Chapter 84: Happy Birthday to You
The secret Yu Fan had hidden in a corner all through high school, terrified of a single stray glance, finally came out of his mouth six years later without a tremor.
Face calm, he even added a “I’m off work” to the stunned office, then hauled Chen Jingshen away like he was carrying groceries.
On the way home, Chen Jingshen turned as if to speak several times. Each time he saw the pink tips of ears sticking out from under Yu Fan’s beanie, he looked away and swallowed it back.
It was quitting time. The street was jammed, people hurrying in every direction. Their arms brushed close, warm and familiar.
Yu Fan squeezed his fingers, warning through his teeth, “Chen Jingshen, that is enough.”
“What did I do,” Chen Jingshen said.
“Smile again and I’ll deck you.”
His Adam’s apple dipped. He lowered his voice and said into the crowd, “Yu Fan, you did not talk like this when you were chasing me.”
“?”
Yu Fan had never met someone this shameless. His eyes doubled in size. “I chased you?”
“Let’s date. I will not hit you at home,” Chen Jingshen arched a brow. “Was it not something like that?”
“…”
Yu Fan yanked his hand free, rolled his eyes, and headed straight for the roast meat shop next door. He had not gone two steps before a hooked arm reeled him back by the neck.
“Not that today,” Chen Jingshen said. “We are changing it up.”
In his apartment Yu Fan almost never used the kitchen. On a good day he boiled noodles or dumplings. He had been gone six years and the level was still high school cafeteria.
Today the stove finally lit in earnest. Warm smells spread.
“How do you know how to cook?” Yu Fan leaned on the wall, dazed.
The kitchen was tiny and open, squeezed between the entryway and the bathroom. The landlord had tossed in an apron when Yu Fan signed the lease. He had never worn it. He tied it onto Chen Jingshen instead.
It was a blue apron with a big brand logo, oddly goofy on Chen Jingshen’s stone face. “I learned after I started renting. Only a few easy dishes.”
“You rent?” Yu Fan stared. “Is your office far from… your home?”
“Not really.” Chen Jingshen kept it vague. The kitchen was small, so they were close. He turned aside and kissed him. “Go wait on the sofa.”
Yu Fan frowned. Something felt off. His phone on the sofa suddenly went ding ding ding again.
It had not stopped since he got home. He dropped into the sofa, thumbed the messages, and was nearly stabbed blind by a screen full of exclamation marks.
“Yu Fan! You are not honest!!!” from Sister Wang Yue.
“I knew it! I knew it!!! I knew there was a reason you wore his jacket! I knew there was something about your poor little face in the car that day! You told me old classmates!”
“Argh I have told everyone who asked that you are definitely not gay! My face hurts!”
“The two of you were off that day! That was not old classmates, that was—”
Yu Fan’s curiosity twitched. “What was it?”
“Old lovers.”
“…”
“So when did you start dating that gorgeous man?”
“High school,” Yu Fan typed.
Ten thousand question marks exploded. “High school until now? No way. So you were already dating before you came to Ningcheng? Then how come I never saw him come find you?”
“Long distance.”
“I never saw you contact him.”
“Telepathy.”
She sensed the brush-off and replied with a flurry of knife emojis. “So you came out in high school? Does that mean Jianjing knew too?”
“No. First time was this afternoon.”
“Oh… got it. I will keep it secret.”
No nee—
Yu Fan’s thumbs paused. He stared at the words he almost sent.
Maybe it was because he had cracked the lid earlier. Maybe because they had grown up. He realized he no longer felt that letting people know he and Chen Jingshen were dating was some terrible thing.
“Wait! One last question!!”
Yu Fan was jolted back by the buzz and sent a question mark.
“Do not yell at me. I am truly curious. I have been thinking about it all night. You have to answer honestly or I will not sleep and I will dream of you.”
Yu Fan was about to reply then do not ask when her typing jumped ahead, the question plainly from the heart.
“Are you the 1 or the 0?”
Across the room, Chen Jingshen glanced up at him. “Too spicy?”
