Xu Tangcheng didn't have his I.D. with him so that night, they only made do with a small guesthouse. The room rate was cheap and accordingly, the environment wasn't very good. The bed linens in the room had a rather unpleasant smell. Yi Zhe didn't notice it; Xu Tangcheng was uncomfortable from the smell but he didn't say anything. The small guesthouse faced a road and Xu Tangcheng couldn't sleep the whole time due to the noise from the passing cars.

In the later half of the night, the wind rose and rain fell, the pitter-patter of the rain seeming to coax him to sleep. Xu Tangcheng dozed off for a while, his mind befuddled. He was only half asleep, so when the sound of something heavy falling came through the window. Xu Tangcheng startled awake, his sleepiness entirely gone.

After not sleeping for a night and lying down for too long, he turned over a few times when it was nearly daybreak to relieve the ache in his lower back. Yi Zhe usually slept deeply but now he seemed to be aware and roused suddenly.

"Didn't sleep well?"

Xu Tangcheng nodded. He lifted a hand and rubbed his temples. "My head hurts."

"Then, do you want to sleep for a while more?"

Xu Tangcheng shook his head.

The curtains in the small guesthouse couldn't be compared to the ones at home. Sunlight broke through them, already spreading through the space in the room. Yi Zhe stared at Xu Tangcheng's side profile for a while, then reached out a hand and covered his eyes.

"Can you sleep like this?"

Yi Zhe's voice was right beside his ear, his breaths also brushing the curve of his ears along with those soft words. Unable to stop himself, Xu Tangcheng let out a laugh at once. "How is it possible for me to sleep like this?"

The corners of his mouth curved up towards the hand that was blocking the sunlight, a sight that touched Yi Zhe's heart. He moved his body and kissed the corner of that mouth.

Unlike the way he had quietly accepted kisses in the past, after a momentary surprise, Xu Tangcheng suddenly turned his head to the side and met Yi Zhe's lips.

To part at the end of the kiss was the hardest thing to do. Yi Zhe caressed Xu Tangcheng's face, his eyes fixed on Xu Tangcheng's features at a very near distance. "I'll go back with you?"

"No need." Xu Tangcheng shook his head. "If you do, they'll be even angrier."

Xu Tangcheng went back home. The one who opened the door was Xu Tangxi. The dark circles under her eyes were too obvious, immediately drawing a frown from Xu Tangcheng. "Didn't sleep well?"

Xu Tangxi nodded. She looked as though she was going to say something but stopped herself, turning to look towards the kitchen.

The apartment was very quiet. Xu Tangcheng waited for a while and heard the sounds of plates and bowls knocking into each other in the kitchen. He changed his shoes but continued to stand at the door without going in.

"Mum and Dad… are they okay?"

"They didn't sleep much last night," Xu Tangxi said softly. "I was persuading Mum at first. Later on, they told me to keep out of it and to go to sleep. But when I got up at three to use the bathroom, the lights in their room were still on."

Xu Tangxi stopped talking. She looked at Xu Tangcheng, her lower lip twitching but with no sound coming out.

"If there's anything you want to say, just say it."

Hearing that, Xu Tangxi's face crumbled.

"Mum said to tell you not to come back… When you and Yi Zhe-gege…" Perhaps she felt insecure and helpless, Xu Tangxi kept twisting a corner of her clothes around her finger. She looked up, a little aggrieved. "...break up, you can come back."

There was actually nothing unexpected about those words. He had already heard them yesterday.

Xu Tangcheng pressed his lips together tightly. After standing there for a while, he nodded slightly and said, "Got it."

He took off the slippers he had just put on and again wore his rain-dampened sneakers.

"Ge…" Xu Tangxi sensed something and shuffled a step forward, pulling at his arm.

Xu Tangcheng patted her hand. He could feel that her hand was cold so he reached out to hold it. But the two siblings had similar physical constitutions and neither could warm up the other.

"Help me get my wallet and keys." Xu Tangcheng smoothed her clothes that she had crumpled just now and said, "I won't take the car key. Give it to Dad. It'll be useful when you guys need a car."

He finished speaking but Xu Tangxi remained unmoving.

A sound came from the kitchen at this moment, the sizzling sound of ingredients being poured into a wok.

Xu Tangcheng hurried her again.

This time, Xu Tangxi finally turned around.

After getting his wallet, Xu Tangcheng opened it and took out a bank card. He had only two bank cards that he was still using now. One was the one he got together with Yi Zhe, the other was the one he was holding now. He had used it for many years and it contained most of his savings.

