Chapter 69

Chapter 69

Before An Ye said those words, she had thought about how Chi Tuo might react.

She was still a bit unsure—though she knew Chi Tuo very well by now, when he got really emotional, he could be pretty illogical.

He just stood there frozen for a while.

Frozen long enough that An Ye started to wonder whether she should say it again, or maybe phrase it differently—but “give it a try” was really the only wording she could accept right now.

Luckily, just as she was about to open her mouth a third time, Chi Tuo finally moved. He walked straight over and thump—plopped himself down right beside her.

Very loudly.

An Ye jumped out of her skin, and so did Lao Bai next to her.

Lao Bai even let out a startled awoo, clearly shocked and displeased that this yellow-pink lump of a pillar had suddenly become a sitting stump.

“I…” Chi Tuo stared at An Ye, opened his mouth—and went mute.

An Ye stared back at him, thinking, Wasn’t he usually a chatterbox when he got emotional? What’s with the sudden mute act?

This time, Chi Tuo didn’t pause for long. He suddenly stood up again and walked straight over to the cat nest. An Ye wasn’t startled this time, just craned her neck to watch him pull a phone out from the cat bed, then hold it and stare at her for a while.

Then he tossed the phone back into the cat bed and walked into the study.

An Ye: “……”

Finally, Chi Tuo came out with a stack of A4 paper, a box of ink pad, and a pen, which he placed in front of An Ye.

An Ye figured her current confused expression must be a classic, so she pulled out her phone and took a selfie.

They were both at a loss for words with each other, so Chi Tuo cleared his throat and said, “Don’t make me laugh right now.”

An Ye: “...Okay.”

“Write down what you just said,” Chi Tuo said as he spread out the paper for her, uncapped the pen, and opened the ink pad.

An Ye: “...What part?”

“Forget it, I’ll do it,” Chi Tuo said, pulled the paper back, and started writing himself.

Starting from “I went to consult Dr. Yang twice,” An Ye realized he could actually write down everything she had just said, word for word, without missing a single bit.

His handwriting was sloppier than it had been in high school. Their handwriting styles had always been kind of similar since they both used to copy the same practice sheets when they were kids. After ten years, her handwriting had become more rounded, while his had grown wilder.

An Ye watched him bury his head in writing, a little dazed.

She herself couldn’t even remember everything she had just said—but he could, even down to the punctuation.

His fingers were very good-looking. The way that black pen was held between them—she didn’t know why, but it looked really appetizing.

An Ye never hid anything in front of Chi Tuo, and especially not in this post-drinking, post-confession situation. She leaned over and kissed the knuckle of the hand he was writing with.

Chi Tuo’s hand twitched, and the pen slashed clean through the paper he had been writing on.

An Ye: “……”

She quietly scooted back half a butt’s width, a little guilty and a little exasperated. “Why do you have to write that down anyway?”"I'm afraid you won't remember once you sober up tomorrow." Chi Tuo's voice sounded fairly calm, but he was still gripping the pen, staring at the torn part of the paper. He looked a bit...

An Ye frowned, leaned in to get a closer look at his face.

His jaw was clenched tightly, and his complexion had gone a little pale.

"You..." An Ye was dumbfounded. "Panic attack?"

"No." He denied it three times in a row. "No. Impossible."

"I'm just excited," Chi Tuo insisted.

"Who the hell turns this pale from excitement?" An Ye stood up. "Do you have any meds?"

"I just drank mixed alcohol," Chi Tuo argued.

"...When have you not had mixed alcohol at my place?" An Ye pointed at the glass. "That tiny shot of baijiu would evaporate if you waited two more seconds."

Chi Tuo: "..."

"Do you have meds?" An Ye asked again.

His vision was already starting to blur, but he still stubbornly pulled out a fresh sheet of paper and began writing from the beginning. While writing, he said, "Let me finish this, and you stamp it properly. I’m afraid you’ll forget tomorrow."

An Ye: "..."

