Luan Nian refused to look after Luke, which meant no one would look after Luke at all. But Luan Nian's words were rarely straightforward. When he said he couldn't, it usually meant he could.
So Shang Zhitao tried again. "Should I bring Luke over now?"
"No."
"What?"
Luan Nian didn't answer her. Instead he picked up a call from Dr. Liang. "What's going on?"
"Your father went to some event recently and met a Professor Gong. They got to talking, and it turns out his daughter is back in the country, teaching at a university in Beijing. Could you help look after her a bit?"
"Gong Yue, right?" Luan Nian asked.
"Wait, how did you know that?"
"I happened to run into her today."
"That's wonderful, then. You young people should get together for a meal sometime, liven things up a little. Otherwise with that personality of yours, won't you suffocate yourself?"
"Fine."
Dr. Liang thought she'd misheard. "You said fine?"
"Mm."
It was rare enough to hear Luan Nian agree to anything that she didn't dare press her luck. "All right, then. That's settled. Talk later."
Luan Nian hung up. The bar's server had already gone home for the night, leaving him alone, so he stretched out on the sofa and looked up at the moon. After the wind, it hung unusually bright. He thought to himself that now that the bar was open, he'd have less free time from here on.
When Shang Zhitao's call came in, he was a little drunk already. He picked up but said nothing.
Thinking she'd dialed the wrong number, Shang Zhitao pulled the phone away to check. It was him. "I'm at your place, but there's no one here. Why aren't you saying anything? Have you been drinking? Should I make you some noodles?"
"No need. I'm not coming home tonight."
"Oh."
Shang Zhitao hung up and watched Luan Nian's little red fish circling in its tank. A fish was easier to keep than a dog. No walks required, and its owner could stay out all night without guilt. She sat in his living room for a while, but he really didn't come back. It wasn't until midnight that she heard Luke barking. She went downstairs still fully dressed and found Luke running circles around Luan Nian, worked up with excitement after not seeing him for a while.
Luan Nian patted the dog, his voice thick and nasal. "Why did you come?"
Luke sat down on the floor and whimpered. Luan Nian crouched to scratch its head, and the dog rested its chin on his knee, just as eager to please as its owner.
"The wind's picked up outside." Shang Zhitao went to the window to look. "Why didn't you come up through the garage?"
Luan Nian kept playing with Luke as if he hadn't heard her.
He knew he wasn't easy to get along with. By all rights, having grown up in a happy home, doted on since childhood, he should have turned out sunny and easygoing. He hadn't. According to Dr. Liang, by the time he was seven or eight he'd already carried himself like a small adult, frowning through the day, rarely taking a real liking to anything, and impossible to please. It was a temperament that matched neither her nor his father, more as if he'd been adopted from somewhere else.
That alone would have been manageable. But by his teens, the things he liked had turned unsettling: weapons, fighting, shooting. Dr. Liang had lost sleep over it, worried he might one day slip onto some antisocial path.
That was the kind of person he was. No warmth in his disposition, no real capacity for empathy, too little softness in him to speak of.
He knew this about himself. For years he'd worked at correcting it, and still, whenever something genuinely upset him, he turned sharp and nearly impossible to soothe.
Seeing Shang Zhitao sitting on the sofa watching him, he grew impatient and spoke to the dog instead. "Tell your owner to stop staring at me."
He wouldn't even address her directly.
Shang Zhitao thought something was off with him tonight, though she couldn't place what. He seemed to have been drinking, and caught in the wind besides, his face was faintly flushed. She reached a hand toward him. He tipped his head back and frowned at her. "If you have something to say, say it. Don't touch me."
"... You seem sick."
"Not your business."
Luan Nian went upstairs. Shang Zhitao followed him, and Luke followed her. He walked to the master bedroom and blocked the doorway, then turned to mock her. "Sorry, can't service you tonight. You'll have to manage on your own."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"Isn't that why you come here, to take care of your needs? Not happening tonight."
"Oh. Fine, then."
That stung a little. Shang Zhitao took Luke back to the guest room, turned off the light, and lay down on the bed. She'd never really fought with Luan Nian before. She had a temper of her own, the kind that could flare up at anyone who pushed her far enough, but she'd never once let it show in front of him. She'd thought about why. Probably she didn't dare. She didn't have the nerve to lose her temper with him, so she talked herself down instead, ears straining to catch any sound of him.
Luan Nian was in the shower. Luan Nian came downstairs. Why hasn't he come to find me? Never mind, he never was one to give in first. Shang Zhitao sat up, defeated, stayed like that for a while, sighed, and finally got out of bed.
She found him digging through the medicine box downstairs. She went over and reached for his forehead, and he turned his head away to dodge her. All at once her irritation left her. What was there to argue about with someone who was sick? She was good at talking herself out of things that way.
Quick-eyed, she spotted the fever medicine tucked beneath the box. "Is this what you're looking for?"
He reached for it. She pulled it behind her back. When he lunged to grab it, his cheek brushed against hers, and she rose on her toes and kissed his chin, quick little kisses, one after another, like a chick pecking at grain. She was coaxing him, her eyes bright, a little timid, a little tender. Her lips were warm, soft, yielding.
Luan Nian looked down at her, at that humble, pleading posture, and felt something catch in his chest.
