Chapter 55

Xu Ze had a habit. Whenever Lu Heyang asked him a question, he would nod instinctively before thinking it through, only afterward recalling what Lu Heyang had actually asked. This time was no different. The moment Lu Heyang finished speaking, Xu Ze nodded.

A moment later, Xu Ze froze, his body and gaze both rigid. He tried to recall Lu Heyang’s exact words, but couldn’t. All he could remember was their general meaning.

After staring blankly for a long time, Xu Ze’s eyes widened slightly. He blinked slowly, then Lu Heyang heard him answer, “No.”

It was an answer he had expected.

Sometimes, liking someone and wanting to be in a relationship with them were two entirely different things. If one were to search the entire world for someone who had never considered dating Lu Heyang, Xu Ze would certainly be among them. He liked Lu Heyang, but that didn’t mean he wanted to be with him, or even had the courage to do so. Certain things that came naturally to most people were difficult to find in Xu Ze.

“Is that so?” Lu Heyang smiled and said with a hint of regret, “That’s a little heartbreaking.”

It now took Xu Ze several seconds to process Lu Heyang’s words and understand what he meant. “That’s not what I meant.”

“Then what did you mean?” Lu Heyang asked in return.

“It’s not…” Xu Ze didn’t know how to put it into words or explain himself. He tried to organize his thoughts, but in the end, could only admit, “I’ve never thought about it.”

He had never thought about it. He had never even dreamed such a beautiful dream in his sleep.

Xu Ze believed he had already received far more from Lu Heyang than he had ever expected. He wasn’t greedy. Even if Lu Heyang decided to take everything back one day, Xu Ze would obediently return it all to its rightful owner.

Xu Ze had assumed that Lu Heyang had asked the question on a whim, but he had answered honestly, expressing his true feelings to Lu Heyang: I haven’t been thinking about being with you. Not at all. You don’t need to worry about that.

But Lu Heyang told him, “If you’ve never thought about it, then think about it now.”

The words tangled up all the understanding Xu Ze had just managed to piece together. He frowned in near bewilderment. “What?”

“Think about being together.” Lu Heyang held Xu Ze’s chin between both hands, gently squeezing his cheeks with his palms. “And from now on, whatever you want to know, just ask me. I’ll answer you.”

He looked at Xu Ze for another two seconds, then lowered his hands. Before opening the door, he said, “My driver is waiting at the school gate. I’ll be leaving soon. Be careful riding your bike home.”

When Xu Ze didn’t respond, Lu Heyang reminded him, “Say you understand.”

Xu Ze’s eyes finally moved, as though a robot had just been powered on. He looked at Lu Heyang and said, “I understand.”

“Good.” Lu Heyang smiled at him and walked out of the stall.

By the time Lu Heyang finished showering, Xu Ze had only just folded the towel in his hands. He didn’t know why he had folded it, so he unfolded it again and hung it on the hook beside him.

“I’m leaving.” Lu Heyang’s voice echoed faintly through the spacious shower room. “Go home early.”

“…Okay.”

That evening, after showering and washing up at home, Xu Ze spent more than an hour working through a set of practice papers. They belonged to He Wei. His private tutor had assigned him far too many, and he couldn’t be bothered to do them all, so he had given them to Xu Ze instead.

They were extremely useful to Xu Ze because none of the questions appeared in textbooks or reference books available through ordinary commercial channels.

After checking the answers and studying how to solve the questions he had gotten wrong, Xu Ze began to daydream.

He still felt as though he were floating, as if nothing were real. It was like being poor for a long time and suddenly receiving a million out of nowhere. His first reaction wouldn’t be delight, but bewilderment, confusion, and worry.

A night breeze had risen outside, stirring the leaves until they made a sound like waves rolling across the sea.

A little while later, Xu Ze heard a knock at the door. It wasn’t loud, but he jolted violently. When he stood up, he nearly knocked over his chair.

Xu Ze had originally had so many things to think about and consider. He had retreated behind that line of reason, keeping himself from going any further. But when he saw Lu Heyang’s faintly smiling face and his hair slightly tousled by the wind, Xu Ze decided to stop worrying about everything.

Lu Heyang wasn’t a million. He was something far better and more precious, someone Xu Ze would never encounter again in the rest of his life.

