Chapter 35
Gu Yanqiu said, “It means single.”
“...” Lin Yuewei reached behind her waist, gently pried Gu Yanqiu’s hand away, and said, “Sorry, I misunderstood.”
“Who told you I had a boyfriend?” Since they had come this far, Gu Yanqiu decided to ask clearly. She didn’t even have a single close friend; when she wasn’t working, she stayed cooped up at home. Boyfriend or girlfriend sounded like pure nonsense. Who was spreading rumors about her?
Now that she had already put some distance between them, Lin Yuewei sat on another sofa and pretended to turn toward the tree branches outside the house. “I don’t know who I heard it from. I forgot.”
Her excuse didn’t hold up at all. Aside from the two times they’d crossed paths going to and from work and at events, plus the final competition, Gu Yanqiu and Lin Yuewei’s lives barely overlapped. Let alone someone who knew them both. And among the people who knew them both well enough to know about their relationship, there was no one besides Jiang Congbi. But Jiang Congbi knew Lin Zhi wasn’t her boyfriend; had she lied on purpose? What would she gain from that? Or... was there someone else she didn’t know about?
Gu Yanqiu slowly rolled the prayer beads in her hand, her expression dark as water. “Then who did you hear was my boyfriend?”
“Ah.” Lin Yuewei’s eyes darted over her briefly. “Lin Zhi, I think. That guy who’s always following you around.”
“Lin Zhi is my secretary.”
“Secre—” So he was just a secretary. Lin Yuewei felt a flash of secret delight, then thought to herself that if he was just a secretary, why talk about him as if he were the person closest to her? No wonder everyone would misunderstand; who wouldn’t think he was her boyfriend?
Her lips moved. She said lightly, “A secretary? I’ve seen him. He’s kind of handsome.” Lin Zhi was such a good-looking young man. Last night, in her mind, he’d still been a fifty-fifty possibility; now he’d finally been cleared of suspicion.
“Handsome?”
“Yeah.”
“He has a girlfriend,” Gu Yanqiu said.
“...” Lin Yuewei looked at her. “So what if he has a girlfriend? I don’t like him.”
Gu Yanqiu said, “When I ran into Jiang Congbi at the event yesterday, she was trying to flirt with Lin Zhi, so I just casually reminded her. That’s all I meant.”
Lin Yuewei said, “Thanks for the reminder.”
Lin Mom waggled her eyebrows. “Since you’re both single, why not try dating?”
Lin Yuewei said flatly, “Impossible.”
Gu Yanqiu gave a helpless laugh.
“Miss Gu, I’m not saying anything bad about you. It’s just that we made an agreement before, and I have to keep my promise.” Lin Yuewei first said this to be considerate of Gu Yanqiu’s feelings, then pulled her mother away. The mother and daughter went off to whisper together.
“Mom, can you stop interfering in this?” Lin Yuewei knew her mother was trying to match them up, but she hadn’t expected her to go this far. It was downright impossible to guard against.
“How am I interfering?”
“You’re making this very hard for me,” Lin Yuewei said. “I can put up with it, but you just tripped me and made me fall into her arms. Don’t you think she’d be embarrassed?”
“No, I don’t.” Lin Mom thought Gu Yanqiu seemed quite willing.
“People can be embarrassed inside. Can you see that? Gu Yanqiu didn’t say anything because she’s gracious. You can’t keep taking advantage of that just because she’s gracious. Who was the one who taught me from childhood to respect others, to never do to others what I wouldn’t want done to myself?”
Lin Mom was speechless for a moment. “Fine, fine. Mom was wrong, all right?”
“And then you’ll just keep doing it?” Lin Yuewei folded her arms and narrowed her eyes at her.
“...I’ll change, I’ll change.” Lin Mom missed her opening and pouted a little, aggrieved.
“You...” No matter what, Ran Qingqing was still her mother. Lin Yuewei could only add helplessly, “Don’t do it again next time.”