"I'll give this card to you. If I give it to Mum and Dad, they'll probably not want it." He passed the rather old card to Xu Tangxi. "Just in case."

"I don't want it." Xu Tangxi withdrew her hand. She dropped her head and looked away. "Mum and Dad are just angry now. After a while, you guys can talk and it'll be fine. You don't have to do this."

Xu Tangcheng didn't argue with her and only gave her a faint smile. Then, he pulled her hand to him again and pushed the card into her palm.

"Anyway, you'll have to take more care of them for the time being." Xu Tangcheng paused, then added, "Especially Mum. Spend more time with her."

After leaving her with those words, Xu Tangcheng took a step back. He wanted to close the door but Xu Tangxi held the door fast, not letting him shut it. Xu Tangcheng patted her head. "Be good."

Two words and Xu Tangxi's eyes immediately reddened.

"Ge, I'm on your side and I'll also help you talk to Mum and Dad." After saying that, two streams of tears fell, the flow unbroken no matter how Xu Tangcheng wiped them.

"All right, I know. Don't cry." Xu Tangcheng felt his heart aching but he put on a look of resignation and sighed, "How old are you already."

But Xu Tangxi ignored his coaxing.

She gripped Xu Tangcheng's hand tightly, looking into his eyes as she asked, "Can you don't leave?"

Failing to get high speed rail tickets for the journey back to Beijing, Xu Tangcheng and Yi Zhe took the regular train back. Yi Zhe was the one who lined up at the counter to buy the tickets and when Xu Tangcheng saw the two tickers for the sleeper carriage, he asked curiously, "It's just over an hour, why did you get the sleeper carriage?"

"There are no more adjacent seats for the hard seats."

In the clamorous ticket office, Yi Zhe shielded Xu Tangcheng as they walked out. The rain last night took away most of the heat from the city and Xu Tangcheng shivered when they left the hall, sticking closer to Yi Zhe.

This train station went back a long way in history and the economy of the small city was also not booming. Hence, the interior of the station was mostly still the same as when it was newly built. The waiting area was small, without even a small shop selling drinks and snacks.

Fortunately, fast food restaurants had always been a trademark of train stations. Yi Zhe saw that there was still some time before departure so he dragged Xu Tangcheng to a KFC at the side. He bought a cup of hot milk and told Xu Tangcheng to hold it.

They sat by the window. The milk was a little scalding at the start and Xu Tangcheng didn't drink it. He only continued to look out the window, chewing on the straw intermittently and spacing out.

"What did Uncle and Auntie say?"

Xu Tangcheng's emotional state hadn't been good the whole time yesterday night and Yi Zhe hadn't dared ask. But even though Xu Tangcheng didn't describe to him the situation in his home, he could roughly guess some of it. He only didn't know how serious it had been.

"Just… that they're quite against it." Xu Tangcheng still did not tell him everything and only said, "It's a little troublesome. Their mindset is quite traditional, it's not easy to get them to understand."

Yi Zhe was aware of this. In the past, he had occasionally watched some T.V. shows and had felt that the families portrayed in the shows were quite similar to Xu Tangcheng's family. They were all large families. They couldn't be said to have money, but they had stable, harmonious, yet complicated family relationships.

"Then what should we do?"

The milk had cooled down a little. Xu Tangcheng finally took the first sip. It was said that drinking milk on an empty stomach was bad and Xu Tangcheng had also always avoided doing it but right now, this mouthful of milk going down to his stomach felt comforting and calming.

"I don't know," Xu Tangcheng said. "We'll take it slow, I guess. They're quite angry now and won't listen to me anyway."

Their tickets were for one upper bunk and one lower bunk. They didn't have luggage with them and after getting on the train, they naturally sat together on the lower bunk. Perhaps the slight rocking of the train had a drowsy effect or perhaps he was too tired, Xu Tangcheng curled his legs in and leaned against Yi Zhe's shoulder, falling asleep before long.

He had a dream. In the dream, he stood in the middle of a strange space, white walls in all four directions and above his head, like a large bell canopy. He wasn't used to this kind of enclosed space and gripped his fist to punch his way out. But he realised that the walls were soft like cotton wadding and he could not exert any force on them. After a while, the lump of cotton on one side suddenly parted—not a gradual dissipation, but more like someone ripping open a hole in the bell canopy, forcibly letting him see the bright world outside.

From that empty spot, Yi Zhe came to him riding his bike and stopped in front of him.

The mountain bike was red in colour, the only colour in the dream.