Yu Fan bit his chopsticks. “Did you put chili?”
“No.” Chen Jingshen said, “Then why are you blushing?”
“…”
Yu Fan thought that stupid heat-in-the-face thing had gone away. It had not happened in years.
Yet even when he washed up for bed, the tips of his ears were still pink.
He brushed his teeth slow, staring at his reflection, thoughts drifting into the stratosphere.
He had not studied all the finer points, but he was not completely clueless. He and Chen Jingshen had used hands and mouths. That was not really doing it—
Sh***.
Sh***…
Any farther and he was going to be in trouble. Watching his face in the mirror redden again, he blankly bore down on the toothbrush. The rasp-rasp sounded like a knife being honed.
When he came out, Chen Jingshen was on the couch with his phone. Yu Fan hung up his clothes and joined him, head still a jumble. “What were you wandering around for today?”
“Looking at the places you lived these years.”
Yu Fan’s heart sped up again. He had a guess, but like an idiot he still wanted to hear Chen Jingshen say it.
He licked his lips, his expression rare and a little soft. “You—” His eyes slid to Chen Jingshen’s screen and his voice jammed.
Chen Jingshen waited and got nothing. “Mm?”
“What are you doing?”
“Beating your high score.” He was piloting the little snake in Snake.
“…”
So you wanted my WeChat again just for this, huh.
Chen Jingshen was focused. A hand suddenly came up and yanked his face over. “Do not cheat,” he said coolly.
Yu Fan sucked hard on his mouth. Chen Jingshen’s fingers paused for a split second. When Yu Fan saw him not move, he hurriedly bent over his screen, saved the snake from smashing into the wall, and steered for a while. He bumped Chen Jingshen’s shoulder. “Take it. Otherwise you will say I cheated.”
“Next time.” Chen Jingshen tossed the phone aside and stopped the cheater with his mouth.
Yu Fan blamed Chen Jingshen for this. His thoughts had been unhealthy for days. The second their mouths touched, that tingling spread behind his ears. He knew the feeling too well and pinched Chen Jingshen’s cheeks.
There was somewhere he wanted to take him. He had seen Chen Jingshen’s Moments and thought, first time in this city, he should see the beautiful places. Yu Fan had walked Ning City end to end these last years and knew where was worth it. Chen Jingshen was flying out the day after tomorrow, so Yu Fan might as well take a day off tomorrow and be his guide.
He leaned in, their noses almost touching. “Chen Jingshen, mountain or sea?”
“I like you,” Chen Jingshen said, mouth squished, voice flat and muffled.
“…”
Yu Fan let go and said evenly, “Tomorrow we—”
The ringtone blasted through the room. Chen Jingshen glanced at the caller ID. His brows pinched. He did not look eager to answer.
Yu Fan grabbed the phone and hit accept, then put it on speaker. Chen Jingshen sank back into the sofa. “What.”
“How far are you from the airport? I am booking your flight.” Luo Liyang sounded frazzled. “The servers are acting up. You need to head back first.”
Chen Jingshen’s eyes lifted. His gaze went instantly clear. The sofa dipped beside him. His boyfriend had already stood and pulled out the black suitcase he had brought over earlier.
“They break only during my vacation?”
“It is year end. I told you! Finish the crunch, then take your time. Stack your annual leave and you can be off for ages. Why did you have to run off now?” Luo Liyang muttered over ticket apps. “How far is your boyfriend’s place from the airport? I will set the time.”
“Half an hour,” Yu Fan answered.
“Oh oh… huh?” The strange voice made Luo Liyang pause. He probed, “Uh, is that the sister-in-law? Ah no… the little brother? How do I address him, Jingshen?”
Yu Fan froze with the suitcase handle in his hand.
Chen Jingshen saw his dazed, annoyed face and finally felt better. “Hang up. Send the booking.”
He had packed a few clothes into that case when he arrived. Now he was leaving with only his laptop and charger inside.
He snapped it shut and looked up into Yu Fan’s puzzled eyes.