"No sleeping tonight." He finally spoke to her properly, his breath scorching. He really was sick.
"Mm. No sleeping."
She fetched him water, watched him take the medicine, then took his hand. "So did you have to entertain someone tonight?"
"Yeah. The bar had guests."
"Didn't you say the first drink would be mixed for me?"
He snorted at that and turned to go upstairs without answering. She trailed behind him. "You don't keep your word! You promised me the first drink and I haven't even tasted it yet!"
I wanted to give you the first drink. Weren't you out shopping with your male roommate? The two of you walking the dog together like some young married couple. Luan Nian would admit, if only to himself, that it had put him in a foul mood, foul enough that he'd rather have poured that drink down the dog's throat than hand it to her. But none of that could be said aloud. What was there to say, anyway. She wasn't the only one allowed messy friendships with the opposite sex. He could have plenty of his own, anytime he wanted.
Seeing he wouldn't answer, Shang Zhitao kept at it. "Hmph. Breaking your word."
Luan Nian pulled her against him, holding her still, and pried her lips open with his tongue, tangling with hers. After a long moment he asked, low and rough, "The first drink. Did you taste it?"
Her face flushed. She licked her lips and shook her head. "Not enough to really taste it." She rose on her toes again and bit down on his lip. It reminded her of Dunhuang, of his palm against her calf, how even through the fabric it had made her heart race. She'd been thinking about it for days.
So could a kiss cure his temper?
His mouth carried the taste of cocktail, faintly intoxicating. She sank into his arms, wrapping hers around his waist, her head against his chest, and called his name softly. "Luan Nian."
"Speak."
"Can I sleep next to you tonight? Nothing else."
"Mm."
And they really did nothing else. She burrowed into his arms, pulled his arm free, rested her head on it, and pressed her palm to his chest. Seeing he had no objection, she grew bolder still, wrapping her arms fully around his waist, murmuring against him. "Honestly, just lying here quietly like this, not doing anything, it's nice too."
"What's nice about it?" he asked her.
"Just..." She didn't quite know how to put it. "Just... nice." It gave her the illusion that there might be something between them beyond sex after all.
His body ran a little hot, and he couldn't say whether it was the fever or the drink. His head wasn't clear either way, and he felt faintly ill at ease.
"Go to the guest room."
"No." She stayed pressed against him. It was rare to see him sick and this compliant, and she found, to her surprise, that she liked it a little. She really had no conscience, enjoying him being unwell like this. She kept her arms tight around him and kept talking.
"Let's not hike in Dunhuang again. It was too tiring. My legs still don't feel like mine."
"When Director Jiang's event ended, she suddenly said to me, Flora, I remember you. How could she possibly remember me? I only crossed paths with her a few times..."
"Lumi is so funny, and so brave too. I feel like after spending so much time with Lumi, I've gotten tougher myself..."
"Luke..."
Luan Nian pressed a hand over her mouth. "Why do you have so much to say tonight?"
"I have to get through everything before you go, because we won't see each other for half a month..."
"Is your phone just for decoration?"
"You never reply to my texts, and you won't call me either." A reply from him was a few words at most, a call barely a minute, and only on rare occasions did he say more than that.
She kept up her soft complaining, sounding for all the world like a nagging little housewife, and when she turned over she caught the inside of her knee against something. The soreness from her overworked muscles shot through her, and she let out a small grunt.
In the dark, Luan Nian turned her toward him, lifted her leg over his, and pressed his palm to her calf, kneading gently.
"It hurts," she said, not entirely sure if it really did or not, tears nearly springing to her eyes.
"That's what I keep telling you. You need to exercise."
She endured the ache and pressed closer to him, until the position between them turned suggestive. He shifted back slightly, leaving a gap between them, and said, "Don't provoke me."
She didn't dare provoke him after that, and stayed quiet in his arms. Her phone buzzed. She picked it up and saw it was Dony, asking what she was doing.
She glanced at Luan Nian and set the phone back down. He'd caught the name flash by. "Has Dony ever actually harassed you?"
"No. Why would you ask that?"
"Because out of everyone at Lingmei, you're the easiest one to push around."
"Is that why you chose me, then?"
She'd used the word chose, as if Luan Nian had had countless options and had simply picked the one easiest to manage.
"Mm. You got it right." He let go of her leg and rolled over, offering her his back, stubborn and cold. She didn't seem to mind, pressing her face against it instead. "I peeked at your schedule. You're not traveling for work, so please help me take care of Luke. And if you have time to give him a bath, that would be even better. He looks like a little mud ball these days. He's also gotten into playing fetch with a frisbee lately. Throws himself into it every time."
Luan Nian thought of her walking Luke down the street with Sun Yuanzhu, and found the memory almost comical now.
The medicine was kicking in, leaving him a little light-headed. His phone lit up. Gong Yue was asking if she could host an event at his bar the following week.
"Sure. You can reach out to the bar manager directly." He replied, forwarded her the manager's number, and deleted her from his contacts.
Luan Nian was, in truth, a lazy man. Too lazy to deal with the give and take of social obligations, too lazy to change anything about the way things stood.
He told himself that not wanting to change things was simply laziness.
At the time, at least, that was what he believed.