Xu Tangcheng wanted to go to him but an unknown force was holding him back, stopping his legs from moving.

In the dream, he couldn't figure out what was happening. He could only stand there, looking at Yi Zhe take unhurried steps towards him. But when Yi Zhe was halfway to him, the road between them was suddenly cut off. Xu Tangcheng watched helplessly as Yi Zhe's surroundings crumbled and collapsed. Terrified, he wanted to shout. His mouth opened but he realised that he couldn't make any sound.

In the dream, Yi Zhe seemed to be completely unaware of the change in his surroundings and was still pushing his bike, walking towards him.

A violent rocking and Xu Tangcheng startled awake. He came back to his senses and opened his eyes, and realised that his head had slid down to Yi Zhe's shoulder. There was already a hand holding him steady.

"A bad dream?" Yi Zhe lowered his head and asked.

"Yeah." Xu Tangcheng rubbed his eyes and realised that his throat was very dry. "Are we nearly there?"

"Yeah, ten more minutes. I was just about to wake you."

Xu Tangcheng looked out the window. The train had yet to enter the station. He leaned his head on Yi Zhe's shoulder again, his arms resting on his knees, quietly waiting for the train to slow down.

A girl sat on the opposite bunk. She had been holding up a book but now, for some reason, she was looking right at them. Xu Tangcheng was spacing out and didn't notice; meanwhile, Yi Zhe returned the look with his brows furrowed, compelling her to lower her head.

They had to exchange their tickets before getting off the train. Xu Tangcheng took his jacket from the side, wanting to look for the tickets in the pocket. When he took the jacket, his wrist accidentally touched the neatly folded blanket. It was soft to the touch, the feeling of something that could completely disperse any force, just like that "cotton cover" in his dream just now.

He suddenly realised that the dream wasn't meaningless. That cotton cover was their current situation. When facing Yu An, he could go all out to protect Yi Zhe and use the strongest force to injure the other party. But his parents had never been his enemies.

This was not a battle. There was no fort for them to conquer, nor did they have ammunition.

For a moment, Xu Tangcheng was lost in his thoughts. Yi Zhe leaned over, helping him take out the tickets.

The days after that actually went by faster than Xu Tangcheng expected. He had thought they would be very hard to endure but being busy with his graduation, being busy with entering the workforce, either one of those already took up too much of his energy, and the time spent in distress could only be shifted to nighttime.

He still persisted on going home but as before, Zhou Hui and Xu Yueliang avoided him. At the start, Xu Tangxi would open the door and speak softly with him for a while. Later on, on a certain day, he knocked on the door for a long time but no one opened it. When he opened the door himself with the key and entered, what greeted him was the loud sound of a door being slammed shut.

Xu Tangxi stood in the living room, looking at him with a rather aggrieved expression.

Xu Tangcheng understood what Zhou Hui and Xu Yueliang meant by that and did not go back anymore since then. He only contacted Xu Tangxi through the phone to understand the situation at home.

Zhou Hui and Xu Yueliang were not doing well. Zhou Hui's eyes were always swollen. This reality made the nights increasingly hard to endure for Xu Tangcheng. Yi Zhe also noticed this. He racked his brains thinking of all sorts of ways to help Xu Tangcheng alleviate his insomnia: warm milk, remedies for calming and nourishing the brain, bedtime stories… Yi Zhe even tried learning to sing lullabies but none of them seemed to work.

And then one day, because his hands suddenly turned numb and cold, Xu Tangcheng lost his grip and broke a glass cup at home, and Yi Zhe forcibly dragged him to the hospital for a checkup. The doctor's diagnosis was that he had a weakened mental state. It couldn't be said to be trivial, but to call it serious also wasn't quite correct. Xu Tangcheng knew his own condition and didn't think much of it, but Yi Zhe stayed silent for an entire night.

One month later, when Xu Tangcheng met Xu Tangxi again, it was when she suddenly came all the way to the entrance to his workplace. The young lady was noticeably thinner and her nose was red from the cold. It was already nine at night at that time. When Xu Tangcheng saw her, he quickly took leave of his colleagues who had come out with him and ran over.

"Why did you come over here?" Xu Tangcheng panicked when he touched her ice-cold face. "You were sick just a while ago and you're not completely well yet. Why did you come here and stand in the cold? Have you been waiting for long?"

"Not long." When she said those two words, Xu Tangxi was still in a normal state but after saying them, her tears suddenly fell.