“What agreement are you talking about?”
“Our little secret.”
“Ah, a shared secret.” Lin Mom said meaningfully. Lin Yuewei didn’t take the bait and didn’t respond to the insinuation. Instead, she said, “Remember what you promised me. Don’t meddle blindly, and don’t invite her over for dinner without asking me first.”
Lin Mom caught the loophole immediately. “What if you agree?”
Lin Yuewei paused, then after some thought said, “We’ll see. I’m going back. It wouldn’t be good to leave the guest hanging too long.”
Lin Mom watched Lin Yuewei’s back without blinking, and a strange intuition suddenly surfaced. Lin Yuewei’s reaction was different from before. If it had been in the past, Lin Yuewei would definitely have refused without even thinking. Why was she saying, “We’ll see” now? Didn’t “We’ll see” mean there might be a next time?
You can’t force a cow to drink water if it doesn’t want to. And if the cow does want to drink, forcing its head down can easily backfire. Lin Mom thought it over and decided to leave the space to the two girls, quietly slipping back to her own room.
Lin Yuewei glanced at the time on her phone. Ten minutes had passed since she had sat down there, and she had spent another ten minutes idly fiddling with her phone. Her mother still hadn’t appeared.
Gu Yanqiu, like her, hadn’t even changed posture once.
Every time Lin Yuewei was alone with Gu Yanqiu, they either had an awkward conversation or were on the way to one. She stood up and avoided the increasingly awkward atmosphere. “I’m going to see what my mom is doing.”
Gu Yanqiu nodded.
Lin Yuewei walked to her mother’s door and knocked. Lin Mom’s voice came from inside. “Stop knocking. I’m napping.”
Lin Yuewei sat back down.
Gu Yanqiu asked, “What is it?”
Lin Yuewei answered honestly, “She’s napping.”
Gu Yanqiu asked again, “Do you want to nap?”
Lin Yuewei had the habit of taking afternoon naps, but after four months of training at the factory, staying up late all the time, she no longer cared much about napping. But Gu Yanqiu was here, so out of politeness she shouldn’t just leave her alone and go to sleep.
“No,” Lin Yuewei said. “Do you want to sleep?”
“I’d like to sleep for a bit.” Gu Yanqiu lifted her eyelids slightly; fatigue showed through.
Lin Yuewei froze. She nearly blurted out, Then hurry up and go home to sleep. Instead she said, “My family has a guest room, but it’s not used much, so it hasn’t been cleaned up.”
She meant to politely refuse to let her keep staying at her house, so the awkwardness wouldn’t continue.
Gu Yanqiu smiled faintly. “It’s fine. I can sleep on the sofa.”
If Lin Mom found out she’d made Gu Yanqiu sleep on the sofa, Lin Yuewei’s ears were probably going to be twisted off. Lin Yuewei hesitated for a moment, then said, “Why don’t you nap in my room first?”
At worst, she could change the bedding after Gu Yanqiu left.
This suggestion hit Gu Yanqiu’s sweet spot, but she couldn’t show it. She put on a show of polite hesitation. “Would that be inappropriate, Miss Lin?”
“What’s inappropriate about it?” Her evasiveness made Lin Yuewei even more uncomfortable; in fact, she felt she wasn’t being generous enough. She waved a hand and said, “I only came home today. The bed is clean, and it’s definitely more comfortable than the sofa.”
“Then I’ll trouble you.” Gu Yanqiu nodded.
“It’s no trouble.” Lin Yuewei led her upstairs. At the doorway to her room, she unlocked the door, walked in, and said, “Come in.”
Gu Yanqiu stepped into Lin Yuewei’s private space.
It was about what she had imagined; a typical young lady’s bedroom, facing south, bright and airy. The most eye-catching thing was the rabbits everywhere. The bedding set was Tokidoki-style rabbit motifs; there was a full-body rabbit plush by the pillow; a small antique display shelf held gold and jade ornaments along with rabbit-shaped ceramic piggy banks; and even the pen holder on the desk by the window was a rabbit.