“You have not folded your clothes.”
“Leave them. I will wear them later.”
“They take up space,” Yu Fan said with a straight face.
“Then endure it,” Chen Jingshen said.
Yu Fan still had photos due that night, so he could not drive him. He carried the suitcase to the entryway and leaned on the wall with folded arms, eyes down as Chen Jingshen laced his shoes.
“What were you going to say,” Chen Jingshen asked. “Before the call.”
Say it when you get back.
Yu Fan nudged a plastic sack by his foot. “Take the trash down for me.”
Chen Jingshen rolled the suitcase with one hand and the trash with the other and went.
Yu Fan held the pose for a while, lost in thought. Seconds later the door he had left ajar pushed open again. Chen Jingshen had come back.
Yu Fan said, “Do not kiss me while holding the—”
Chen Jingshen did what he did earlier, a quick peck and gone.
He exhaled softly. He had wanted to ask if Yu Fan would come back to Nancheng with him for a look. In the end he said the line that had become a habit. “Wait for me.”
Yu Fan had been used to being alone since he was little. He had lived solo in Ningcheng for five years. In Nancheng he had not been much different. He had scrapped and clawed his way up by himself and never thought anything of it.
But on day one after Chen Jingshen left, he bought two dinners and nearly stuffed himself.
Near clock-out he kept glancing at the studio’s glass door.
He left the desk Chen Jingshen had used empty by habit.
The next morning he woke and, half-asleep, reached twice across the empty pillow. Then he stopped, opened his eyes slow.
Chen Jingshen had not even stayed long, and they had video-called for a while last night. Why was he being this pathetic…
He rolled onto his stomach and buried his face in the pillow, thinking about yesterday’s video.
Nancheng was colder, so Chen Jingshen wore a gray knit. He hated stuffy heat and had cracked the window. He was still coding at one in the morning.
Someone came into his office to talk shop. From the voice it was the guy from the other day on the phone. Plaid shirt. A little chubby. A bald spot coming in. Glasses thick as bottle bottoms.
Chen Jingshen had his phone propped up while they talked. Naturally the visitor saw Yu Fan on screen. He elbowed Chen Jingshen, said he knew Jingshen’s boyfriend would be very handsome, then beamed and told Yu Fan hello.
Yu Fan went stiff and said woodenly, “Hello, uncle.”
“…”
The man never addressed him again. When the door shut, Chen Jingshen finally lost it. He covered his mouth with the back of his hand and shook with suppressed laughter.
“Chen Jingshen. Think I cannot reach across a screen to smack you?” Yu Fan demanded.
“Do you know how old he is?” Chen Jingshen asked.
“How old?”
“Three years older than me. Twenty-seven.”
“…”
Yu Fan rubbed his face, mortified. “You think you will be bald like him at twenty-seven?”
Chen Jingshen stopped laughing.
The hair in the video was thick and black. Clearly there was no risk for decades. Also…
Chen Jingshen at work was not quite the same as usual. Tall and slim, melted into his chair, calm and casual as he typed. When he got tired he would turn and glance at the video…
Yu Fan lay there thinking, then poked his face out of the pillow and held his phone up. He deleted the blurry screenshots where you could not make out the face, and kept a few clear ones. He scrubbed his face and got up.
“I finally see why you and your boyfriend are so lukewarm.”
In the studio, Yu Fan had just finished a set when Wang Yue, arms folded as she watched, sighed.
Lukewarm? Him and Chen Jingshen?
Yu Fan frowned at the display. “Why.”
“Long distance. And busy. Look at your man. Six years and he has only been here twice, both times only a few days. What a runaround.” Wang Yue leaned at the window with a cigarette. “But could he really not come a bit later? Tomorrow is your birthday.”
“I do not celebrate.”
And Chen Jingshen did not know his birthday anyway.
“That will not do. Since you started working for me, we celebrate every year.” Wang Yue said, “If you are not booked, I am reserving that private kitchen tonight. What do you two want to eat?”
