Shang Zhitao felt like she couldn't move forward or back. Luan Nian had blocked every way out, and it left her feeling a little helpless. After leaving the hospital, she'd curled up on his living room sofa, a cup of hot water he'd boiled for her within reach. He kept making her drink it. Every time he glanced her way, she had to take a sip.
She listened to him on the phone with his mother.
"Mild pneumonia from a mycoplasma infection, with coughing and high fever. What should she eat?"
The voice on the other end talked for a long time. Then Luan Nian answered.
"Not me. Asking for a friend."
"Got it. Bye."
He hung up and went to grab his coat, telling Shang Zhitao, "Take five full days of sick leave from Alex."
"I still have work to do."
"Once you've burned yourself half to death, you won't have to worry about work anymore."
"Then I'll go home and rest."
Luan Nian stopped moving when he heard that and looked at her. He asked her directly, "What's this attitude about?"
Shang Zhitao pressed her lips together and said nothing. He glanced at her. "Get your thoughts in order. We'll talk when I'm back."
She really did try to organize her thoughts. Her fever made her head foggy, but she still managed to pick out the important points. First, what happened between them was an accident. Second, a relationship like theirs went against decency. Third, they had already ended things, and she was the one who'd said so. So they shouldn't be doing anything that looked the least bit intimate.
Somewhere in the middle of thinking this through, she fell asleep.
A person with a fever gets drowsy easily, and his sofa was comfortable, the thin blanket over her warm, the apartment quiet with none of the drilling noise from the renovation work back home. Everything about it was just right for sleep.
Luan Nian came back carrying bags of groceries and found her sunk deep in sleep on the sofa, her face flushed red, a fine sheen of sweat on her forehead, a faint wheeze in her breathing as the virus fought it out inside her.
He took off his coat and went straight to the kitchen.
He'd just been out buying everything on the list his mother, Dr. Liang, had sent him, a list for someone recovering from illness. Dr. Liang had even wished his friend a speedy recovery and told him to take good care of her, warning that pneumonia left untreated properly could come back again and again, and that would mean real suffering down the line.
If Dr. Liang knew his friend was asleep in his apartment right now, what would she think?
Luan Nian cooked for Shang Zhitao, his phone propped nearby with the notes app open to what Dr. Liang had said she could and couldn't eat. He didn't stop to examine why he felt a flicker of worry over her getting sick. He just thought it was a little pitiful, her being alone in Beijing like this.
Pity, that's all it was. That was how he summed it up to himself.
Since when did you start having pity for people? he asked himself while he cooked.
By the time the food was ready, she was still asleep. Luan Nian sat on the sofa flipping through a magazine while a clay pot on low heat simmered pears in rock sugar in the kitchen. His apartment was full of magazines he'd never counted, and he liked to flip through them in his spare time to see what was in fashion. Every so often he reached over and touched her forehead to check her temperature. It had come down a little since before.
Shang Zhitao stirred awake in the dim light and saw that he'd turned on a small lamp. Under its glow, his features looked no softer, still a cold and distant man. It made her a little sad. No one had ever told her what to do about falling for someone like him. She lay quietly watching him, waiting for the right moment to speak, so she could get out everything she'd rehearsed.
Luan Nian heard her stir and turned his head. "Awake?"
"Mm."
"Let's eat."
Shang Zhitao was a little surprised. Whatever she'd been about to say, she swallowed it back down. She coughed a few times and followed him to the table.
"Thank you for the trouble."
"Drop the formalities."
"What?"
"Doesn't it tire you out, all this 'you' this and 'you' that?"
"Oh."
Luan Nian had made a few vegetable dishes and a slow-braised beef. Shang Zhitao, unused to being treated so well, felt almost embarrassed by it, and whatever she'd rehearsed before falling asleep was completely gone from her mind. She ate quietly, glancing at him now and then, and found he was still the same, cold as ever, like the man who'd laughed so freely in Hokkaido had never existed. After the meal, she thought she should leave, but he brought over a small bowl of stewed pear in rock sugar.
