Chapter 32

At 12.45am in the middle of the night, I woke up sprawled out on the desk, an examination paper stuck to my face.

Since I got home, I still hadn't completed the multiple-choice questions of this general science paper. I really didn't procrastinate, I just seriously didn't understand how this particle increased in speed, how the chemical compounds were deduced, how come there was a big A and a small b, and how these diseases were inherited. Speaking of which, I wondered if liking my Ge had anything to do with a genetic mutation. I pondered over it for a while.

My Ge was on my right, furiously typing away. His bandaged left hand wasn't very flexible, but that didn't affect his efficiency. I saw that his coffee had gone cold, so I picked it up, intending to make him another cup.

My Ge suddenly leant against the back of his chair, rubbing his temples as he let out a long sigh. When he saw that I was beside him, he was quite surprised, "How come you haven't slept yet?"

The depth of his focus when working was unfathomable to me.

My Ge saw the general science paper on the table from the corner of his eye. He exclaimed 'aiyo' as he picked it up and flipped through it, "My God, you're studying? That's unlike you…you're not really planning on getting into the top fifty to do your Ge, are you? Courageous."

I hated it when he mocked me like this. I admitted that I wasn't as smart as my Ge; when my mum gave birth to us two, she had given all the brains to him. When it came to me, there wasn't enough left so some dough was mushed together to create half a brain. I hated studying. I didn't even know how to do these questions that used knowledge that was useless after you finished learning it.

My Ge gave my answers a quick once-over. He rubbed his chin as he said, "Tsk, three wrong for just chemistry alone."

I grabbed his neck, "Fuck, I didn't ask you to help me grade my papers! Bloody hell!"

He laughed, making me want to yank his two smiling canine teeth out and shove them up his nose.

"Okay okay, calm down." My Ge hooked an arm around my neck and pulled me back to his side. He picked up a pencil and taught me how to do the questions, drawing as he explained.

I sprawled out on the study desk as I listened to him teach. He had one arm around my shoulder while his other hand scribbled on the paper. Only the lamp on the study desk was switched on. The pencil's shadow moved along with the walking of its nib, creating the rustling sound of its footsteps.

My Ge leant very close to me. His lashes were half lowered, and the creases of his double eyelids were sometimes deep and sometimes shallow. His gaze was fixed on the questions in concentration. In his eyes, only an exam paper was reflected. I impulsively squeezed myself into his line of sight.

"What are you doing?" The pencil in his hand paused.

"Ge, I think you were a princess in your last life."

"Bullshit."

Perhaps my Ge's explanation was clearer than that of my school's teachers, or perhaps I only liked to listen to my Ge speak. After he explained the whole paper to me, I actually understood it.

“Rest for a while.” I sat on the study desk and crossed one leg over the other.

My Ge stood up and stretched. He rested his hands on each side of the table and held a cigarette in his mouth, wanting me to help him light it up.

"Darling, give me a light."

"I don't have one. Don't fucking smoke so much, two or three a day is enough. Don't go overboard."

"It's to keep me awake, otherwise I can't hang on." My Ge patted my uniform pant pockets for a lighter and took it out, lighting his cigarette up himself. He turned and leant against the edge of the table, lightly exhaling.

After he was finished with his cigarette, he broke the silence, asking me if it still hurt.

I didn't know where he was referring to. My face wasn't swollen anymore and the strangulation marks on my neck hadn’t been deep in the first place. The marks on my body were already close to vanishing. It still hurt a bit inside my ass, and the bruises he had created on my body still hadn't disappeared. He had covered me in injuries, though I had deserved it.

"Ge was a bit too heavy-handed." He stubbed out his cigarette and mindlessly pulled out the cotton from inside the cigarette filter tip. "But you have to learn your lesson."

"It's not that Ge doesn't love you, that day was really…" He seemed to have thought of something and turned his head back. I lifted his red sandalwood bracelet and waved it in front of his eyes.

