Chapter 84
GU FEI LOOKED at Jiang Cheng, whose gaze hadn’t shifted from him since he pointed at him and said, “You.”
Sometimes Gu Fei felt that aside from the unique qualities and skills of an overachiever, Jiang Cheng also possessed a superior reasoning ability that other overachievers lacked—he could completely flip the narrative around. Upon further reflection, you might even find yourself agreeing with him, as though he’d been right all along.
Gu Fei had been on the receiving end of this before, when they’d argued about the tattoos, but he hadn’t explained his reluctance then, and now Jiang Cheng was demonstrating his superpower again.
Frankly, the question Gu Fei asked him back then no longer had any significance at this point in their relationship. Whatever answer it led to, whatever the question meant, none of it mattered anymore. Back then, Gu Fei would have preferred it if Jiang Cheng was only after a fling. To go out with him just to try it, just on a whim, just out of loneliness—whatever.
But Jiang Cheng hadn’t answered back then. He seemed unable to completely separate the two concepts. So Gu Fei chose to dive in headfirst: I’ll keep liking you until you don’t need me to anymore.
I can do that, as long as the one you want is me, and not anyone else.
That was why when Jiang Cheng pointed at him and accused him with his own words, Gu Fei felt—despite his surprise, his anger, and his urge to scoff—that there was no fault in Jiang Cheng’s logic.
That’s right. I’m the one who’s ready to stop this whenever you want to.
Gu Fei felt the need to say something now, but it wasn’t something he could do lightly. Jiang Cheng was a dangerous cocktail of sensitive and impulsive that was lethal when combined with his ability to rationalize anything.
But scariest of all, Gu Fei could tell that Jiang Cheng was insecure. It was something he frequently sensed in the way Jiang Cheng strove to hold on tight for fear of losing what he had.
Anything you say right now can and will be kept as evidence in Jiang Cheng’s heart.
Proceed with caution.
It wasn’t that a long-distance relationship was out of the question. But if one person was at a top-tier university and the other was stuck back here, their completely different situations would erode the common ground they shared over time. Their relationship would gradually fade into nothing.
Maybe even before distance separates us, the constant bickering and probing over differences like this will wear us down, and we’ll finally return to our own respective worlds.
Of course, it’s also possible that miracles do happen, and we can walk together until the end.
Not everything could be solved like a math problem. With those, each question only had one correct answer; whatever the process, all you had to do was look for the path that would lead you to the right answer. The overachievers knew how to find shortcuts, while the less adept slackers might take the long way round. However, they would all arrive at the same finish line, because there would only be one right answer. Anything besides that was the wrong answer.
Meanwhile, their situation right now had infinite possibilities and infinite endings, all of which were valid answers. There could be one, two, or three; there could be six, even, but no one could say one was more correct than another.
Compared to Jiang Cheng, Gu Fei thought maybe he was too careful, too pessimistic. Perhaps he wanted too much to protect Jiang Cheng from any harm. But Jiang Cheng was the opposite of him. He was optimistic, hotheaded, direct, and sensitive. Jiang Cheng was a solid believer in the philosophy of “what does this little bit of pain matter in the midst of wind and rain?”2
No matter how many times Gu Fei pondered these thoughts in his mind, he couldn’t say a word of it to Jiang Cheng.
Gu Fei had no way of leaving this place. He dared not even dwell too much on the word “leaving,” let alone actually try to figure out a way out of here.
Meanwhile, there was no reason for Jiang Cheng to stay.
It was a stalemate that could not be resolved, at least for now. If the board wasn’t laid out in just the right way in preparation for a timely miracle, they were bound to reach a dead end.
Clearly, Jiang Cheng hadn’t considered this possibility, nor did he want to. And there was no reason for him to force Jiang Cheng to confront these questions when Jiang Cheng didn’t even consider them an issue.
“That’s not true,” Gu Fei said instead, meeting Jiang Cheng’s eyes. “Do you overachievers cherry-pick the things you want to remember? How unreasonable.”
“Quit trying to change the subject.” Jiang Cheng smirked. “Gu Fei, sometimes I think it’s a real disservice to call yourself a slacker when you process and react on par with an overachiever.”
“Apart from that question, did I say anything else?” Gu Fei was still looking straight at him.
“Anything else?” Jiang Cheng narrowed his eyes, his expression haughty. “I don’t remember anything else, only that you were reluctant to get a tattoo because you were worried about having my mark on your body in case we break up.”
“Wanna bet that I’ll smack you?”
“I’ll believe it when you do.”
Gu Fei didn’t say anything. He stared at Jiang Cheng for a few seconds, then suddenly lifted his elbow and swung it at Jiang Cheng’s face.
As usual, Jiang Cheng’s reflexes were impressive. As soon as he started to move his arm, Jiang Cheng was already leaning back to dodge it. But Gu Fei never planned on hitting his face. He moved forward as Jiang Cheng leaned back and pressed his forearm against Jiang Cheng’s throat, pinning him down; Jiang Cheng was forced to fall back onto the bed with Gu Fei on top of him.
“Fuck,” Jiang Cheng cursed, glaring at him.
“You don’t know me well at all.” Gu Fei locked Jiang Cheng’s neck in place with his arm and held one of Jiang Cheng’s hands down with his leg. When Jiang Cheng tried to lift his other hand, Gu Fei immediately caught it in his grasp. “How could I bear to hit your face?”
“Tsk, tsk, tsk.” The corner of Jiang Cheng’s mouth twitched.