Shoutout to Alinaza for the commission!
That night, Jiang Se didn’t get a single bite of the Buddha Jumps Over the Wall that Lu Huaiyan brought back for her.
After begging for a hug on the sofa for half an hour, she quickly removed her makeup, washed up, and then drilled into the blankets and fell asleep.
She was awakened in the middle of the night by the heat, and almost thought she had another low fever.
Her groggy consciousness gathered, and only then did she realize it was the man behind her holding her too tightly.
He was shirtless, closely pressed against the skin exposed outside her pajamas, the contact directly squeezing out a layer of sweat.
If it were before, Jiang Se would most likely have pushed away this heat source.
But now, perhaps used to his nearly domineering embrace, she slowly blinked a few times and fell asleep again.
The latter half of the night she slept especially deeply, not even knowing when Lu Huaiyan left.
When she woke up, a long string of messages lay in her WeChat, all from Guo Qian.
Qianqian: [image.JPG]
Qianqian: [There’s no photo Guo Qianqian can’t get.]
She followed it with a gif showing off how amazing she was.
Jiang Se smiled, didn’t scroll further, and directly opened the first picture in the chat.
It was an old photo.
In a billiard room where the lighting barely counted as bright, the man standing at the very center was Lu Huaiyan.
He was leaning against the pool table, head lowered as he rubbed chalk onto the cue.
Beside him stood Cen Li and Guo Song and a few others, Guo Song also holding a cue, obviously playing against Lu Huaiyan.
The room was spacious; besides seven or eight men, there were also a few girls.
The girl standing next to the window, looking toward the pool table, was Zhu Mingli. Her gaze was fixed on Lu Huaiyan, but in the half-open window behind her appeared a passing silhouette.
That silhouette was just behind Zhu Mingli’s side and back; at first glance, the two of them were cleverly lined up into one photo through the half window sash.
Jiang Se stared at Fu Yun’s side profile in the picture and smiled lightly.
This photo was taken at a certain banquet. If she remembered correctly, it was her twentieth year, a birthday banquet hosted by the Guo family.
Back then, Zhu Mingli and Fu Yun should’ve already been very familiar, thick as thieves for years. How could they not be familiar?
Yet no matter the occasion, the two of them always looked like strangers.
Even now, Jiang Se couldn’t understand how the always proud and lofty Zhu Mingli would fall for Fu Yun.
While thinking, her fingertip slipped and swiped to the next photo.
The moment she saw it, Jiang Se’s gaze slightly tightened, but her expression quickly returned to normal.
Her fingertip continued swiping on the screen; the next dozen photos were all of Lu Huaiyan and Guan Jiayi.
A handsome man and a beautiful woman, even in a crowded staff cafeteria, they were very pleasing to the eye.
The angles of these photos were all sorts of strange, near and far, high and low, obviously candid shots.
Among them, one happened to capture the moment Guan Jiayi looked toward Lu Huaiyan.
The girl was holding a cup of low-calorie drink, sipping through a straw while secretly looking up at him, her clear, clean eyes filled entirely with him.
The man kept his gaze lowered the whole time, as if unaware of her look.
The photo was taken beautifully, an image straight out of an idol drama.
Jiang Se didn’t linger on that photo for long. Soon she finished browsing all of them; behind the photos was a video.
A gloomy snowy day, a vintage-style round-arched window frame, snowflakes falling softly, piling over half the windowsill.
The man sat by the window playing the piano.
He played with full concentration, clear eyelashes quiet and lowered, his long fingers dancing over the black and white keys.
The video was under 30 seconds long; when it started recording, the music was already near the end.
Jiang Se almost recognized it at the first note, it was Debussy’s “Clair de Lune,” the piece she chose for herself on her coming-of-age day.
When the last note fell, the man lifted his eyes, the usual coldness in his pupils not yet fully shading away the gentle softness inside.
The moment he looked up, a bright, crisp “Ah Yan” followed immediately.
It was Guan Jiayi’s voice.
The video ended right on her tremoring, heart-filled “Ah Yan.”
Jiang Se calmly pressed exit, returned to the chat window, swiped down, and, just as expected, Guo Qian’s later messages were all about Lu Huaiyan and Guan Jiayi.
She read them quickly, ten lines at a glance, then tossed her phone onto the bed and got up to wash.
She had an appointment with Dr. Gina for therapy and needed to prepare well.
—
The last time Jiang Se saw Dr. Gina was on New Year’s Day. That day, Cen Mingshu had rushed into Lu Huaiyan’s villa to drag her out, and without another word brought her straight to Dr. Gina’s office.
