Chapter 103: Shen Jixing’s Endless, Unrequited Love

Night fell, and their reflections intertwined in lingering softness.

Ripples spread again and again across the water in the bathtub. Shen Jixing’s hand, resting on the edge of the white porcelain, was dotted with droplets. At the end of the silver chain bloomed a rose at the very height of its beauty.

“So it was here.”

Zhou Yili caught that cool, neat hand and forcefully laced their fingers together.

The silver sensor brushed against the rose.

It looked exactly like a pair of bracelets.

“Why am I the one wearing the sensor?” Zhou Yili asked lazily, one phrase after another.

Shen Jixing slowly opened his eyes. He struggled to pull the rose-shaped silver chain from around his wrist and, with trembling fingertips, tossed it to Zhou Yili.

“...You can have it all.”

Zhou Yili: “...”

He knew the little darling was probably a bit angry.

He hooked a long finger around the rose floating in the water, lowered his gaze, drew the other into his arms, and kissed him without another word.

When it came to making him open his mouth, Zhou Yili had too many ways.

If he pressed a little harder, Shen Jixing would instinctively part his lips. Before any sound could form, Zhou Yili would seal him again, turning every protest into a scorching, lingering kiss.

Again and again.

Shen Jixing wanted to strangle that lion full of wicked intentions.

“...”

Zhou Yili wrapped him in a soft towel and set him on the bathroom counter, first drying his wet black hair.

“Mad at me?”

Rarely, the young master’s voice carried a smile, even a teasing, spoiled softness at the end of his words.

The ends of Shen Jixing’s black hair were still slightly damp. Sitting on the sink, he gave him a cold glance.

Zhou Yili’s sharp brows and eyes were full of amusement. On that proud, disdainful face there seemed to be endless gentleness and patience reserved only for him.

In truth, it was not that unbearable.

“No.”

Shen Jixing lowered his eyes and wrapped his arms around Zhou Yili’s neck. “It’s time to sleep.”

Zhou Yili set down the hair dryer and nodded without argument.

“It is time to sleep.”

Shen Jixing kept feeling that something in his words was suspicious, yet he could not quite tell what.

Zhou Yili twirled the little rose chain between his fingers, took Shen Jixing’s damp wrist, and tried to fasten it back on.

Shen Jixing felt that this flower, worn on his body, seemed to provoke Zhou Yili in some way.

“I’m not wearing it.”

Zhou Yili thought about it for a moment and said nothing more. He simply wound it carelessly around his own finger.

Then he carried him out of the steam-laden bathroom.

“Fine. I’ll wear it.”

“...”

Shen Jixing let him carry him, lazily lifting his slightly damp eyes to look at him.

It jingled and clattered all over him like a Christmas tree.

Forget it. As long as he liked it.

Zhou Yili seemed to realize it too. Holding the soft, warm body in his arms, he lowered his head and rubbed lightly at the tip of Shen Jixing’s ear.

“Why do you love giving me love tokens so much?”

Shen Jixing: “...”

“I just thought it was kind of interesting.”

While filming, his emotions had been impossible to hide. So Shen Jixing had left it behind in a secret way, exchanging it for the chance to feel Zhou Yili’s heartbeat.

It was, in its own way, a different sort of punishment.

This was the first time Shen, the top star, had ever taken something from a set.

He leaned against Zhou Yili’s shoulder, drowsy with sleep. “If you don’t like it, throw it away.”

Zhou Yili pinched his cheek. “What are you saying?”

As though he were being asked to throw away some priceless treasure.

Shen Jixing’s cheeks reddened slightly as he opened his eyes. Why did this man always like to keep touching him?

He was about to speak when Zhou Yili looked straight at him with deep, dark eyes.

“Didn’t you not bear to throw it away either?”

Shen Jixing’s sleepy eyes shifted faintly.

Before him hung a gently swaying six-pointed star, and on every silver line were carvings that matched something deep in his memory.

“Why did you keep it?” Zhou Yili asked.

And why did he always wear it?

Shen Jixing had never liked jewelry. This necklace was the only thing on him.

There was stubborn seriousness in Zhou Yili’s black eyes.

Shen Jixing had never attended banquets, yet Zhou Yili had seen him at one twice.

Once was today, when he had broken his own rule. Then what about the other time?

Had it been because of him that Shen Jixing had stopped attending any victory celebrations at all?

Zhou Yili’s long fingers slipped behind his ear, brushing away a trace of moisture from his hair.

Was it because you were like me too?

Had you also once been trapped in that blood-soaked memory, unable to break free?

Shen Jixing looked at the six-pointed star. After a moment of silence, he answered honestly, “It’s good material. I kept it as a memento.”

Zhou Yili: “...”

“A memento of what?”

“An ex-boyf... mmph.”

Before he could finish, Zhou Yili bit his lip in retaliation. “Now I’m your curren—”

His eyes flickered.

“No, husband. Say it again for me?”

“...”

Shen Jixing buried his face in the soft towel. “I’m asleep.”

...

Shen Jixing had not lied to Zhou Yili.

That ring really had been kept as a keepsake.

He was the kind of person who cut ties with the past cleanly. Back then, when he left Boyu without hesitation, he left without taking a single thing.

He had thought he could bid farewell to the radiant boy just as decisively, like the farewell letter itself.

Shen Jixing picked up the lone ring from the floor.

“Since you don’t like people knowing, then we’ll date in secret.”

“I think my fate, too, has your track in it.”

“So the one you’re giving up on is me?”

For the first time, Shen Jixing felt an emotion he could not let go of.

Clearly he could have left France, left the orphanage, left Boyu, left all the love and pain that had trapped him.

So why, of all things, could he not leave Zhou Yili behind?

Inside that shabby little lounge, the dazzling new star held the six-pointed star ring in his palm and, for the first time, felt with terrifying clarity his heart surging and clamoring, telling him an undeniable truth.

So I like him.

Zhou Yili never knew.

On that quiet afternoon, dust drifted through the air.

On the evening Zhou Yili believed himself discarded, Shen Jixing began his endless, boundless secret love.

...

“Awake?”

Zhou Yili parted the soft towel and lowered his gaze, searching for the little white dove curled against his chest.

Shen Jixing, who had slept for only five minutes: “?”

He lifted his eyes, cold and drowsy, to Zhou Yili, then leaned indifferently against his shoulder and rubbed the tip of his nose there. “What are you doing?”

Zhou Yili lowered his head and said only one word into his ear.

“...”

“Weren’t you just...?”

Shen Jixing seemed to wake all at once. He reached for the towel on him, but the soft fabric slipped from his fingertips and fell to the floor.

Zhou Yili casually removed the silver sensor.

Shen Jixing knew exactly what he intended to do, and immediately hid his hand behind his back. “Dream on.”

Zhou Yili did not force him. Instead, he hooked an arm around his ankle from behind.

“...”

“Teacher Shen.” Zhou Yili idly rubbed at his cool, fair ankle. “Are you really pretending to be stupid, or just pretending to be stupid?”

Shen Jixing could not make sense of a single word.

“Since I was afraid you’d cry, I only did half just now.”

Shen Jixing calmly prepared to roll out of bed, deciding that tonight they should part on good terms and leave it at that.

Zhou Yili grabbed the ankle with the sensor dangling from it and, with effortless strength, hauled him back.

“I still have work tomorrow morning...”

Shen Jixing tried to awaken Zhou Yili’s conscience with the word work.

As if Zhou Yili had any conscience.

“Aren’t you not even willing to skip court for me once?”