Chapter 94

Chapter 94

After two days of collective filming, the following two days of the "Friendship Between the Opposite Sex" show are arranged for pair filming. Tomorrow’s schedule includes camping on the mountaintop, with a live-stream duration still set at two hours, focusing on heartfelt conversations between friends, such as hopes, wishes, and the things they want each other to do.

The production team went through the schedule for tomorrow once more, just like the day before, before dismantling the setup and calling it a day.

There was no need to shoot the accommodation content today, as the accommodation in the mountains, which was converted from old houses, had some water issues. The smell had already been strong when they checked in yesterday, and today there was a backup in the public restroom. The suite where An Ye and the others were staying had a smell that even with the bathroom door closed, could not cover up the stench of a sewage drain.

Unable to accommodate anyone, the resort manager had the few independent houses on the back mountain cleaned up. Though the renovation was old, making it unsuitable for filming, they were much more comfortable to stay in than the houses they were supposed to use for shooting.

An Ye, Chí Tuō, and Qí Wéi Lán Yī Fāng were arranged to stay in one of the independent houses, two stories, with one room upstairs and one downstairs.

“All double rooms, no cameras,” Qí Wéi looked around, arranging everything swiftly. “We’ll stay downstairs, and you two stay upstairs.”

Chí Tuō was on the phone, nodding as he heard the arrangement, and then he went upstairs first.

“What happened to him?” Qí Wéi asked in a low voice, pulling An Ye aside.

“He was scared.” An Ye smiled and patted Qí Wéi’s shoulder before heading upstairs.

He had told her on the live stream to never surprise him like that again.

His voice was hoarse.

Suddenly, her heart ached.

For her to say those things during the live stream, it took a lot of courage, and that courage had come from Chí Tuō, who had stood outside the interview room and told her not to be afraid, that he was there.

And then, just like when she was a child, she was a little rebellious, thinking to herself that it didn’t matter because Chí Tuō was there.

That feeling of always having someone by your side no matter what trouble you get into—it had been a long time since she’d felt that way.

Chí Tuō was still on the phone.

Once An Ye officially announced their relationship, Chí Tuō became the busiest person.

His boss, Lao Yuan, was actually the first to call him. The call lasted for more than ten minutes, and An Ye could vaguely hear that Lao Yuan was asking for a matchmaking red envelope.

After that, it was his clients.

Most were people from the entertainment industry, some congratulatory, others probing.

Chí Tuō sat on the lazy couch in the small living room on the second floor, his tall frame curled up, looking quite pitiful.

An Ye came upstairs, holding two bottles of water. She handed one to Chí Tuō and opened the other for herself, sitting on the lazy couch opposite him.

Chí Tuō got up, pushed the couch next to An Ye, then threw himself back into it, resting his head on An Ye's lap.

He looked more relaxed now, no longer seeming so pitiful.

An Ye had been lazily scrolling through her phone. Qí Wéi's PR team had done a great job. At least, for now, the rumors with Guān Shèngyǔ were drowned out by the live stream content. On major social media and forums, there was hardly any consistent content capable of driving the narrative forward.

The public’s interest in a trending topic doesn’t last long, and the months of work that Huàn Zhòu had invested would be much harder to restart after An Ye interrupted it.

Of course, with Huàn Zhòu's PR capabilities, it wouldn’t be impossible for them to create another scandal to target her in a few months.But that was a matter for the future. In a few months, she and Huàn Zhòu would no longer be connected, and her studio would be relatively stable. The hardest part was already behind her.

She had been thinking about these things and didn’t pay much attention to what Chí Tuō was saying. So when Chí Tuō suddenly spoke the word “mom,” she was so startled that she almost threw her phone at his face.

Chí Tuō was quick and caught her phone just in time.

An Ye remembered the last time Chí Tuō had taken his mother’s call. At that time, her large apartment hadn’t been sold yet, and Chí Tuō had stepped out onto the terrace in the middle of winter to take the call.

Now, she felt a little embarrassed, unsure whether she should get up and step away.

Her intuition told her that Chí Tuō’s mother, Zhāng Róu, wouldn’t be particularly supportive of their relationship.

But Chí Tuō was lying with his head on her lap and didn’t move at all.

So An Ye remained still, too.

Chí Tuō handed her phone back to her, looked at her, and nodded. "I’ll see when she’s free this year and bring her over."