She pulled a sheet of paper over, grabbed Chi Tuo's pen, and scribbled her name and ID number beside him. Then she pressed a fingerprint above the name.

She smacked the paper in front of Chi Tuo and asked, "Where’s the medicine?"

Chi Tuo stared blankly at the paper. "You know writing something like this could get you swindled out of everything you own, right?"

"Go ahead and swindle me." An Ye, having written what basically amounted to a blank check, went into Chi Tuo’s room. The nightstand was the last place meds might be. She dug out a bunch. "Can you take these after drinking?"

Chi Tuo didn’t answer. He was still staring at that piece of paper. After a moment, he staggered to his feet, tossed the sheet into the shredder in the study, turned it to the highest setting, and watched it grind into powder. Then he staggered back to his room and looked at An Ye sitting on his bed, studying each bottle of medication.

When she saw him enter, she tilted her head up and frowned, tone full of familiar annoyance: "Chi Tuo, I swear you're really good at pretending. That old-dog mask is glued to your forehead, huh? You always act all quiet, but you're secretly taking this many meds?"

"A lot of those I only took once or twice. The side effects were bad, so I didn’t throw them out." Chi Tuo came over, scooped up the dozen or so bottles, and dumped them all back in the drawer. "Stop messing with them. If you take any of these after drinking, it’s instant death."

An Ye: "...Then what are you going to do?"

"I’ll lie down for a bit." Chi Tuo sat on the bed too and looked at An Ye. "What you said just now—was it real?"

His emotional processing speed was apparently capable of orbiting the Earth three times.

Still hadn’t made it back.

An Ye emphasized, "I might be really bad at this. So bad we might not even be able to stay friends."

"Impossible." Chi Tuo didn’t even hesitate, cut her off firmly, then pushed the cross-legged An Ye toward the pillow and lay down with his head on her lap.

An Ye: "..."

"You already kissed me," Chi Tuo mumbled with his eyes closed. "I’m just lying down a bit. Way more reserved than you."

An Ye: "..."

His shamelessness was on another level...Then he asked again, "You really did kiss me just now, right?"

An Ye: "...Yes, yes, yes."

Chi Tuo opened his eyes and looked at her. "Why?"

His bedsheet was black, which made both of their skin look especially pale. An Ye was half-leaning against the pillow, head lowered, meeting Chi Tuo's gaze.

Chi Tuo still didn’t look great—he was already starting to sweat. The inexplicable panic attack had left the corners of his eyes slightly red.

But his gaze was striking.

So striking that An Ye almost had the urge, like a reflex from her profession, to take a photo of him right then.

That kind of gaze, filled with complex emotions—so intense it felt like she had just watched a tragedy unfold in his eyes.

The kind that burns too brightly to last long.

"No reason," she replied, and reached out to cover his eyes.

Neither of them said anything after that.

Lao Bai also jumped onto the bed, trying to wedge himself into the space between the two of them to sleep. Chi Tuo pushed Lao Bai's butt inch by inch until the cat was a full meter away.

Lao Bai was unusually well-tempered this time, wagging his tail as he moved to the other side of the bed.

An Ye: "..."

Chi Tuo turned over, hugged An Ye’s waist, and buried his face into her stomach.

An Ye rubbed his head.

She truly didn’t resist. Any intimate action with this person felt completely natural. Her heart even softened a little because of that feeling.

This moment, lying down with him, doing and saying nothing—just holding each other—unexpectedly made her feel safe.

She had never experienced this before. In the past, after exhausting herself with a role, she’d usually choose to take a bath, stretch for half an hour, then go to sleep.

She couldn’t let herself be idle—when idle, she would start thinking. And her life couldn’t really withstand too much thinking.

But now she was completely idle, and yet all she was thinking about was...

"Chi Tuo, where did you get this bedding set?" she heard herself ask. "Doesn’t seem to attract fur."

Chi Tuo was stunned by the question, lifted his head to look at her. "Huh?"

An Ye laughed and pressed his head back down. "I just suddenly got curious."