Something in her chest ached sharply.
Being this good to a friend with benefits made her suddenly able to picture how he must have treated Zang Yao. It had to have been better than anything she could imagine.
She drank the pear soup with her head down, then stood up and started putting her coat on. "Thank you for looking after me. I'm much better now. I won't trouble you any further."
Luan Nian frowned but didn't argue. "I'll drive you."
"Then thank you for the trouble."
Shang Zhitao didn't want to say any of those rehearsed lines anymore. She figured being firm with herself would do more good than anything she could say. She got into his car, and as they got close to her place she dug through her bag for her keys. They were gone. How had she lost them? She was sure she'd kept them somewhere safe in her bag. She called Sun Yu, who heard how hoarse her voice was and asked if it was serious. She said she was much better. My keys are missing, she said, when will you be back?
"I'm on my way to Tangshan right now. There's a matchmaking event tomorrow, I need to be there to keep an eye on things."
"That's fine, I'll ask Zhang Lei."
Only after hanging up did she remember Sun Yuanzhu had gone to the northwest and Zhang Lei was in Chengdu. She held the phone, not sure what to do.
Luan Nian turned the car around and drove back toward his place.
"Just drop me at the corner, there's a hotel nearby." Not going back to his apartment was the last bit of stubbornness she had left.
"So you can die in a hotel room?" Luan Nian's words turned especially sharp when he was annoyed, though he didn't get annoyed often. Nearly every time he'd been in the past six months, it had been because of her.
His words caught in her throat, and she really did get angry. She stared out the window without speaking, her breathing a little heavy from the cold and the anger, her chest rising and falling.
Luan Nian knew better than anyone how to press someone's buttons. He rattled off a phone number and said, "This is it, isn't it? Go stay in a hotel, then, and I'll call your family and tell them how you are. I'll make it clear that if anything happens to you, or if there are any complications later, it's not the company's problem."
Her anger died instantly. Luan Nian had gone straight for her weak point, the way you'd strike a snake where it hurts most. She didn't want her parents finding out she was sick, didn't want them worrying, especially since she'd always told them on the phone: I'm doing great, my coworkers like me, my boss thinks highly of me, I make more than enough to spend freely, at this rate I'll own a place in Beijing before I turn thirty.
If Luan Nian ever called her parents, he'd surely tell them her work was barely adequate, that she was constantly one step from getting cut, that her salary was below average even by the company's standards, that there was no way she'd own property before thirty. He'd probably add that their daughter's personal life left something to be desired.
His mouth was vicious enough that he'd absolutely say something like that.
"I just didn't want to trouble you."
Luan Nian glanced at her, indifferent. "Don't worry. Whatever's between us is over, but we did sleep together a few times. Consider this after-sales service. Once you're better, that'll be the end of it, completely." Then he mimicked her tone. "I would never tell anyone about what happened between us."
Shang Zhitao couldn't out-argue him. She just nodded. "Well then, thank you."
"You're welcome. It's the least I can do."
After all that driving around, they ended up back at his apartment. The security guard at the complex saw their car leave and come right back and couldn't help calling out, "Mr. Luan, back so soon."
Then he smiled at Shang Zhitao. The guard had never quite believed she worked some disreputable trade, and Luan Nian didn't seem like the type who'd hire an escort, either, but she didn't look like his girlfriend. Strange relationship, whatever it was.
The guard wasn't the only one curious.
Shang Zhitao was curious too.
What kind of person was Luan Nian, really? Someone that hard-edged, and yet he'd made her a meal fit for someone sick. Surrounded by so many women, and yet he dared bring her home. Most people wanted to keep their distance from someone with pneumonia, and yet he was taking care of her.
"Could I borrow a T-shirt from you? I don't have any pajamas, and I still need to take my contacts out..."