There was no point arguing, so Yu Fan let her plan. He flipped through the shots one by one, then turned and caught the assistant staring at him. “What are you looking at.”
The assistant jumped and hugged the prop bouquet like a shield. “Nothing!”
She lasted a moment and could not help herself. “I am just curious… Yu Fan-laoshi, if you miss your boyfriend this much, why do you not go see him?”
Both Yu Fan and Wang Yue blinked.
“I do not miss him that much,” Yu Fan said stiffly.
“Please. A blind man could tell. How many photos of him are you hiding in that phone.” Wang Yue came back to herself and scowled. “Right. Have I ever stiffed you on holidays? I give every break on time. Why have you never gone to see your boyfriend? And anyway, are you not from Nancheng?”
“…”
The question clung to him all the way home.
Why had he never gone back?
At first he had not dared. He was afraid of bringing trouble with him. Afraid that if he saw Chen Jingshen he would not be able to leave.
But it hurt too much to keep wanting. So he drowned himself in side gigs and coursework. He ran himself until he could not breathe and passed out the second he hit the bed, too busy to think. Over time he shoved the whole thing into a box, a no-go zone. If no one mentioned it, he could forget that city forever.
Now, maybe it was time to go and look, and while he was there, find Chen Jingshen.
He zoned out on the sofa for a long while, then rapped himself on the forehead.
Forget it.
He was not seventeen or eighteen anymore. No need to be reckless… later.
He sat up and reached for the roast rice box on the table. Before he could peel it open, WeChat buzzed. Chen Jingshen.
“Working late. No video tonight.”
“I beat your score. You played six years and got only that much.”
During dinner Wang Yue was on a date when an employee called. The first sentence out of the phone was a brick.
“I want five days off.”
The tone was cocky, but then, the guy almost never asked for time off. He probably had a dragon’s hoard of unused leave. “Which days?” Wang Yue asked.
“Starting tomorrow.” A zipper rasped in the background. “I have already rearranged, both clients. We changed the dates.”
“You are skipping your birthday?!” She blinked, then realized. “You are going to your boyfriend?”
“No.”
“Then what?”
Yu Fan tossed clothes into a suitcase. “Cross-province to beat someone up.”
If it was a cross-province beating, he could not tip off the target.
He bought a midnight ticket, then lay on the sofa playing Snake to kill time. When he edited photos, two blinks and it was two in the morning. Playing a few rounds now took only half an hour.
He crashed again. He tossed the phone aside and covered his eyes with his forearm, listening to his pulse.
A little fast.
He truly had not been back to Nancheng in a very long time. Embarrassing truth, this would be his first time on a plane.
How would he find Chen Jingshen after he landed? He did not know the company. He had no clue where he lived. Asking straight up was way too obvious.
He muddled through thoughts for a long time, then checked his phone. Nine.
He exhaled and opened the app to hail a ride to the airport. The screen chimed at the top.
The ticketing app. Weather delay. Departure pushed to three a.m.
Yu Fan: “…”
Powered by the belief he would crush Chen Jingshen’s score, he fought three more hours of Snake. He even messaged to ask how late Chen Jingshen was working.
At midnight, the birthday wishes from Wang Yue, Zhang Jianjing, and the others flooded his WeChat. Chen Jingshen still had not replied. He was probably buried.
Yu Fan put on his jacket, pulled the suitcase to the entryway, and the ride-hail driver called.
He grabbed the handle, phone on his shoulder, and opened the door. “Hold on, I will—”
He stopped dead at the figure outside, hand raised as if to knock.
“Great, great.” The driver’s voice from the phone bled into the silent hall. “Shall I wait downstairs?”
The call did not end. There was no response. After a moment, the driver tried again. “Hello?”
Yu Fan stood frozen for a long time. Then he came back to himself. “Do not wait. Sorry. I am canceling.”
He hung up and looked up again.
Chen Jingshen stood there with a messenger bag and a small cake in hand. His shoulders were straight, travel-worn, and a little tense. His face was blank. Standing in the dim light, that blankness read as heavy and somber.