Dr. Gina already knew from Cen Mingshu that Jiang Se had returned to Beicheng.
She was half Chinese, half British, speaking perfect, standard Mandarin.
As soon as Jiang Se entered the therapy room, she smiled and asked: “Sleeping any better lately? Still taking the medication?”
Jiang Se made an “mm” sound, placed her handbag on the chair, slowly sat on the recliner, and said: “That feeling has started again.”
“What kind of feeling?”
“Being watched in the dark,” Jiang Se said. “Just like when my hands were bound and my eyes covered, always feeling like some gaze is stuck to me, ready to tear me apart, devour me.”
Dr. Gina listened quietly, her gaze soft as she looked at Jiang Se.
The curtains in the therapy room were drawn, the lighting dim. The girl’s expression seemed calm, but her eyes churned with emotions.
Fear, disappointment, and an anger she couldn’t repress.
Almost exactly the same as when she first came here at eighteen.
Back then, she stubbornly told her: “Everyone says that person was just my imagination, but I know he wasn’t.”
She held onto that stubborn belief for two years. In the third year, after one therapy session, she suddenly said softly, “I think I really am sick.”
And now, she seemed to have returned to the worst point of her illness.
When the curtains opened again, two hours had passed.
Bright white light streamed in from outside. Dr. Gina picked up a pen to write the diagnosis, then looked at Jiang Se and smiled: “I prescribed more medication for you, and increased the dosage of your old one.”
After handing her the prescription, she lowered her head to organize the medical file, slipped the recorder into a document box, and said casually, “Your Little Aunt is always worried your condition will worsen. I once joked to her that sometimes even I can’t tell if you’re very sick or the clearest-headed of all.”
She said it lightly, as if it really were just a joke she made to Cen Mingshu.
After saying that, she took a book from the shelf and said, “When you see Zheng Huan next time, bring her this book. It’s the latest research from my professor on serial killers.”
Jiang Se had arranged to meet Zheng Huan at the end of the month. She took the book and nodded: “She’ll be back at the end of the month. I’ll bring it to her.”
Dr. Gina’s dark brown eyes reflected Jiang Se’s face. She smiled: “Thank you. And when you see her, remind her to come find me. She’s like you, she needs treatment.”
Once she got in the car, Jiang Se placed the book on the passenger seat.
At home, she took it to her room, about to write Zheng Huan a message when Guo Qian’s call came.
Miss Guo, who had sent over a hundred unanswered WeChat messages today, had clearly reached her limit.
Sure enough, the moment the call connected, Guo Qian’s voice was impossible to suppress.
“Tell me what’s wrong with Lu Huaiyan? He just finished a scandal with Sun Wei, and now he’s immediately stirring things up with that Guan family girl. Sese, I’m telling you, that video was filmed in Guan Jiayi’s villa in England!”
“That villa belongs to Guan Jiayi’s grandmother,” Jiang Se placed the book on the shelf and said calmly, “Even if it was Guan Jiayi’s villa, why are you angry if I’m not?”
“Guan Jiayi’s working as a principle at North Ballet now. Whenever she has time, she runs to Grandpa Lu’s place. She couldn’t make it more obvious that she wants to be Grandpa Lu’s granddaughter-in-law.” Guo Qian paused, then switched targets entirely, aiming straight at Jiang Se. “You’ve been back in Beicheng for days now, right? Have you seen Grandpa Lu?”
Jiang Se’s hand paused.
The second day she came back, Lu Huaiyan had asked if she wanted to go to the old estate to play with the macaw and have dinner with his grandfather.
But she refused.
“No, I’ve been busy these days,” Jiang Se said calmly. “Qianqian, everyone has the right to openly, properly like someone. Guan Jiayi likes Lu Huaiyan, that’s between them. It has nothing to do with me, or you, or anyone else.”
At those words, Guo Qian went quiet: “Sese… I feel like you’re not even taking this relationship seriously. I thought—”
She didn’t say what she thought, but Jiang Se knew.
It was her first relationship with someone she once liked. Anyone else in her situation would probably fall deep. Something like today’s situation, if not getting angry and jealous, then at least not staying this calm.
Jiang Se lowered her lashes: “Don’t worry about these things. Just graduate first. If you don’t want to come back and get engaged after graduating, then stay abroad. My Little Aunt won’t leave you alone.”
When she first arrived in Tongcheng, Guo Qian had even slapped her own chest saying she’d already asked her grandfather to help and would share the emergency funds with her. The old man must’ve thought she was too outrageous, he agreed at first, then took it back.