Luan Nian walked into the guest room and opened the closet. Two sets of loungewear hung inside. He went to the bathroom next and pulled open a drawer, revealing a contact lens case and solution, along with women's skincare products.
Shang Zhitao had no idea what any of this meant, why he'd have these things in his apartment. Luan Nian just shrugged. "You'll have to share with the other women." He said it half joking, then even produced sticky notes in different colors. "Label them, so nobody uses the wrong one by mistake."
Even Shang Zhitao, slow as she was about this sort of thing, could tell he was teasing her. This had clearly all been prepared for her, because she remembered asking him once, "Pajamas, towel, contact solution..."
And what had he said back then? "Can't you pack your own bag?"
So this was the kind of person he was. Someone who acted like he couldn't be bothered with anything, but who actually remembered every word you said.
So had he let her leave things at his place because she was his only bedmate in this city?
Her mind wandering through all of this, Shang Zhitao went to shower and changed into the pajamas he'd set out for her. They were comfortable, but she wasn't wearing a bra underneath, which left her feeling a little exposed. Luan Nian knocked and brought in her medicine. She ducked under the covers, only her head poking out, watching him set it on the nightstand, refusing to come out.
He was amused despite himself. "Like I haven't seen it before?"
"?"
"What are you afraid of?"
"... It's not proper, a man and a woman alone like this," Shang Zhitao said seriously.
"Mm." Luan Nian turned to leave, then stopped in the doorway and said, "You didn't seem to think anything was improper when we were being intimate."
He closed the door and left.
Under Luan Nian's mix of pressure and persuasion, Shang Zhitao stayed at his apartment for a full week, until her follow-up appointment, when the doctor confirmed the inflammation had cleared and agreed to let her go. She followed him out of the hospital, back to his place to pack up her things, nothing more than those two outfits, which she stuffed into her backpack. Before leaving, she went to the bathroom, and the sight of the contact solution sitting right there made something in her chest ache again. She still couldn't understand why he'd prepared all this for her, or the Christmas present sitting on the sofa, things that made her feel, just a little, like maybe Luan Nian actually liked her. It had to be an illusion.
A wave of hurt rose up in her chest without warning.
She stood there for a long moment before pushing the door open and stepping out, and found Luan Nian waiting for her right outside. She walked straight up to him, looked him in the eye, and asked seriously, "Why are you always so vicious with your words?"
"Am I vicious with everyone, or just with you?"
Luan Nian had no idea why she was asking any of this. His brow furrowed slightly.
Whoever ever takes this seriously again is a damn fool, she thought to herself. She reached out, grabbed him by the collar, yanked him toward her, and kissed him, biting down on his lip.
Neither of them mentioned the fact that Shang Zhitao had said things were over between them. She'd only just recovered, and Luan Nian was gentler than before, more patient too. She was frantic with need, but he held her hands pinned above her head, refusing to give her what she wanted, no matter how she pleaded.
Luan Nian held grudges. He was in no hurry now, though he'd been quite ready to walk away back when she'd been the one to end things. This was him refusing to let her have her way, punishing her, plain and simple. He teased her until her eyes went red, then finally pressed his lips to hers and asked, "Not over, then?"
Shang Zhitao felt like she could barely think straight anymore. She shook her head gently, her lips brushing against his, and offered him the tip of her tongue.
Neither of them could lie to themselves, and neither could lie to the other. However cruel the words they said, their bodies never lied. Their bodies wanted each other more than they'd ever wanted anyone else. Before long, neither of them could hold back anymore. Luan Nian's teeth caught her earlobe, and he growled against her ear, "Still going to fight me?"
She shook her head, her eyes clouding with tears. Something in Luan Nian softened at the sight, an ache he hadn't expected, and he gathered her into his arms.
Luan Nian finally admitted to himself that the drink he'd had after Shang Zhitao said it was over had tasted bitter, and that some part of him had regretted it.
He really did love her body.