He looked at Yu Fan, dressed to go, then dropped his gaze to the suitcase in his hand.
For a second it felt like Yu Fan was not gripping a suitcase handle but one of his rawest nerves. The slightest pull and it would snap.
A long time later he dragged out his voice. He had dozed on the plane, so it came hoarse. “Where are you going?”
Yu Fan seemed to blink, then let go of the handle in a rush. “Cross-province to beat someone up.”
“Who?” Chen Jingshen asked.
“You.”
“…”
The typhoon had passed, but downstairs the toppled stainless placards and broken umbrellas in the trash still made your heart skip.
Chen Jingshen let out a long breath. His shoulders dropped. It felt like his pre-dawn flight had finally landed at this exact moment.
“No need to cross. I came myself.” He lifted the cake. “Happy birthday, Yu Fan.”
The first thing Chen Jingshen did after coming in was shower. He had worked straight through two days to make this flight. He did not want to bring the smell of the office.
Yu Fan leaned in to sniff his neck and declared there was none. Chen Jingshen brushed the back of his hand down Yu Fan’s cheek anyway and took clothes into the bathroom.
Lying on the sofa, Yu Fan mass-responded thank you to the flood of messages.
“Your present is almost there. Wait for it.” from Wang Lu’an.
“By the way, how are you celebrating? Going out?”
“No.”
“Good.”
“?”
“I mean, it has been windy and rainy there. Do not run around. Xianjing says you are skinny as a chick. Be careful. Do not let the typhoon blow you away.”
Yu Fan snapped a photo of his fist to scare him. He looked at it and sighed. No intimidation at all.
The bathroom door opened. Chen Jingshen came out in a white T-shirt.
Yu Fan glanced over and found inspiration. “Hand,” he ordered.
Chen Jingshen paused mid-towel and held it out, thinking they would hold hands. Yu Fan slapped his palm hard. “Make a fist.”
He sent the picture of Chen Jingshen’s fist instead. The typing bubble on the other end pulsed forever. Then came a single line.
“Holy Sh**!”
Yu Fan dropped the phone and stared at his own arm. He really needed to move that gain-weight plan up.
The sofa dipped. Chen Jingshen sat, fresh and clean, a light scent of body wash on his skin. Yu Fan turned with a question ready and swallowed it when he saw his expression.
Chen Jingshen had dried his hair. He reached for the cake. It was small, palm-sized, simple, with a ring of rosy strawberries. The kind you could order online with decent reviews.
He still remembered the little slice Yu Fan had once brought him.
“How did you know my birthday?” Yu Fan asked. A knee poked his leg.
“I knew back then. I helped Ms. Zhuang file your class materials,” Chen Jingshen said.
“Then why did you not tell me you were coming?”
“I was not sure I would make it.”
He had bought the ticket barely an hour before takeoff, left the office without even repacking, grabbed the cake pickup on the way. He had picked up the phone several times and then put it back down.
He wanted it to be a surprise.
He rummaged in the bag and came up empty. “Do you have a lighter?”
“If I say yes, will you check whether I smoked?”
“I will not. You do not have an ashtray.”
“…”
Yu Fan got up to hunt one down. He had not smoked since moving here, so it took a while. When he returned, Chen Jingshen was slouched against the sofa, eyelids low. He looked as cool and heavy as certain moments in memory.
He was not good at hiding emotion.
Or maybe he was a person with not many of them. Whatever he did, he wore the same face. It made it hard for others to read him.
But Yu Fan found him easy to read. Happy, angry, sad… somehow he felt it at once.
When Yu Fan came back, Chen Jingshen lifted his eyes and stood to take the lighter.
Yu Fan did not look at him. He tossed it on the glass coffee table. “I tried it. Broken.”
Chen Jingshen said, “I will buy one downstairs.”
“Leave it. Do not light it. Childish,” Yu Fan drawled. “Just eat.”
