Chapter 106

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Xia Xingcheng finished Bei Yi’s novel ‘The Right Trap’ with Yang Youming, and once he turned to the last page, he said, “You’d better take it.”

Sat on the sofa, Yang Youming reached out and rubbed Xia Xingcheng’s hair.

“The story’s pretty good,” said Xia Xingcheng. “With He Zheng directing on top of it, I’m sure it’ll be an amazing movie. Don’t rush to decline it, okay?”

Yang Youming replied, “I’ll think it over.”

He Zheng’s side, however, seemed to be in no rush either. After their meeting the other day, he had yet to get in touch with the both of them again.

Xia Xingcheng wasn’t like Yang Youming; he couldn’t not shoot dramas or go on tours or film commercials for long periods of time. He had to constantly accept roles that came his way to keep himself in good shape.

He accepted Yang Youming’s advice to push away the big IP mysterious fantasy drama, and instead took up a modern office drama with a capable director and a female lead with decent acting skills. Said drama would take about four months to shoot, and as the male lead with important scenes, it meant that he wouldn’t be seeing Yang Youming for a full four months.

Although he knew that this kind of situation was unavoidable when he chose this profession, Xia Xingcheng still felt wholly uneasy at having to part with Yang Youming for so long. Before he left, he took the initiative to invite He Zheng out to meet him. Up until now, he still remembered that when He Zheng had gone to look for Yang Youming at last year’s filming, Yang Youming had made up his mind and quickly left him.

This time, Xia Xingcheng met with He Zheng on his own. He didn’t beat around the bush, either, and got straight to the point, saying, “Director He, I’m going to shoot a TV drama soon. I know that saying this is inappropriate, but I still want to ask this of you—don’t meet with Ming ge behind my back.”

He Zheng sat across from him, rarely forgoing a smoke, merely staring at him. “Why?”

Xia Xingcheng humbly lowered his head. “I know you’re concerned about me, and you sincerely want what’s best for us, but this matter is not your responsibility. It’s not Ming ge’s responsibility either. It’s me who stubbornly pursued him, and the fact that he could give me an answer is the greatest blessing of my life. You mustn’t advise him to leave me again.” At the end, he raised his head and looked at He Zheng with an earnest stare.

He Zheng asked, “Why ‘again’?”

Xia Xingcheng was mute for a moment before saying, “That night at the hotel, I know that you went to see Ming ge.”

He Zheng sighed.

Xia Xingcheng was mentally prepared. He was well aware that He Zheng would definitely try to persuade him, but he also knew that anything He Zheng said would be useless.

Yet, He Zheng said, “I had a lot of things I wanted to say to you at first. But two days ago, Yang Youming asked me to meet him.”

All at once, Xia Xingcheng was struck dumb.

He Zheng fiddled with the lighter in his hand. “He told me more or less the same things you did, with a much stronger tone than yours—he forbade me to see you in private.”

Xia Xingcheng felt as if someone had suddenly squeezed his heart.

The small private room of the restaurant was very narrow, but its lighting made the room seem spacious and bright. It illuminated the minute details of He Zheng’s expression, and there was an unspeakable weathered and worn[1] look in his eyes. “I’ve never seen this kind of Yang Youming before.”

Xia Xingcheng felt both happy and sad.

He Zheng said, “You know what, Xingcheng? The fact that you got stuck didn’t come as a surprise to me at all. Right from the beginning, when I saw your state during filming, I thought that you’d get stuck. But getting too deep in the act isn’t a terrible thing—so long as you leave those circumstances and leave that person behind, it’ll always weaken with time. Yang Youming actually understands this better than I do. So, I don’t understand why he’d get stuck—why would he indulge himself even when he was perfectly aware that he’s in deep?”

Xia Xingcheng picked up a glass of water and took a light sip to moisten his dry lips. He looked straight at He Zheng. “Did you ask him why?”

He Zheng nodded slowly. “I did.”

Xia Xingcheng abruptly tensed up at the impending answer.

He Zheng said, “He was like this then, too, sitting across from me; he shook his head at first and said he didn’t know either, and if he knew, it wasn’t that he couldn’t hold back. After that, he paused and suddenly laughed, then said that—it was probably because he was inescapably doomed[2].”

Xia Xingcheng heard the thump-thump of his heart as it throbbed violently. He understood what Yang Youming meant by ‘inescapably doomed’—there were also times when he’d feel that Yang Youming was his own inescapable doom. Thus, he couldn’t help but let out a small laugh.

He Zheng saw him laugh, and after a while, said, “It was the exact same laugh as yours.”

Xia Xingcheng was embarrassed by these words.