Lin Yuewei dusted the bed surface and turned back. “Miss Gu.”
Gu Yanqiu withdrew her gaze from the rabbit pen cap and gave a soft “Mm.” Lin Yuewei noticed where she had been looking and, belatedly, covered it a little. “Please don’t laugh.”
“I’m not. It’s very cute.” Gu Yanqiu’s smile was gentle.
Lin Yuewei stiffened, then smiled as well. “Miss Gu, don’t casually call other people cute in the future. It makes it easy to cause misunderstandings.”
“What misunderstanding?” Gu Yanqiu asked curiously.
“There was a theory I saw on Weibo before...” Lin Yuewei started to explain, then suddenly closed her mouth.
“Miss Lin?”
“Nothing. I just suddenly forgot what I wanted to say. Sometimes the things you have hanging on the tip of your tongue are exactly the things you forget when you turn around.” Lin Yuewei laughed twice. Roughly speaking, the theory meant that if you really liked someone, you couldn’t think of specific words like pretty or good personality to describe them; cute was the highest level of liking. If she said that, the two of them would definitely end up in another awkward deadlock, so Lin Yuewei kept quiet.
“Many people are like that.” Gu Yanqiu tried very hard to find something to talk about. “I remember when I was little and doing homework, I’d often have the pen in my hand and still go around looking for the pen.”
Lin Yuewei said, “Then you were pretty stupid, hahaha.”
Gu Yanqiu: “...”
Meeting the other woman’s helpless gaze, Lin Yuewei covered her mouth and coughed lightly. “Sorry.”
“It’s fine.”
“Go take your nap,” Lin Yuewei urged, afraid she’d start saying the wrong things if they kept talking.
Gu Yanqiu’s hand moved to her collar. “How...”
Lin Yuewei asked, “What is it?”
Gu Yanqiu looked troubled. “I’m not sure if Miss Lin has any extra pajamas. I can’t sleep comfortably in this...”
The word she left out was underwear. Lin Yuewei automatically connected the context and glanced at her chest... Lin Yuewei coughed again and said, “I do, but it’s something I’ve worn before. It’s been washed. Do you mind?”
“I don’t mind.”
“Then I’ll get them for you.” Lin Yuewei stood in front of the wardrobe and reached in, then suddenly paused and looked back. Gu Yanqiu was still looking around the room. Lin Yuewei frowned. If she was already going to the trouble of napping at her place and asking for pajamas, why not just go home?
“Miss Lin?” She had been standing there too long. Gu Yanqiu couldn’t help speaking up. “It’s okay if you don’t have any. I usually sleep in my clothes at the office.”
Lin Yuewei had already taken the pajamas out. They weren’t the full cartoon set she owned, but a low-cut camisole nightdress in silk; the fabric felt cool to the touch, perfect for sleeping in this weather.
“Only this one is available. Is that okay?” Lin Yuewei lied. She also had shorts and T-shirts in her wardrobe; if nothing else, she had a long T-shirt.
“...Okay.”
Gu Yanqiu looked at Lin Yuewei. Lin Yuewei led her to the bathroom. “You can change in here.”
Considerately, Lin Yuewei even shut the bathroom door for her.
Inside the bathroom, Gu Yanqiu stood facing the pajamas in a difficult position. She had asked for pajamas, but the style wasn’t what she had imagined; going forward was awkward, and backing out was awkward too.
After closing the door, Lin Yuewei spun in place, making little finger-gun shapes with both hands and silently pointing them toward the door. Whether Gu Yanqiu had meant it or not, she herself had certainly meant it. Last time she had already wanted to see what kind of figure Gu Yanqiu was hiding under those long clothes and long pants; today Gu Yanqiu had practically thrown herself onto her sights.