Chen Jingshen had not planned to be that perfunctory. He was reaching for his phone when his cheek suddenly cooled. A rich sweetness hit his nose.
Yu Fan had scooped up a handful of cream and smeared it on his nose and around his mouth. It covered his lower face. On that deadpan expression, the sight was ridiculous.
The sofa dented hard the next second. Yu Fan knelt with one knee by his hip, lowered his head, and licked the cream off his right cheek. That small canine grazed his face and itched.
Chen Jingshen’s Adam’s apple slid. He wrapped an arm around Yu Fan’s waist and pulled him to straddle his lap.
They pressed together through layers of cloth. Yu Fan cupped his face with both hands and bit his jaw. He swallowed the cream and looked down, cold-eyed. “Chen Jingshen, your face tonight is as nasty as the first time we met. Begging for a beating.”
He paused and corrected himself. “I mean the milk tea shop one.”
Chen Jingshen did not reply. He held Yu Fan’s waist, caught the back of his head, and pulled him down for a kiss. Yu Fan’s mouth was full of thick, sweet cream. Chen Jingshen took it slowly, and who knew which of them swallowed it in the end.
“I was thinking. When you left, were you like that just now,” Chen Jingshen murmured against his lips.
Yu Fan froze. His mouth stopped moving.
A hot hand slid under his shirt and pressed to his narrow back. Feeling the stiffness, Chen Jingshen soothed him with a slow stroke.
“No.” After a long time Yu Fan spoke, voice flat. “They came to our door to collect from Yu Kaiming. I left in a hurry. No suitcase. A burlap sack.”
“Mm.” Chen Jingshen pictured it and held him even tighter. Yu Fan could feel the rumble in his chest as he spoke.
“Actually that milk tea shop was not the first time,” Chen Jingshen said out of nowhere.
“What?” Yu Fan blinked, then nodded. “Oh, I know—”
“When you cut yourself. It was not the first time.”
“…”
Yu Fan stared, dazed. “What do you mean?”
“I saw you burn your forearm with a cigarette,” Chen Jingshen said.
Yu Fan opened and closed his mouth. Nothing came out. He wanted to deny it, but the nudge of the memory made a few flashes slot into place. Maybe it really had happened. It was only once, in a school bathroom. He had just fought kids from another school that day. Everything else on him was worse than that little burn. He had jabbed it, felt it was pointless, flicked the cigarette to the floor, put it out under his shoe, and forgot.
Someone had seen. Someone had remembered.
“I thought then,” Chen Jingshen’s fingers slipped into his hair and skimmed through it, “we could not keep going like that.”
So he wrote that letter. Weighed every word. Edited and edited. Turned it in. Clumsily forced his way into Yu Fan’s life.
The hands on Chen Jingshen’s face clenched, fingertips digging into skin. He could feel the faint tremor.
Yu Fan’s nose stung. His expression stayed fierce and cold. He looked down and asked, “Chen Jingshen, did you pity me?”
“No. I love you,” Chen Jingshen said.
So when he saw him with a suitcase, it felt like he was yanked back to that old wooden door. The suffocation returned, crowding tight until he could not breathe.
“Yu Fan,” his voice was low and hoarse, “do not leave again.”
Yu Fan’s eyes burned red. He dipped his head, like six years ago on the rooftop.
Chen Jingshen held his neck and kept him from kissing. “I want an answer.”
Something fell and landed warm on his wrist. Yu Fan’s eyes were red through and through. He hummed, and the hand at his neck pulled him in and kissed him.
Chen Jingshen kissed hard. Yu Fan did too. It was the first time he had kissed like this, so hungry and fierce, both obedient and wild. Night temperatures were dropping. There was no heat on. They traded body heat, heartbeats, and breath, everywhere they touched burning.
Chen Jingshen’s lips parted. His jawline drew a clean taut line. One hand slid under fabric, mapping inch by inch. The other thumbed open a waistband and had just begun to move when the person kissing him suddenly paused and tilted back a fraction.