Xu Ze realized that from the very beginning, he had never even considered refusing as an option. He would never be able to turn Lu Heyang down, no matter how many reservations and anxieties he had about the matter.

His throat felt dry, and his body refused to move. With one hand on the doorknob, Xu Ze was so nervous that he didn’t even realize he was blocking Lu Heyang from entering.

“Is someone else home?” Lu Heyang asked politely from the stairwell.

“No.” Xu Ze stepped back and opened the door a little wider.

He noticed the folder in Lu Heyang’s hand and realized that Lu Heyang must have come over for a reason.

Once inside the room, Lu Heyang sat down in the chair at the desk, pushed Xu Ze’s practice papers to one side, and took a stack of documents and a signing pen out of the folder. Then he turned to look at Xu Ze, who was standing by the bed.

“Come here.”

Xu Ze walked over. Lu Heyang slipped an arm around his waist, shifted his left leg behind him, and guided Xu Ze down onto his lap.

“Have you showered?” Lu Heyang leaned toward Xu Ze’s shoulder, sniffed him, and asked.

Xu Ze, who had never sat on anyone’s lap before, looked extremely stiff. He nodded.

“Sign here.” Lu Heyang handed him the pen and pointed to a signature line.

Xu Ze didn’t look at what the documents were, nor did he ask a single question. Lu Heyang told him to sign, and he signed. One document after another, he wrote his name more than ten times in total. Only when Lu Heyang said, “That’s enough,” did Xu Ze put the cap back on the pen and set it on the desk.

“Aren’t you going to ask what they are?” Lu Heyang asked, touching Xu Ze’s ear.

Xu Ze stared at the desktop. Lu Heyang’s fingers were making his ear itch a little, and he instinctively shrank his neck back. “What are they?”

“A contract selling yourself into slavery,” Lu Heyang replied.

“To whom?” Xu Ze tried to play along with the joke.

Lu Heyang smiled and asked in return, “Who do you want to sell yourself to?”

Xu Ze turned to glance at Lu Heyang, then quickly turned back to stare at the desk. Apparently, he really wasn’t suited to joking around with people. He murmured, “No one.”

“They’re some subsidies, reimbursements, insurance forms, and things like that.” Lu Heyang rested his fingertips against the edges of the documents and roughly squared them up. “There may be some things you weren’t aware of before, so you never applied for them. I’ve sorted out everything your maternal grandmother is eligible for.”

“Can expenses from a private sanatorium be reimbursed too?”

“Yes. Part of the hospitalization and medical expenses can be reimbursed.” Lu Heyang answered with an unwavering expression and absolute certainty.

Xu Ze had questions, but his thoughts were rather jumbled at the moment, and he didn’t know where to begin. He said, “If you have time, could you send me a digital copy so I can look through it?”

“Of course,” Lu Heyang said.

Even if he didn’t send it, Xu Ze would find all sorts of excuses for him anyway—he was too busy, he had forgotten, and so on. Lu Heyang didn’t feel particularly guilty about it.

He asked Xu Ze again, “Is there anything else you want to say?”

Xu Ze’s hands were both curled into fists on the desk. After remaining quiet for a few seconds, he finally asked, “Why did you say you wouldn’t be coming to class very often this semester?”

From behind Xu Ze, Lu Heyang could see that his shoulders had tensed the moment he asked the question. It proved that Xu Ze really wanted to know the reason.

“Because I might be going to military academy.” Lu Heyang reached his right hand forward and slipped two fingers between Xu Ze’s clenched fingers, gently opening his fist. “If I apply to a military academy, the written and physical examinations will cover some rather specialized material, so I’ll need extra lessons and training. I’ll also have to visit military academies and military bases in advance to observe and learn.”

Xu Ze seemed unable to process it at first. Only after a while did he turn around and ask, “Military academy?”

He had assumed that Lu Heyang would definitely enter politics in the future. Even after graduating from a military academy, Lu Heyang could still enter political circles, but Alliance University would obviously be a hundred times easier than military academy. If the ultimate goal was the same, choosing military academy meant taking a huge detour—unless Lu Heyang also intended to get involved in the military.

“Yes,” Lu Heyang replied.