Lin Yuewei wandered around her own fan forum for the better part of half an hour, looking at fans’ varied confessions of love. There was still no sound from the bathroom. If she hadn’t been keeping watch the whole time, she might have thought Gu Yanqiu had already come out. Lin Yuewei locked her phone, raised a hand, and knocked on the door. Pressing her ear to the panel, she asked, “Miss Gu.”
“Here... I’m here.” A flustered voice.
“What’s wrong?”
“N-nothing.”
If nothing was wrong, why was she so panicked? Lin Yuewei said through the crack in the door, “Really nothing? Did you change into the pajamas?”
“I changed.”
“Then come out already. I’m about to fall asleep.”
Gu Yanqiu slowly opened the door a crack, revealing a face with a faintly resentful look. Lin Yuewei almost laughed, but her curiosity was even stronger. “Quick, come out. Let me see.”
Gu Yanqiu pressed her lips together and walked out.
Lin Yuewei’s eyes lit up.
She had imagined Gu Yanqiu’s figure would be good under her clothes, but she hadn’t expected it to be this good. Her skin was actually even fairer than her face. Lin Yuewei had long planned to enter the entertainment industry and had always held herself to celebrity standards in private; she had seen plenty of stars, all of them picked from the best of the best and meticulously maintained. Gu Yanqiu was one of the few people she had ever seen whose fair skin could rival a celebrity’s.
Her shoulders were rounded, her straight collarbones pale and clean; at a glance, they looked smooth, like the milk Lin Yuewei had hated drinking as a child. The shyness hidden deepest in those eyes wasn’t visible to outsiders; what showed on the surface was like the cold water of an alpine pool, clear and chilling.
Ice skin, jade bones; flesh and bone evenly proportioned.
Those two phrases surfaced in Lin Yuewei’s mind. Before her thoughts could even expand, she saw Gu Yanqiu slip onto the bed as if evading something and cover herself with the blanket.
She looked so anxious that it almost made Lin Yuewei feel like she was the one trying to do something to her. Then her thoughts suddenly veered off course; the glimpse she’d caught just now of Gu Yanqiu’s front seemed a little bigger than it had looked in clothes...
An indescribable heat surged up from the very tip of her heart. For some reason, Lin Yuewei felt a little dry-mouthed.
“Sleep well.” Lin Yuewei quickly left the room.
Gu Yanqiu: “...”
The room finally fell completely silent. Gu Yanqiu sat on the bed hugging the blanket, thinking about how Lin Yuewei’s almost tangible gaze had fallen on her body; the tips of her ears slowly began to burn.
She sniffed the scent of the blanket and then the pajamas separately, imagining that this was Lin Yuewei’s scent, and her breathing gradually deepened.
Gu Yanqiu began to move the prayer beads in her hand faster.
...Form is emptiness; Amitabha.
Lin Yuewei went straight downstairs and lay on the sofa, reflecting on herself. She was a proper person; she was only curious about Gu Yanqiu and absolutely did not want to do anything.
In the few years before same-sex marriage was legalized, homosexuality was already as common as heterosexuality. After legalization, there was even less to say. From the earliest memory she had, Lin Yuewei had treated the two orientations with the same attitude. Likewise, she had never considered whether she was a lesbian, straight, or bisexual.
Now it seemed she was very likely a lesbian. Looking at Gu Yanqiu’s body was much more comfortable than looking at a man’s.
Gu Yanqiu was probably the devil. It was one thing for her to have a devilishly attractive face that kept making Lin Yuewei space out, but even her figure was the kind only a devil could have trained.
The moment Lin Yuewei closed her eyes, she thought of the scene just now; so she simply didn’t close them. She reached to the side and found nothing.
Where was her phone?
Lin Yuewei got up and checked the living room, the sofa, the coffee table, the floor; in the end she remembered she had left her phone upstairs in her room.
Lin Yuewei hissed softly. Going back upstairs would mean another round of awkwardness.
Footsteps sounded on the stairs. Lin Yuewei turned her head to look.