Yu Fan’s cheeks, neck, and ears were all the color of ripe apples. His lips and eyes were wet. He pressed their noses together and said without expression, “Chen Jingshen, I want to have s** with you.”
…
Near midnight, the rain in Ningcheng was still whispering and gathering strength. The delivery rider clomped down the hall of Unit 402 in a rain slicker and knocked. “Hello, your—”
The door opened. A sleek, strong arm reached out and took the bag. The door shut with a snap before the man could see anything.
Inside, the room was half-lit by a warm bedside lamp.
The bag was ripped open. Light gleamed along Chen Jingshen’s fingers. Yu Fan looked away and kicked him. “No. Just—”
A sudden icy splash hit his lower belly. He flinched at the cold and flushed to his hairline. “Chen Jingshen, do you want to di—”
The hand went lower and a body pressed over his. Yu Fan’s muffled scolding broke and dissolved into breath.
Lightning flashed outside and threw two tangled shadows long across the wall. Thunder rolled.
Yu Fan heard none of it. In his world there was only Chen Jingshen. His breathing, his scent, his heat, spreading and spreading until everything was him. Yu Fan groped for the sheet. His fingers were pried up and laced with another hand. From that moment on, he was entirely held in Chen Jingshen’s hands.
Chen Jingshen looked down at him and measured with his eyes. Yu Fan’s waist was so narrow it felt like one hand could circle it.
Sweat ran off Yu Fan in sheets. His belly rose and sank hard with each breath. He felt dragged along, helpless. After a long time, Chen Jingshen slid a pillow under his back.
Yu Fan had always believed that although he was thin, he was strong. The bad kids in Nancheng and those debt collectors had agreed.
This was more exhausting than a fight.
It was not that it took effort. It was just…
He could not keep still. His toes curled hard. The tremors ran through him. He ended slumped on Chen Jingshen’s shoulder, bit his neck like always, and tasted salt.
The tingling in his scalp had barely faded when he was pressed to the pillow again. Drops from Chen Jingshen’s jaw fell to his waist.
A sound escaped him against his will. Red-faced, he tried to bury himself in the pillow and die. Chen Jingshen grabbed his hair and forced his head up.
Yu Fan collapsed and scattered, cursing in broken fragments. Called him a dog. A pervert. Then everything blurred into held-back little noises. Chen Jingshen turned his face and kissed him deep and slow through the haze.
The rain finally eased around four. In the end Yu Fan was practically carried to wash up. Back in bed he did not even bother to pick a fight. He fell sideways and slept.
Morning. He woke to knocking and an unmentionable sweetness in the air.
He thought he had imagined it, then the knocking came again, steady and strong.
His mind crept back. He moved a finger and pain fizzed through his lower belly, forcing his eyes shut again.
Chen Jingshen was at the headboard typing. The keys were crisp and pleasant, oddly soothing. Yu Fan pried his eyelids up. The screen was a jumble of code that made his head swim.
Sensing movement, Chen Jingshen looked over, contentment soft in his eyes. He slid a hand into the collar to check his temperature.
Yu Fan figured it was more grocery delivery. He stretched a foot to kick him. It felt like a huge punt in his head and barely brushed him in reality. His voice came out a busted gong. “Go open the damn door.”
“Mm.” Chen Jingshen set a bottle of water on the nightstand and went downstairs.
The cake was still on the coffee table. They had not managed to put it in the fridge. Remembering how Yu Fan had smeared cream on him last night, Chen Jingshen’s hand curled. He dumped the cake and made a note to buy another later. Distracted, he cracked the door.
It opened a sliver and something exploded.
A party popper burst in midair, ribbon and glitter raining down. He squinted against the sparkle. Then a familiar voice boomed.
“Surprise!!!” Wang Lu’an’s voice shook the entire floor. Beaming, he threw his arm out and commanded, “All right! One two three go!!!”
In the hall, Zou Kuan, Zhang Jianjing, and Wang Lu’an sang in syrupy unison, loud enough for the whole building to hear. “Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you! Happy birthday to you!”
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