“Was it something your family wanted you to do?” Xu Ze asked cautiously, unsure whether the question crossed a line.

“No.”

That’s good, then.

Xu Ze didn’t say the words aloud, but his whole body relaxed.

“I’m going abroad tomorrow morning to attend the first stage of training. I’ll probably be gone for a week or two.” Lu Heyang held Xu Ze by the shoulder and turned him around to face him. “And it won’t just be those one or two weeks. In the future, I may need to spend even longer periods away.”

He wasn’t referring only to preparing for the military academy examinations. In every respect, he would need a great deal of time. He still had a long road ahead of him.

“That’s okay,” Xu Ze said.

They had always been like two parallel lines that never intersected. Each had things to do and goals to accomplish. If Lu Heyang was willing to take a detour whenever he had free time, just to come and see him, that was enough. Xu Ze had no other demands.

…No, that wasn’t true. He did have one demand.

Xu Ze found Lu Heyang’s wrist and loosely wrapped his hand around it. He didn’t look into Lu Heyang’s eyes, his gaze fixed on some indistinct spot. His voice grew quieter, too.

“If one day you really have to leave, could you tell me goodbye first?”

No matter how long their relationship lasted, Xu Ze needed Lu Heyang himself to bring this far-too-unreal dream to an end. As long as Lu Heyang said the words, Xu Ze would wake up immediately. He wouldn’t keep his eyes closed and pretend he hadn’t heard.

Saying goodbye meant formally taking leave of each other. It wasn’t a request for Lu Heyang to promise they would meet again.

The wind was still blowing outside the window. Lu Heyang rested one hand against Xu Ze’s lower back, making sure this dandelion-like Alpha wouldn’t be blown away. Then he said, “I will.”

More than once, Lu Heyang had sensed the pessimism Xu Ze carried inside him, perhaps without even realizing it himself. But Xu Ze had made progress this time. Instead of silently dwelling on his pessimism, he had at least managed to voice it.

Lu Heyang didn’t stay much longer. When he was about to leave, Xu Ze was still standing beside the desk, holding a tissue and examining it carefully. Lu Heyang reassured him, “You probably didn’t get any on those places, did you?”

“…”

Xu Ze lowered the tissue and raised his head. His face and lips were a little red, but his eyes were unexpectedly bright and watery. He tugged at his wrinkled T-shirt and followed Lu Heyang.

Before opening the door, Lu Heyang turned to look at him. Xu Ze was either slow to process things or had finally begun to feel happy after all his disbelief, worry, and pessimism. There seemed to be the faintest hint of a smile on his face—the sort of indescribable, foolish happiness that came from being secretly delighted all by himself.

“You’re so adorably clueless.” Lu Heyang laughed, held Xu Ze by the shoulder, and kissed him on the lips.

Xu Ze’s eyes were still shining. He took Lu Heyang’s hand in his own, but let go after a few seconds, careful not to keep him any longer than necessary.

“I’m leaving,” Lu Heyang said.

He closed the door and walked into the stairwell. He had descended only a few steps when he heard the faint sound of a door opening. Turning around, he saw Xu Ze peering at him through the narrow gap in the door, looking out from behind the security gate. Lu Heyang waved at him.

After descending one more floor, Lu Heyang suddenly realized that midsummer had already passed. The gardenias in the residential complex were no longer blooming. All he could smell was the scent of trees and wind.

Only after Lu Heyang disappeared into the stairwell did Xu Ze close the door. He returned to his room, drew back the curtains, and opened the window. Bracing his hands against the windowsill, he looked down.

About half a minute later, he saw Lu Heyang step out of the stairwell. After walking a few steps, Lu Heyang turned around and looked up through the swaying branches. Dappled light fell across him as the leaves moved like waves on the sea. Beneath the trees in the night, Lu Heyang looked as though he were standing at the bottom of a deep blue ocean.

The moon was actually beautiful tonight, but Xu Ze didn’t lift his head to look at it. He simply gazed down from the windowsill at the moon in the sea, far below.

Xu Ze couldn’t go to bed early that night. He worked on practice papers until midnight. Before going to bed, he opened his drawer and took out the little notebook. He turned to the page with twelve circles drawn on it, then flipped to the next page. At the beginning of the first line, he wrote down today’s date and drew a horizontal line.