It was Gu Yanqiu, holding her phone.
“Miss Lin, you left your phone upstairs.”
Lin Yuewei said, “Thanks for bringing it down.”
It wasn’t polite to stand there and wait, so Lin Yuewei walked from the living room toward the staircase. From her angle, looking up at Gu Yanqiu made her legs seem even longer, and she couldn’t help glancing to the side. Only when she reached her did she finally meet Gu Yanqiu’s eyes.
Lin Yuewei held out her hand. Gu Yanqiu placed the phone in it, her fingertips a little cool as they brushed lightly across Lin Yuewei’s palm.
Lin Yuewei held back the faint shiver that rose from instinct.
Gu Yanqiu didn’t speak; neither did Lin Yuewei.
They stood there facing each other, the scent that belonged to the other person winding around them, tangled and inseparable.
Gu Yanqiu was restless and distracted; she swallowed quietly and said softly, “Miss Lin.”
“Hm?” Lin Yuewei’s gaze was a little hazy, fixed on her slightly parted, pale lips and unable to look away.
“I...” At some point, Gu Yanqiu had moved very close. Her breath brushed against Lin Yuewei’s face as she licked her dry lips.
“The great river flows eastward, the stars in the sky align with the Big Dipper—” The phone just handed back to Lin Yuewei began buzzing and howling at once; the opening of The Water Margin blared thunderously through the house. Lin Yuewei fumbled in panic and nearly threw the phone away, but in the end she managed to catch it. She didn’t even need to look at the caller ID to know who it was; it was Jiang Congbi’s custom ringtone, The Water Margin.
Lin Yuewei answered through clenched teeth. “You’d better have something important.”
Jiang Congbi: “???”
Jiang Congbi: “Am I interrupting your good time?”
Lin Yuewei said, “No good time. Spit it out.”
Hearing that her voice sounded off, practically like she was about to tear Jiang Congbi apart with her bare hands, Jiang Congbi stopped joking and got straight to the point. “Well, I just wanted to ask if you want to go shopping this afternoon.”
“Shopping?”
“Yeah.”
“Go shopping my ass!”
Jiang Congbi wiped her face, feeling as if Lin Yuewei had sprayed her through the phone.
“If you don’t want to go, then don’t go. Why are you so fired up?” Jiang Congbi said aggrievedly.
“Sorry, I was rude.” Lin Yuewei’s voice came from the other end.
Jiang Congbi’s jaw practically dropped when she heard that. She thought, Is this civilized human being really my childhood friend? Then she heard a familiar voice say, “It’s fine.”
Jiang Congbi: “!!”
Jiang Congbi: “Gu Yanqiu is with you?”
Lin Yuewei said, “Who else?”
Jiang Congbi roughly realized where she had gone wrong and laughed sheepishly. “Did I interrupt something between you two? I can’t believe it, I really can’t. Yesterday you were still saying why should you care about her, and today you’re already doing this and that. A woman’s heart is as deep as the sea.”
The volume on the call was pretty loud. Lin Yuewei covered the microphone, still worried Gu Yanqiu might hear, and said to Jiang Congbi first, “Wait a minute.”
Then she put down the phone and asked Gu Yanqiu, “What were you just going to say to me?”
She vaguely remembered the other woman had leaned toward her and said the word “I.”
The moment had passed. Bringing it up now would no longer have that atmosphere, so Gu Yanqiu simply played dumb and erased everything that had just happened. “I didn’t say anything, Miss Lin.”
“Was I remembering it wrong?” Lin Yuewei felt as if those few seconds had possessed her.
“You remembered wrong. I’ve returned your phone; I’m going upstairs to take a nap. Good afternoon.”
“Good afternoon.”
Lin Yuewei stared blankly as she watched her go upstairs. Then she sat back down on the sofa, turned her back to the stairway, and continued speaking to Jiang Congbi. “What were we talking about?”