Money was possible, once she returned to the country.
And so the emergency funds were gone.
Guo Qian said, “I know, I’m looking for an internship now. Worst case, I’ll work for your Little Aunt in the future.”
Once the topic shifted, Guo Qian finally stopped talking about Guan Jiayi and Lu Huaiyan, chattering instead about her glorious plans.
By the time the call ended, the sky was dark.
Evening light couldn’t suppress the thousands of city lights.
Jiang Se placed her new medication on the bedside table, took a shower, and when she walked into the living room she immediately noticed the piano in the corner.
She thought of the piece Lu Huaiyan had played in the video.
He played “Clair de Lune.”
Her favorite piece.
Jiang Se could play too, when they were young, music lessons always started with piano.
After building foundation in theory, they learned violin.
Seven years ago, after she injured her hand, she couldn’t play violin anymore.
Piano she could still play, but her left pinky lacked strength, so the music always felt off.
She never despised a single scar on her body.
Even if her playing wasn’t perfect, if she wanted to play, she played, not afraid of others laughing.
Jiang Se walked over, lifted the piano lid, sat down on the bench, and slowly let the melody that had lingered in her mind pour into her fingertips.
The piano sounded like a story.
Outside the door, the man who had just stepped out of the elevator didn’t unlock the door immediately. Holding his suit jacket over his arm, he stood quietly outside, listening.
Only when the piece ended did he open the door and enter.
When Jiang Se saw him return, she went to close the piano lid. But the man who was bending down to take off his shoes spoke as if he had eyes on top of his head: “Wait a moment.”
Hanging up his coat as he spoke, he undid the cuffs of his shirt, rolling up his sleeves as he walked toward her.
“I’ll be your left hand.” He sat down behind her, his two long legs spread openly on either side of her legs, saying, “Just now, that piece ‘Moonlight’, I’ll play with my left hand, you play with your right hand.”
Jiang Se glanced back at him: “How are we supposed to play like that?”
“Maybe others can’t, but we can.” Lu Huaiyan tilted his head and kissed her temple, saying, “Dare to try?”
“What wouldn’t I dare.”
Jiang Se turned her head back, set her right hand on the keys, and without giving him any time to prepare, struck down the first note on her own. She was deliberately making trouble, the rhythm fast then slow; a piece not even five minutes long was dragged out to seven minutes before it ended.
But this man, no matter how she changed the tempo, could always keep up.
When the messy, tangled performance ended, Lu Huaiyan’s right hand, resting beside her waist, pinched at the hollow of her waist. “Has the young lady played enough? Can you play properly now?”
The spot he pinched was Jiang Se’s ticklish spot, and he pinched her so she couldn’t hold back a laugh.
After that, she didn’t mess around again.
Her hand touched the keys. She said to Lu Huaiyan, “Starting.”
“Mm.”
They pressed the keys at the same time, one large hand and one small hand, their notes connecting with almost no flaw at all.
As if it really were the same person playing, he had truly become her left hand.
The tremor and resonance of the piano notes echoed in the deepest part of the soul.
When the last note’s lingering sound dispersed into the air, they both fell silent for a moment.
Jiang Se heard Lu Huaiyan say, “Turn your head.”
She knew what he wanted to do; what he wanted was what she also wanted. When she tilted her head over, she parted her teeth on her own.
He kissed her very gently, tender and lingering.
But beneath the gentleness was an uncontrollable, surging desire.
That light and hazy piece of music ignited the yearning they held for each other deep in their bones.
Even in his urgency, Lu Huaiyan didn’t intend to do it on the piano. He gently closed the keyboard cover, lifted her with one arm, kissing her as he walked toward her room, his right hand undoing his shirt buttons and belt at the same time.
The curtains in the bedroom were already drawn, the whole room quiet, desire fermenting continuously in the darkness.
Lu Huaiyan noticed that this girl seemed to have a bit of fire in her today.
His shoulder was bitten with a very deep bite mark, bleeding, so that when he lowered his head to kiss her, he tasted a mouthful of blood.
And yet he actually enjoyed this bad temper of hers in bed.
When they first got together, this girl clung to him like a vine, yet she never bit him, never left any marks on him, and would never call his name when she lost herself.
Now she not only liked biting him, but also liked calling his name.
He moved a bit too hard; Jiang Se couldn’t help biting him again.
Lu Huaiyan let her bite, but the strength of his hand gripping her waist only grew stronger. His low, hoarse voice fell by her ear: “Why do I feel like you’re angry at me?”
