at first sight when they saw this face, and they had racked their brains to win his heart.
There had even been some vile predators who had nearly tricked him away when he was little.
At school, it had been frightening, with everyone around him staring. Not only had they fought over him, but some had even wanted to kill him out of love.
He had run into human traffickers, run into crazy people on the subway, and nearly been hurt by a male teacher at school.
For the first half of his life, this troublesome face had brought him countless misfortunes for no reason.
Because of the incident with the male teacher, he had also taken a whole year off from school and changed his learning environment. From then on, he had worn a mask whenever he met people, and his life had gradually stabilized. He had never faced that kind of harassment again.
So for Su Jingyan, the mask was like a fig leaf, and he didn’t want to take it off at all.
But now his fig leaf had been ripped off. How could he not panic?
At this thought, Su Jingyan felt extremely wronged, as if a secret hidden for many years had suddenly been discovered by someone. He couldn’t hold back any longer, and he choked up.
When the boy saw him crying, his pupils shrank, and his heart throbbed violently. He knelt on the floor and hugged Su Jingyan’s head with trembling hands.
He kept saying, “Don’t cry, don’t cry!”
But however the boy comforted him, Su Jingyan cried louder and louder and even hiccupped as he sobbed.
The boy was at a loss and simply pulled him into his arms.
Su Jingyan’s head was buried in the boy’s chest, and he trembled from sobbing so hard.
The boy held him tightly, and his heart throbbed even harder, as if he had found a treasure he had lost. His eyes were bloodshot, and the temptation of holding him made him want to rub him into his own body and merge them into one.
“Don’t cry! Don’t cry!” the boy kept repeating, his whole body tense.
As soon as you cry, my heart feels like it’s being stabbed a thousand times with a sharp knife, and the pain makes me want to kill myself.
The boy’s fingers clenched into a fist, making his knuckles crack.
Su Jingyan was held so tightly that he could hardly breathe, and his anger grew. His two hands had been hanging at his sides, but they suddenly reached out and pushed hard against the other boy’s chest, trying to break free of his arms.
But his pushing seemed to provoke the boy, whose eyes instantly turned red. He hugged him even tighter and, in a trance, kept repeating “Don’t cry.”
Su Jingyan was squeezed harder and harder and completely forgot to cry.
Seeing that the boy stubbornly refused to let go, he felt a surge of irritation. He opened his mouth wide, aimed at the other boy’s neck, and bit down.
Su Jingyan bit hard enough to make his own teeth hurt, but the boy seemed not to notice and still held him firmly in his arms, not discouraged in the least.
Su Jingyan grew tired of biting, and the inexplicable anger subsided. He looked at the boy’s neck and realized he had been about to tear off his flesh, and that the body beneath him was trembling uncontrollably.
Su Jingyan himself liked this boy, and he felt that the force with which he was being held was very abnormal. Instead, he began to soothe the other boy.
“I’m not crying anymore. Don’t be afraid.” Su Jingyan sighed, answering the boy’s “Don’t cry.”
Hearing Su Jingyan’s voice, the boy buried his head in the side of his neck. His body was still shaking, and his voice trembled. “Then don’t leave me! Don’t leave me!”
Su Jingyan smoothed the boy’s hair with his hands. Seeing the boy like this, he felt very uncomfortable and very sad.
“Okay, okay, I won’t leave you.” Su Jingyan coaxed him like a child.
Hearing this, the boy slowly calmed down.
Suddenly, Su Jingyan noticed something was wrong.
Something wet had dripped onto his neck.
The boy was crying.
Fig leaf: a reference to Adam and Eve’s use of fig leaves to hide their nudity.