“Talking about what you and Gu Yanqiu were doing?” Jiang Congbi had already set out her sunflower seeds, watermelon, and drinks on the coffee table, crossed one leg over the other, and planned to interrogate her properly.
“Nothing much. My mom invited her over for lunch, and then she’s going to nap at my house.”
“Can your guest room be used? Where is she sleeping?” As expected of a best friend who had grown up with Lin Yuewei with their pants off in the same yard, Jiang Congbi immediately seized on the key point. “It’s not your room, is it? Didn’t you have a cleanliness obsession? You’re actually letting someone sleep in your room?”
“Just change the sheets afterward, won’t you?” Lin Yuewei’s words were clearly an admission.
“Oh-ho.” Jiang Congbi found the melon in her hand no longer enough to satisfy her. “You two are moving at lightning speed.” At the same time, she didn’t forget her own role and threw a wrench into things. “Didn’t you say you had no interest in her and wanted me to pursue her? I’m graduated now; I have plenty of time every day.”
Lin Yuewei said, “I... I was helping you check her out, see what her character was like and all that.”
Jiang Congbi said, “Well, thanks a lot.”
Lin Yuewei felt guilty. “No need to thank me. It’s what I should do.” She hadn’t thought of Jiang Congbi at all when she saw Gu Yanqiu in that little camisole today.
Jiang Congbi said, “So what’s her character like? Did you check her out?”
“It’s all right, I guess.”
“So I can keep pursuing her?”
“...”
“Why aren’t you answering me?”
“I think...” Lin Yuewei hesitated before saying, “I think you’d better not pursue her.”
“Why?”
“I asked her before. She said she doesn’t have the mind for dating right now, and besides...” Lin Yuewei deliberately put on a troubled look. “She’s frigid. She definitely won’t be able to satisfy you.”
Lin Yuewei added, “By nature. Basically impossible to cure.”
Jiang Congbi made no sound; on the sofa, she laughed until she was rolling around. Lin Yuewei heard rustling over there. “Jiang Congbi?”
Jiang Congbi seemed to have suffered a major blow. She sniffled and kept up the act to the end, saying firmly, “It’s fine. I believe I can cure her. If she’s frigid for a day, I’ll wait a day. If she’s frigid for a year, I’ll wait with her for a year. My heart is eternal.”
“And if it’s ten years?”
Jiang Congbi shrugged. “Then I’ll go find someone else.”
“...” Lin Yuewei knew she wasn’t that patient. She coaxed her patiently, “See? You’re just making extra trouble for yourself. Better to give up early; a short pain is better than a long one. If you get in too deep later, it’ll be even harder to pull out.”
Jiang Congbi declared solemnly, “Stop talking. Buddha said, if I don’t go to hell, who will? Then let me go to this hell.”
“There’s heaven and you refuse to enter it; you insist on entering hell. Are you闲—”
Before Lin Yuewei could finish, a hand lightly tapped her left shoulder.
“Don’t fool around.” Lin Yuewei clicked her tongue. Then she froze all over and turned around. Gu Yanqiu was standing there again at some point, looking at her with a complicated expression.
Lin Yuewei panicked. “Y-you’ve been standing here when?” Please, heaven, let her not have heard anything.
Gu Yanqiu looked at her steadily, her expression indescribable.
“Probably... since you said I was frigid.”
Author’s note:
Yesterday I saw a comment saying that Miss Gu is a Buddha under the bed and a demon on it, hahaha.
Wishing them a happy time grinding against each other from now on, da-da-da.
Little skit: Someday in the future, the two of them are all thunder and fire, everything has fallen naturally into place, and they’re only missing that last step.
Gu, petty, vengeful, Yanqiu suddenly slams on the brakes: I just remembered, I’m frigid, after all :)
Lin, who would die without being tsundere, full of nonsense, Yuewei: ...
TL Note:
Common Buddhist saying "我不入地狱，谁入地狱 (If I don't go to hell, who will?)," is often used humorously, kind of like "I'll take one for the team."