On the black sheets, Lao Bai’s fur actually wasn’t all that visible.

"...I lint-roll it every day," Chi Tuo said, voice muffled. He rolled over onto his back and sighed.

"Feeling better?" An Ye asked him.

"Yeah." Chi Tuo sighed again.

"Since Lunar New Year till now, why do I feel like every time I see you, you have a panic attack?" An Ye looked at him.

She’d been asking a lot of questions like this lately—and she wasn’t as resistant to doing it as she used to be.She could at least be somewhat helpful now—even if it was just offering a leg for him to lie on.

“Ever since I came back to the country, my sleep’s been bad,” Chi Tuo didn’t hide it. “Poor sleep leads to faster heart rate and heightened emotions, so the episodes happen… more often.”

An Ye paused. After thinking for a moment, she still couldn’t hold back: “Am I one of the triggers?”

Chi Tuo looked up at her, frowning. “What?”

“My situation’s a bit of a mess,” she said. “Qi Wei said your team basically lived in the meeting room just to dig through five years of my work records.”

Chi Tuo flicked her arm with a snap, rather roughly. “None of your damn business. If it weren’t for you, I might not have even made it through the past few years.”

An Ye: “……”

Rough—but kind of nice to hear.

“If I hadn’t promised you that I’d become a lawyer,” Chi Tuo said, “I might not have even gone to college.”

An Ye: “Huh?”

Chi Tuo gave a small smile. “Honestly, at the time I thought… it was too tiring. I didn’t want to study. I wanted to help out at my uncle’s shop and stick with my mom 24/7.”

An Ye: “……”

“Good thing I didn’t,” Chi Tuo smiled again. “If I had, my mom probably wouldn’t have gotten better either. We’d just be stuck in a vicious cycle.”

Good thing he didn’t—otherwise, An Ye really would’ve become a celebrity he could only support through fan club votes.

Just like every other celebrity, with her real story buried under a sea of rumors.

An Ye reached out and patted his head.

“Jiujiu,” Chi Tuo called her.

“Mm?” An Ye responded.

“You can’t say tomorrow that you were just drunk and agreed without thinking,” Chi Tuo squinted at her. “If you dare say that, I’ll drag you straight to the Civil Affairs Bureau.”

An Ye: “……”

She smacked him on the forehead with a slap and lifted her leg. “Move, I’ve got pins and needles.”

“You off tomorrow?” Chi Tuo scooted to the side, lying next to her.

After a moment, he reached out and pulled her into his arms.

It felt so natural, as if they’d done it countless times before.

“Gotta change the script,” An Ye sighed in his arms. “I’m not taking Director Yang’s films anymore. The beginning always goes smoothly, then he always rewrites the script. If he’s not filming on the deadline, it physically pains him.”

“Sigh, impressive,” Chi Tuo said with heartfelt admiration. “You’re probably the only one in the industry who can straight-up say you’re not doing Yang Zhengyi’s films.”

An Ye laughed, “Heh heh.”

“How about…” He started negotiating again, “you write me something…”

An Ye: “……”

“Mainly because you drank tonight. That bottle of baijiu was fifteen percent, and you drank two-thirds of it in one go,” Chi Tuo tried to sound more convincing. “I… when it comes to things said while drunk… you know, I’ve handled a lot of cases like this…”An Ye: "……"

She sat up, ran to the living room to grab the pen Chi Tuo had just made her copy, then ran back and jumped onto Chi Tuo’s bed, pressing his face down and drawing a goose on his face.

Chi Tuo: "?"

An Ye noticed the goose looked a bit round.

She held him still and kept drawing, turning the goose into a turtle shell.

An Ye: "…Damn."

Chi Tuo: "?"

An Ye: "Don’t move!"

She then drew four legs and a tail under the turtle shell.

Closing the pen cap, she clapped her hands. "If you stand in front of me with this face tomorrow, even if I’m dead drunk, I’ll remember it."

So annoying.

Nagging, nagging, nagging!