Sang Suiyu fell completely silent.
As quiet descended upon the room, Tan Chen’s body tensed up imperceptibly, his instinct telling him he was about to get beaten up.
Yet this did not shake his desire in the least. An insatiable void seemed to pervade his chest; all the intimacy moments ago had felt like nothing more than scratching an itch from outside a boot, leaving him with a taste of sweetness that only stoked his hunger further.
His palm still rested at the back of Sang Suiyu’s head as he waited quietly. If Sang Suiyu didn’t react further, it would amount to tacit permission to continue.
Instead, Sang Suiyu gave him a deep, penetrating look, suddenly grabbed the plush toy beside him, and slammed it right into his face, telling him to go practice by himself on the side.
Caught completely off guard, Tan Chen took the hit directly. By the time he pulled the plush toy away from his face, he saw that Sang Suiyu was already heading for the door.
It seemed he truly couldn’t take it anymore, whole body radiating a rare flash of anger. Likely because things had been far too messy just now, a few stray beads of sweat hung between his disheveled locks of hair.
“Yuyu,” Tan Chen hurriedly followed right behind him, surprisingly still crying foul, “Just forgive me, okay? I really tried my best.”
“Are we really not continuing tonight?”
“Then what time are we continuing tomorrow?”
Sang Suiyu had already gripped the doorknob, but hearing those words, he couldn’t help turning around, unable to believe Tan Chen could still be so relentlessly persistent. “Look at you—do you look like someone who can keep going?”
With a loud BANG, he slammed the door right in Tan Chen’s face, nearly hitting the bridge of his nose.
Yet Tan Chen didn’t feel the slightest bit discouraged. Standing frozen on the spot for a moment, the sensation of kissing Sang Suiyu just moments ago still lingered persistently in his mind.
No—strictly speaking, that couldn’t even count as a real kiss. It was still light-years away from what Tan Chen had envisioned—an image that had been buried deep in his heart for a very, very long time.
At the very least, those impossible dreams he once thought would never come true were now laid right before his eyes. They were genuinely within his reach, and the distance between them seemed to be silently closing.
Agony and bliss intertwined in the depths of his heart, slowly filling the endless void within his chest, drawing him completely into a state of indulgence he couldn’t pull himself out of.
A moment later, his gaze slowly drifted down, abruptly landing on the plush toy held in his hand.
The moment Sang Suiyu stepped out of the bedroom, he suddenly felt something was off.
Did I just hit Tan Chen with that plush toy?
That plush toy had been won by Tan Chen at a balloon-shooting game when they visited a theme park back in high school, after which Tan Chen had gifted it to him.
Its design was quite unique—cute like a puppy, but with a tail like a wolf. Sang Suiyu had loved it dearly and had kept it by his bedside ever since.
Back then, Sang Suiyu happened to be playing a survival video game, and the plush toy looked remarkably similar to one of the animals in it.
Which means… even though it’s my room, I’m the one who walked out, while Tan Chen is the one who stayed inside.
Sang Suiyu choked on his words for a moment. But forget it—Tan Chen’s bedroom was right next door anyway. He could just sleep in Tan Chen’s room tonight.
Upon stepping into the room, the very first thing Sang Suiyu did was enter the bathroom.
Staring at his lips in the mirror and inspecting them carefully, he confirmed they were indeed slightly swollen, their plump texture displaying an increasingly vivid color.
There was even a subtle sting, entangled with an indelible, intense sensation that he simply couldn’t untangle or separate.
Staring at his reflection in the mirror like this, Sang Suiyu fell into deep thought.
To be honest, Tan Chen’s behavior tonight was truly perplexing.
He didn’t believe for a second that someone with Tan Chen’s capabilities would genuinely fail to execute such a simple task as holding back his strength just a little.
Back in high school, when they did shot put, Tan Chen could hurl the ball to whichever exact distance he pleased within his capability. If that wasn’t considered precise enough, even the most intricate sculpts in ceramics class were an absolute breeze for him.
Therefore, as long as he wanted to, they wouldn’t have made a single mistake in the first place. For things to turn out like this only meant one thing: he had never intended to succeed at all.
But why? What good does doing this do for him?
Vaguely, something felt like it was breaking out of its shell deep down. He recalled the surging, dark color in Tan Chen’s eyes every time he leaned in close, as well as the near-uncontrollable, light nips against his lips whenever their mouths touched.
Those guesses he had never entertained before—guesses that sounded like complete fairy tales—floated into his mind, only to dissipate like mist a second later because they were simply too absurd.
Carrying these doubts and perplexities, Sang Suiyu slept poorly again that night.
He seemed to still be dwelling on these thoughts in his dreams, causing scene after buried scene from his memory to resurface.
It was their Senior 3 classroom during lunch break. Sang Suiyu was sleeping with his head resting on his arm. Seeing that he couldn’t sleep soundly because of the bright light, Tan Chen gently draped his jacket over his head.
Before the jacket fully fell into place, a small gap was suddenly parted. Tan Chen’s head slipped inside as well, lying on his side facing his face.
Sang Suiyu had been half-asleep, only feeling as though Tan Chen’s nose was lightly brushing against his own. Within that confined space, their breathing entangled tightly until a warm sensation seemed to land gently on his lips.
Back then, Sang Suiyu had been completely oblivious, sleeping right through it. Yet years later, that exact warm touch overlapped with the imprint left on his lips tonight—they were almost entirely identical.
Sang Suiyu was startled awake from his dream.