An Ye’s eyes widened.

Chí Tuō paused for a moment, rubbed his forehead, and said, “I haven’t been taking my medication lately, but the situation is under control. Maybe I’ll try again soon.”

An Ye’s eyes widened even more.

Chí Tuō placed his hand in hers. There was a thin layer of sweat, and she could feel his fingers trembling ever so slightly.

Zhāng Róu’s voice was always soft, so An Ye didn’t catch what she said on the other end of the line. All she could sense was that the conversation wasn’t entirely about her and Chí Tuō.

There were other things, things that Chí Tuō seemed to be avoiding.

She couldn’t understand how someone who would tell her everything—even small injuries—could remain so calm and speak with such an even tone on the phone, even when his lips had turned white.

“Mm.” Chí Tuō finally gave a low sound of affirmation. “Take care of yourself. Don’t forget your routine checkup next week.”

He hung up the phone.

An Ye held his fingers, still feeling the sweat. She didn’t have a tissue, so she rubbed his hand against her clothes to dry it.

Chí Tuō chuckled. “I didn’t wash my hands when I came in. Aren’t you disgusted?”

“Well, I haven’t showered yet either.” An Ye mumbled, pulling his other hand over to rub.

Chí Tuō wiped the other hand clean and flicked her ear.

It was a habit he had developed gradually after they got together. It wasn’t overly intimate and could be done in front of others. An Ye thought it was quite addictive when he did it.

She didn’t ask any questions. She just waited for Chí Tuō’s hand to stop trembling and for the sweat in his palm to dry up, only to reappear again. It took six minutes.

“I... I’ve always wanted to go back to Wàng Chéng,” Chí Tuō said. “To visit my grandmother’s grave.”

After saying that, he fell silent again. The emotions that had taken six minutes to calm down were clearly starting to feel off again.

An Ye felt that Chí Tuō, right now, was like a child who had eaten too much and finally calmed down, only to stuff another bun into their mouth.

Was it to desensitize himself?

An Ye wasn’t very familiar with psychology, but she could still sense that Chí Tuō’s mention of visiting his grandmother’s grave was something he had forced himself to say.

Chí Tuō turned over, buried his head in her belly, and hugged her tightly.His forehead was slightly damp with sweat, and there was sweat on his neck too. From the veins bulging on his neck, it was clear that his heart rate was too fast.

"If you need to take medicine, just tell me," An Ye said, ruffling his hair.

Chí Tuō nodded.

Silence.

An Ye just sat quietly, waiting for him to calm down.

Chí Tuō's approach to his panic disorder had a significant impact on An Ye.

His attitude toward mental illness was very casual. He knew why he was having an episode and didn’t try to avoid it. He would even push himself further, like today, when the situation wasn’t serious, and after calming down a little, he’d push again.

She had thought about why Chí Tuō acted like this.

It must be because of Zhāng Róu.

Zhāng Róu’s depression had caused the same kind of harm to both Chí Tuō and herself. Chí Tuō had gone through it, so he didn’t want his own mental issues to make the people around him uncomfortable.

He bore it on his own.

When an episode hit, he’d try to manage it with methods that those around him could accept.

An Ye didn’t know how many twists and turns Chí Tuō had gone through before taking this path. It certainly hadn’t been easy. Otherwise, he and Zhāng Róu wouldn’t be in a situation so strained that they needed to keep their distance.

But by the time he came back to face her, he had already gotten himself together.

When he was at his worst, she wasn’t there.

And when she was at her lowest and about to break, he returned.

An Ye reached out and mimicked Chí Tuō’s gesture, flicking his ear.

"Are you feeling better?" she asked.

He must have been feeling better since the sweat on his neck had almost disappeared. It only took three minutes this time.

Chí Tuō was still lying on her stomach, nodding.

An Ye waited quietly for a while. He was holding on tighter and tighter. Even though he wasn’t sweating anymore, he just wouldn’t move.

"Hey," An Ye said, poking her belly.

Chí Tuō’s face pressed against her stomach, pushing out and then sinking back in.

An Ye: "…"

She ruffled his hair. "My legs are numb!"

Chí Tuō shifted his head slightly but still didn’t move.

An Ye: "…What’s wrong?"

This familiar sticky way of holding her and hiding his face made An Ye feel like he was crying.