At first, he didn't react, but when he saw that the other bracelet was around my wrist, his shoulders stiffened and his eyes suddenly turned uneasy.

It seemed like my Ge was finally choosing to stop lying. His gaze landed on the blue agave plant in the corner as he avoided my eyes.

He reached out a hand to take another cigarette. I pressed down on the cigarette box.

My Ge frowned, withdrawing his canine teeth into his pursed lips. He turned off the desk lamp and turned to leave.

In the darkness after the light had disappeared, I felt around for my Ge and grabbed onto him, hugging from behind as I gave his heated ears a kiss.

He reached out to pry me off but his right hand was caught by me. I rolled the red sandalwood bracelet onto his wrist and interlocked our fingers, telling him not to take the bracelet off.

"Ge, I'm willing."

I giggled as I rested my chin on his shoulder.

Unexpectedly, the world suddenly turned upside down. I had been flipped over. When I finally got a sense of what was going on, I was already draped over his shoulder.

"What, put me down."

He carried me to the opened window and patted my ass, "This Didi is broken, I'll have to throw it away and buy a new one."

My head was hanging downwards as I hugged his waist and cried out, "You dare?! Fuck, don't walk forward anymore! I won't mess around anymore! Chen Xing Ge is moving houses and asked me to take it back, before that I really didn't know anything! I didn't purposely hide it from you, I only took it today! I was just playing with you just now!"

"Playing with me?"

My Ge let me hang outside the window for a bit. I knew he wouldn't really throw me down, but anyone would be scared this far from the ground. I tightly held onto him and cried frantically, "No! When, when I was younger I thought like this too! When I was younger, for some reason, I liked to watch you shower and even secretly wore your underwear before. Anyway, I'm a pervert, I'm a pervert okay!"

Fuck, what the hell was I saying.

Unexpectedly, my Ge's actions paused for a few seconds, then he put me down.

"Bastard Duan Rui, you're a piece of shit." I shoved him. Just when I was about to kick him, he pulled me into his arms, embracing me.

The study was too dark; I couldn't see his expression. My Ge kissed my forehead.

"Pervert." He insulted me.

"Dog shit." I wasn't backing down.

We fought all the way to the bedroom. It was almost 2am; I was extremely tired, yawning as I slammed head first into my pillow. My Ge pulled off my pyjama shorts and checked if my hole was still swollen or not, applying a bit more medication. I tossed about, so tired that I couldn't even open my eyes.

If I didn't hug someone, I couldn't really sleep properly, so I soon woke up. My Ge had left a night light on. He was sitting on the bed, his right hand with the red sandalwood bracelet on holding the complimentary card given by the florist shop. On it was the love note I had written for him.

I narrowed my eyes, pretending to sleep while observing my Ge. A faint smile was playing on his lips. He moved towards the night light, attempting to put the card against the light to see the words I had scribbled out. However, the card was too thick and opaque, so he could only give up. In the end, he kissed the card that I had dirtied with my scribbles and slotted it into the transparent pocket of his wallet.

I secretly took a peek. There had originally been a photo inside that pocket. It was a photo of the two of us, taken on the first day that we had moved into our new house. It was so old that our faces almost couldn't be seen anymore.

I realised that every time we took a photo together, I would just take it with my phone. I had already collected a few hundred photos in Wife's Pretty Pictures, but Duan Rui wouldn't ask for them from me. That was fine; tomorrow, I would pick a few that looked nice and send them to him so he could keep them wherever he wanted to.

My Ge didn't realise that I was pretending to sleep. He turned off the light and quietly got under the blanket, shuffling to my side. I couldn't open my eyes now, I'd be found out by him. I felt like he was looking at me, never stopping.

Duan Rui kissed my forehead, then lay down, putting his head very very close to mine, almost touching. Soon, his light and steady breathing was calm by my ear.

I flipped over on my side to face him, burying my head in his chest. This was how we had always slept. In the past, I wanted to sleep like this forever and never wake up. Now, I hoped that the sun would rise like it always did, and the first thing I saw when I woke up would always be him.