In the end, He Zheng lit a cigarette, and his eyes narrowed slightly in the smoke as he said, “Lao-Yang is Lao-Yang, after all, not Yu Haiyang. We’ll pretend that we never met. I don’t want to fall out with Yang Youming.” At this, He Zheng sandwiched his cigarette between his fingers and scratched his head. “Speaking of which, I’ve never seen Yang Youming fall out with anyone before. If there was someone he didn’t like, he’d always just refuse to acknowledge them.”

Xia Xingcheng smiled.

At last, He Zheng said, “Tell Yang Youming not to worry about movie matters. You too. Let’s just wait and see.” His words were vague, and he didn’t plainly state whether or not he’d use Xia Xingcheng.

However, to Xia Xingcheng, nothing touched him more deeply than Yang Youming’s ‘inescapably doomed’. Only after he thanked and apologized to He Zheng did he leave the restaurant.

When Xia Xingcheng returned home, the lights in the cloakroom were on. He changed into slippers at the door, quietly made his way over, and saw Yang Youming sitting on the floor with his back to the door, a large opened suitcase by his side. He was taking clothes out and folding them one by one, carefully tidying them up before putting them back in.

The opened suitcase was the one Xia Xingcheng had casually left lying around. He had taken down the clothes that he would be bringing to the shoot and chucked them in his suitcase, yet he hadn’t had the time to sort them out yet.

At this time, he walked over to Yang Youming and quietly sat down at his side, his hands hugging his knees, his head resting on Yang Youming’s shoulder.

Yang Youming’s hands didn’t stop moving. He said, “Your clothes are all over the place, won’t they be all wrinkled when you take them out? Moreover, you won’t be able to pack that many things with them like this.”

Xia Xingcheng gazed at his side profile; he was very close, and he could almost count the man’s long and fine lashes. He said, “I know.”

Yang Youming said, “You know, but you’re lazy.”

Xia Xingcheng laughed soundlessly. “Why are you acting like my mom?”

Yang Youming tilted his face. He could probably only see the tip of his nose. He said, “Think I’m annoying?”

Xia Xingcheng rubbed his forehead on the other man’s jaw. “When I was small, I thought that I wouldn’t be able to live without my mom. Now, I think—how am I supposed to keep on living without you?”

Yang Youming said, “Don’t talk nonsense.”

Xia Xingcheng slightly raised his head and angled his face, finding Yang Youming’s lips for a kiss.

He was very reluctant—even though the separation was temporary, he was still utterly unwilling to part with him. The other man was obviously still right next to him, but he was almost overwhelmed by an intense longing.

Xia Xingcheng stayed in the new crew for four months, from summer to autumn, during which he had another birthday. On his birthday, he invited the cast and crew to a meal, and from start to finish, his neck was adorned with the birthday present Yang Youming had given him the previous year—the star necklace.

Yang Youming did not come to visit the crew. They would video call every night, and Xia Xingcheng unceasingly felt like he was head over heels in love; he was crazy about Yang Youming till he went dizzy with it, drowned in a dopamine-induced happiness.

While he was filming, ‘Gradual Distance’ was screened in other countries, and the reactions were intense.

Although it couldn’t be watched in domestic theatres, netizens and fans who eagerly awaited the movie could always find the movie through other channels.

Whenever Xia Xingcheng went on Weibo, his fans’ enthusiasm would always hit him in the face. They shouted his and Yang Youming’s names and discussed the two of them like they were in a spectacular love affair.

Various screenshots and clips from ‘Gradual Distance’ circulated online, and the number of times Xia Xingcheng saw the word ‘Mingxing’[2] grew increasingly frequent. Later on, he learned that it was his and Yang Youming’s CP name. Someone also posted a photo of Yang Youming visiting the set of ‘Accidental Murder’ and leaked the fact that Yang Youming played opposite of Xia Xingcheng.

The fans demonstrated an almost crazy zeal, and many people firmly believed that Yang Youming and Xia Xingcheng were really together. Xia Xingcheng had no idea where their intuition came from, but it was so sharp that it caused him to have a guilty conscience.

Huang Jixin made time to come see him in the crew, and when they went out for a meal, Huang Jixin lamented, “I’m not sure if this is good or not.”

“What’s not good?” asked Xia Xingcheng.

“There’s no doubt that the more popular one is, the better,” Huang Jixin said, “It’s just that you’ll always be linked to Yang Youming, and I don’t know if that’ll impact you badly.”

Xia Xingcheng asked, “What’s gonna happen?”

Huang Jixin shook his head, at a loss. “I don’t know. It’s pretty bad based on traditional mindsets. What’s more, Yang Youming’s fans will also scold you.”

Xia Xingcheng stared at Huang Jixin and burst out laughing without warning.