His colleagues behind him saw what was happening. Afraid that something had happened, they came over to inquire out of concern. Xu Tangcheng put his arm around Xu Tangxi and waved them off. "It's all right, she's my younger sister."

Xu Tangxi also realised that she was making a scene and quickly wiped her tears with her sleeve and buried her face low.

Xu Tangcheng brought Xu Tangxi home. He gave Yi Zhe a call, asking him to buy a portion of takeout back.

"Tell me, what's going on? Did you come all the way here from home in secret?" Putting down his phone, Xu Tangcheng leaned against the dining table and asked.

Xu Tangxi cupped her hands around a glass of hot water, taking small sips from it. She nodded.

"Hurry up and call home. Mum and Dad must be so worried."

Hearing that, Xu Tangxi shook her head. "I didn't bring my phone."

"You're really…"

Putting aside his lecture for now, Xu Tangcheng quickly sent Xu Yueliang a message, telling him that Xu Tangxi was with him and that he would send her back tomorrow.

"You quarreled with Mum and Dad?"

At the start, Xu Tangxi didn't say anything. When Xu Tangcheng started walking towards her, she finally said in a choked-up voice, "I just wanted to persuade them… You haven't been home for so long, how can they not miss you? I don't understand. It's not like you're committing murder or arson. Are they really not allowing you to go home for the rest of your life just because of this?"

At the age of barely over twenty, there were many things that a person did not know, did not understand and could not accept. Xu Tangxi asked, "What's so important here? Girl or guy, as long as you're doing well, isn't that enough?"

"You think this way but they don't." Xu Tangcheng didn't dare let Xu Tangxi cry her heart out. He patted her back, wanting to calm her down. "How traditional the mindset of our family is, isn't that something you've experienced since young? Festive occasions must be spent at home. I suggested before to spend Lunar New Year in the south but Mum and Dad didn't agree. When our cousin-brother divorced, our family fretted and brooded over it for so long… How do you expect them to accept this matter?"

"No one can accept it right from the start." Xu Tangxi lifted her head, looking at him rather stubbornly. "Everyone has things that they cannot accept but they should at least give it a try. I thought about it for a whole night before I figured it out. But they didn't. They don't accept it. Their mindset is outdated and obstinate. They immediately judge a person to be guilty without giving them a chance to speak."

At this point, Xu Tangcheng basically understood what Xu Tangxi was thinking. She was really on his side and hoped that their parents could understand her. She kept thinking that she was the one in the right here and without her realising it, this confrontation was gradually turning into outrage.

"Think about it, Mum and Dad are already over fifty. For them to change the mindset they've had for so many years is really very difficult." Xu Tangcheng pulled out a chair and sat down beside Xu Tangxi. "We also cannot judge them purely by our worldview because the environment they grew up in is different from ours. For us right now, even though the environment around us can't be said to be very open, we have indeed been given opportunities and are able to understand the open-minded way of thinking through various methods. But in the culture they have known, there has always only been getting married, having kids, starting a family. No one has ever told them that people of the same sex can be in love. They have never heard of it, much less seen it."

Xu Tangxi's finger kept digging into the side of the glass. When Xu Tangcheng finished speaking, she wanted to object but instantly realised that there was nothing she could say.

"Most people are ordinary. You can't expect them to create something out of nothing, and come up with a way of thinking on their own. That's why I say that I can understand them." Xu Tangcheng reached out a hand and smoothed out Xu Tangxi's rather messy ponytail. "To take the shortcomings in the culture around a person and blame them entirely on the person having a backwards mindset, I think it's too harsh a criticism."

Xu Tangxi's eyes flickered. She bit her lip and didn't say anything.

Xu Tangcheng paused, then asked Xu Tangxi, "Don't you think so?"

"Then, is it always going to be like this?" This could be considered to be agreeing with Xu Tangcheng's words but the young lady was unwilling to be content and still wanted to argue. "You'll have to talk to each other one day. You aren't going home and they're also not yielding. Mum and Dad have become so much thinner. There's also barely any meat on your face now…"

"I don't know what to do either but this is how it is for now. Wait for Lunar New Year." Xu Tangcheng let out a pained laugh and said, "Mum and Dad shouldn't have talked about this matter to Uncle and the others. I'll have to go home for Lunar New Year. They probably also won't object to that, otherwise they wouldn't be able to explain it to the rest of the family. Tangxi, I don't actually want to force them to accept it, you shouldn't force them either. Listen to me. Take good care of Mum and Dad, don't let them risk their health because of this."

Xu Tangxi was quiet for a long while. Then, she sniffed and said, "Okay."