She should comfort him.

But she knew that if he was crying, it was probably because she had confessed on the live stream. He had held it in for a long time. Even now, he still said very little. Maybe once he let it out, he’d start talking more. And his actions, so similar to how he had been as a child, combined with the lingering tension from the live stream that hadn’t quite faded, made An Ye feel an impulse she couldn’t suppress.She secretly took out her phone and lowered her head to tug at his hair.

Chí Tuō looked up.

An Ye, who had already found the right angle, quickly pressed the shutter button.

Chí Tuō: "…………"

Seeing that he wasn’t moving, An Ye pressed the button several more times.

It wasn’t rare for Chí Tuō to cry, but when he did, he liked to hide his face or avoid her. After they reunited, every time his eyes were red, it was usually because of her crying. When they hugged and cried together, there was never much time to observe Chí Tuō’s appearance.

So, this situation seemed to be a first.

This was the first time she saw Chí Tuō crying.

Tears hadn’t been wiped off his face yet, his nose was slightly red, and his lashes clumped together from the tears.

An Ye: "…"

Why does a grown man look so pitiful when he cries, like a delicate flower with tears?

Chí Tuō pursed his lips, got up, and took An Ye’s phone. His voice was still nasal: "…What’s so good about taking pictures? You’re more obsessive than me…”

He said half of it, but his voice got stuck.

An Ye’s phone had a separate album with a password. The expressions she took for filming were always put into an album named "Work."

Chí Tuō had seen it before. There were pictures of her and others in it, with each photo labeled with the emotional state or scene. Everything was categorized meticulously, like notes made while studying.

He thought the photos he took today would be in there. He took her phone out of simple curiosity to see what kind of scenes she had written beneath the pictures.

But they weren’t there.

Next to her original "Work" album, An Ye had created a "Life" album.

Chí Tuō clicked on it.

There weren’t many pictures, but from the last two weeks, it contained selfies of her in the makeup room, pictures of meals he made, Lao Bai, a shot of him in the kitchen, a picture of him sleeping, and the one he had just taken when he was crying.

In two weeks, there were about thirty or forty pictures.

Chí Tuō felt like he might lose control of his tears again.

An Ye always touched him in unexpected ways. When they were younger, when Chí Dìngbāng had left home without leaving any money, Chí Tuō didn’t have money for breakfast, and An Ye would share her breakfast with him. While sharing, she would argue that the portion she gave him should be bigger because, after all, he ate more. As they grew older, his reclusive personality was suppressed by the family situation, so he would go fight with small thugs on the street—picking on bullies who took advantage of stray animals or extorted elementary school kids. He was too cowardly to achieve anything significant, and easy to beat. An Ye never stopped him, but their secret base always had medicine for wounds. Then, five years ago, after she had gone missing, she carefully sent him a red envelope, along with this album related to life.

An Ye’s heart was soft, hidden deep inside, but as soon as it showed even a little, it made you believe that there were still beautiful things in this world.

At least, there was her.

"The photos are too few," Chí Tuō rubbed his nose, took his phone, bumped it against An Ye’s, and then added dozens of photos.

An Ye looked at the newly added pictures in the album. Some of them were taken recently. Chí Tuō’s photography style was completely different from hers. He liked close-ups—Lao Bai’s blue eyes, close-ups of their intertwined fingers, and her eyelashes when she was asleep.

At first, everything was fine, but then An Ye picked out a picture of herself in a qipao, which Chí Tuō had saved at some point: "…What does this have to do with life?"

Chí Tuō: "When this picture came out, I was planning to quit studying. My uncle had even talked to me, hoping I would stay in Singapore after I graduated. But when I saw this picture of you, I thought, 'Let me give it another try.'"

An Ye lowered her head and thought about the scene she was filming for that movie.She actually couldn’t remember clearly. She only remembered that this character had been sold to a theater troupe when she was little, and had suffered a lot. At that time, in order to look good in a qipao, she couldn’t be too thin. With the pressure and not being able to eat, she ended up eating and then throwing up, leading to a stomach ulcer.

There were still several more production photos. When she was filming these, she never thought these photos would end up in her life album.

Chí Tuō, holding her phone, copied the way she organized her work album and noted down the life behind these photos.

Her life as An Ye, and Chí Tuō’s life.

Their life.

And life always moves forward.