He opened his eyes abruptly, his mind not yet fully awake, feeling that linking these things together was utterly unbelievable.
Daylight had broken, light streaming through the gap in the curtains. He closed his eyes gently, wanting to process his emotions before getting out of bed, only to sense something wrong a second later.
He slowly turned his head, his pupils quivering slightly—sure enough, Tan Chen was lying right beside him.
Because they were so close, turning over meant his face almost brushed against Tan Chen’s. Tan Chen’s deep eyes were open and shining, staring at him with intense warmth.
“When did you come over here to sleep?” Sang Suiyu couldn’t help asking softly.
“Just a little while ago,” Tan Chen didn’t lie to him. He had woken up in the morning only to find that Sang Suiyu had rare oversleeping tendencies, with the door shut tight without a sound. That was why he had snuck into the room to accompany him for a nap.
However, Tan Chen had underestimated his own level of excitement recently. Sleeping next to Sang Suiyu, his mood was nowhere near as tranquil as it used to be, to the point where even his temples were throbbing.
Seeing Sang Suiyu wake up now, he immediately wrapped both arms and legs around him, his scalding breath landing by his ear: “I’m waiting for you to get up so we can continue practicing.”
Still practicing? Practice what? Practice continuing to pretend to be a big bad wolf biting my lips?
At the thought of this, Sang Suiyu felt a lingering sting on his mouth. Yet every time Tan Chen hugged him, his grip was so heavy he couldn’t break free at all.
This made Sang Suiyu even more bewildered. Unable to tolerate guessing aimlessly any longer, he simply called out his name directly: “Tan Chen.”
Sensing Tan Chen’s arms freeze slightly before loosening their grip, Sang Suiyu was finally able to sit straight up, facing him head-on while staring gravely into his eyes.
“I know you messed up on purpose last night.”
“I’m not saying I can’t accept it, I just want to know why you did it. What good does doing this do for you?”
As if touching a nerve somewhere, the color deep within Tan Chen’s eyes shifted slightly.
Because both of them had gotten up in a hurry, the curtains were drawn tight and the lights weren’t on, making Tan Chen’s pupils glow with an eerie light in the dim room.
Then, he spoke rapidly: “Can you really accept it?”
Sang Suiyu’s heart skipped a beat for no reason. “What do you mean?”
“Accepting me kissing you for real like this,” Tan Chen’s voice was light yet scalding hot.
After he spoke, the entire room seemed to fall silent for a moment. No matter how Sang Suiyu had tried to imagine it, he had never expected Tan Chen to say something like this in the end.
For a split second, he almost suspected that his outlandish guesses and the hazy memory from his dream were all real, with only a shred of remaining sanity pulling him back.
“Because I was really worried my parents wouldn’t believe us,” thankfully, Tan Chen immediately followed up with an explanation. “Look, after we kissed last time, we still couldn’t convince them.”
“So I thought about it afterward—if we keep faking it in front of them, it won’t be convincing enough. In that case, we might as well kiss for real. If we kiss for real a few more times, they’ll have no choice but to believe it.”
He probed Sang Suiyu’s reaction. “But I was worried you wouldn’t be able to accept it, so I didn’t consult with you first. I wanted to wait until you got used to it.”
Get used to it?! How could anyone get used to this kind of thing? We aren’t a real couple, so why should I get used to it?!
Sang Suiyu stared at him in shock, yet the stormy emotions in his chest finally began to slowly ease.
So that was why. He knew Tan Chen couldn’t possibly fail at such a simple task; he just hadn’t expected him to be harboring such thoughts deep down.
Those lingering doubts were finally resolved at this moment, and certain baseless guesses that he couldn’t even convince himself of finally dissipated once again.
Still, he was thoroughly blown away by Tan Chen’s line of logic. Unable to hold back any longer, he said, “What on earth are you worrying about? Worrying that I can’t accept it? Aren’t you worrying about the wrong person?!”
“Aren’t you the one who wants to date someone? It’s not me who wants to date! The one who should find it hardest to accept ought to be you!”
“But the issue with my parents hasn’t been resolved yet, has it?” Tan Chen’s eyelashes fluttered, causing the shadows cast across his cheeks to sway gently.
He looked briefly at Sang Suiyu, all dark gloom carefully concealed beneath the surface, leaving behind only a downcast expression that matched his tone.
“If we can’t convince them, there won’t be a relationship to speak of anyway.”
In an instant, Sang Suiyu felt as if he were transported back to a few days ago.
When Tan Chen had softly confessed his feelings back then, he had worn this exact same expression, dropping a bombshell on Sang Suiyu’s mind and filling his chest with a mix of heartache and distress.
It was the exact same at this very moment. Suddenly feeling a tightness in his chest, a wave of complex, aching emotions surged uncontrollably, making him almost want to agree right on the spot.
Yet perhaps because he had endured far too much over the past few days, the words caught squarely in his throat, making Sang Suiyu check himself and take two cautious, probing looks at him.
“So what you’re saying is… when I perform kissing scenes with you later, I shouldn’t fake it anymore, but kiss for real instead, right?”
“Mhm,” Tan Chen lowered his head and asked in a low voice, “Is it really no good?”
“I didn’t say it’s no good…” Sang Suiyu ultimately couldn’t hold back.
Then, he suddenly noticed that Tan Chen’s downcast, broken expression from moments ago seemed to shift—as if he couldn’t keep up the act any longer.
Sang Suiyu: ?