Huang Jixin was baffled. “Have you gone mad?”

Xia Xingcheng sighed. His eyes still contained a smile, but his tone was sly as he said, “Go ahead and scold me! Who told me to snatch their gege? Let them have this, a little bashing is nothing.”

Huang Jixin hurled his chopsticks. “Laozi refuses to listen to this!”

In any case, no matter how lively it was outside, for four months, Xia Xingcheng threw himself into filming earnestly, doing exactly what He Zheng had told him to do before—being a proper actor.

When shooting wrapped up, his assistant Hua Hua accompanied Xia Xingcheng back to Beijing.

The young Miss Hua Hua was a little slow, but she was honest and protective, and she kept her lips sealed tight. As long as Xia Xingcheng went out of his way to explain any matters to her in detail, she would always handle them well, so Xia Xingcheng followed Yang Youming’s previous instructions and kept Hua Hua by his side.

When Xia Xingcheng got back to Beijing, at the airport, he discovered that his four month-long disappearance to film had not depleted his fans’ enthusiasm in the slightest. On the contrary, it made them more fanatical.

That day, a great number of fans had gathered to see him at the airport. When Xia Xingcheng left, he was barely able to move a single step. After that, the airport dispatched their security to escort him out.

The enthusiastic girls followed him all the way to the car.

The one who came to pick him up at the airport was Huang Jixin. He didn’t call for a driver and personally drove the completely sealed off nanny car himself, and he had gotten out to help Hua Hua load the luggage.

Crowded in by those girls, Xia Xingcheng almost blacked out, and he had no strength to open the car door.

When he opened the car door a crack, he saw Yang Youming sitting in the back seat, beckoning at him. His heart immediately constricted, and he turned around to use his body to block off the narrow opening, then said to his fans, “Get back, everyone! Pay attention to safety!”

A girl pressed against the car door, and Huang Jixin promptly pulled her away and shouted, “Don’t squeeze! Don’t squeeze! Be careful of falling!”

Xia Xingcheng took advantage of this moment to slip into the car, then closed the door for the time being.

Without even giving himself the time to heave a sigh of relief, he turned around and threw himself at Yang Youming’s embrace. “I’ve missed you so much!”

Yang Youming hugged him, and said, “I’ve missed you too.”

Hua Hua got on the front passenger seat, and Huang Jixin drove the car through the airport road.

Xia Xingcheng stared at Yang Youming for a while, then cupped his face and kissed his lips. He eagerly claimed them, unleashing four months worth of intense longing.

The two of them sat on the row furthest back, and they were hidden away from the driver’s seat by another row of seats between them. Even so, the sound of their rustling clothes as they fiercely kissed and touched each other wafted clearly to the front.

Huang Jixin’s brows crumpled as he held back the urge to curse, and yet next to him, Hua Hua turned around curiously to find out what exactly was going on.

“HEY!” Huang Jixin called out to Hua Hua. “What are you doing?” If it weren’t for the fact that he was currently driving, he would’ve made to pull at her.

Hua Hua blanked out. “I…” Afterwards, she suddenly whirled back around, her eyes wide like she was about to lose her head out of fear, and she directed a loaded look at Huang Jixin.

Huang Jixin was about to go crazy. “Yang Youming stayed in his room for so many days—are you telling me that you haven’t figured out a thing?”

In a daze, Hua Hua replied, “I didn’t think that far.”

Huang Jixin wanted no more than to pry her head open to see if it was filled with tofu dregs, and said, “No one can say a word, you hear? If there’s a… fifth person who finds out about this, you’re fired. And I’ll make it impossible for you to have a career in this line of work!”

Hua Hua sullenly cried, “I won’t say anything, but if it weren’t me saying it, and somebody else found out, would I also get fired?”

Hearing the sound of Xia Xingcheng’s increasingly quickening breaths, Huang Jixin finally lost it and yelled, “I’ll send you both home right away! Please, please restrain yourselves!”

Their kisses halted. Xia Xingcheng gazed at Yang Youming with wet eyes, who smiled at him and pushed away the hair that had fallen onto Xia Xingcheng’s forehead.

They eyed each other, and after a while, Xia Xingcheng shouted at Huang Jixin, “Go to a hotel near the airport!”

Huang Jixin seethed, “Out of the question! Hold back for my sake! Get the fuck back home!”

☆ ☆ ☆

[1] 沧桑感 or, a sense of having been through good times and bad

[2] 在劫难逃 (idiom) if you’re doomed, you’re doomed // there’s no escape from misfortune

[3] their ship name, also the chinese word for star/celeb

t/n – thank you so much to Tinsunny and Anon for the kofis ❤

⟵ Chapter 105 | TOC | Chapter 107 ⟶

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