RITM - 52

Chapter 52: The Seventeen-Sided Mirror - Ideals (1)

“Xinqi, are you alright?”

Xie Xinqi shook her head, forcing a smile. “I’m fine, just a little dizzy from watching the movie for so long. But it was really great! That monster scene scared me half to death.” She realized her voice was louder than usual, her laughter sharper and more cheerful. She desperately hoped Xie Xiuchen would notice her, but she didn’t want him to know she’d seen him—and deliberately walked ahead of him. What kind of mindset was this? What was wrong with her…

“Yeah, the entire theater gasped! It was so intense, but the 3D glasses gave me a splitting headache.”

“You’re such a drama queen about glasses, even though you’re nearsighted.” Xie Xinqi deliberately turned her head, showing her profile to the people behind her, and playfully pushed her friend’s forehead.

The crowd exiting the theater at this time was overwhelming, and the elevators were already packed. She followed the flow of people into the stairwell. Too timid and overly self-conscious about her behavior, she didn’t dare look back to see if Xie Xiuchen and his date were following her. By the time she reached the first floor and squeezed back into an elevator, turning around only to find that he was nowhere to be seen.

The crowd surged out of the mall like a tide, spilling into the vast world outside. As the elevator doors slowly closed, a thoroughly one-sided performance finally came to an end. She entered her car feeling utterly defeated, but for a long, long time, she simply rested her head on the steering wheel, lost in thought. Without a clear goal, she drove home absentmindedly. When she arrived, she felt a strange reluctance to enter the house. In the end, it was her brother’s driver who spotted her and called out, “Miss,” forcing her to reluctantly go inside. Xie Xiuchen was sitting in the living room playing with his phone. Judging by his attire, she knew what she had seen at the cinema wasn’t a hallucination. She tossed her bag onto a chair and said lazily, “Brother, you’re back.” But she avoided meeting his eyes.

He put down his phone and looked at her calmly. “At the cinema earlier, why didn’t you come over to say hello?”

“You were at the cinema too? I didn’t know. If you saw me, you should’ve come over to talk to me.” She yawned exaggeratedly. “You don’t usually go to the movies, so why today? Who did you go with…?”

“Don’t pretend.”

Interrupted unexpectedly, she feigned curiosity and widened her eyes. “Huh?”

“You’ve never been good at hiding your feelings. Your act at the cinema was incredibly forced, and it still is.” Before he even finished speaking, he noticed her face flush red. He knew he was right, but suddenly exposing her felt a bit unfair. Teasingly, he added, “What, guilty conscience?”

“I—I saw you on a date with a girl and didn’t want to interrupt. And now you’re blaming me?”

He chuckled softly. “Didn’t you want me to find a girlfriend? Are you saying you don’t approve of the one I’ve chosen?”

“I approve, but she’s too tall—almost as tall as you.”

“It’s fine. I can handle it.”

His easy smile was like a thorny comb, raking through the blood vessels of her heart, inside and out. The image of their kiss kept replaying in her mind. Agitated, she snapped, “Well then, I wish you happiness. I’m tired, so I’m going upstairs to sleep.” But after taking just two steps, her wrist was caught by Xie Xiuchen. Startled, she turned back to look at him.

“Xinqi, you seem upset.”

He squinted slightly, smiling as casually as ever, appearing relaxed and lighthearted. But the icy stiffness of his fingers betrayed him, making her instinctively try to pull her hand away. “Kissing in public and saying such disgusting things—have some consideration for the people around you! It made everyone uncomfortable, okay?”

Xie Xiuchen was momentarily stunned. “Disgusting things?”

“What about the nonsense about your skin perfuming your shirt? It made me want to throw up!” She had never imagined that another woman could understand the scent of Xie Xiuchen so intimately. It felt like someone had licked the ice cream she was eating—utterly unsettling.

To her surprise, the man who had been so smooth in the cinema now blushed. Instead of letting go, he tightened his grip on her wrist, adjusting his awkwardness while maintaining his amused expression. “Just a kiss and a few sweet words, and you’re this upset? My little sister is still such a child. You haven’t even seen the more exciting parts yet.”

The atmosphere tightened like a wound-up spring, and her body trembled slightly as she pushed his hand away. “I’m not upset! You’re overreacting. Let go—I’m exhausted!”

He yanked her closer to him. “Xinqi, you don’t like me interacting with her, do you?”

Her face flushed red. She knew her childish emotions couldn’t escape his sharp eyes, so she sidestepped the issue: “I just don’t like her, that’s all. You know I can’t stand women who act coy.”

“So if it weren’t her, it would be fine?”

The image of her brother with another woman flashed in her mind. She frowned and shook her head. “How should I know? You haven’t introduced anyone to me. Besides, why would you need my opinion on your relationships? Didn’t you tell me not to meddle in your private affairs?”

“Telling you not to interfere was to spare you from worrying about my love life. Right now, I just want to know what’s truly in your heart…” His words trailed off as his phone suddenly rang. He had intended to silence it, but seeing the questioning look in his sister’s eyes, he sighed helplessly, calmed himself, and turned around to answer the call. The house was so quiet that the distinct Taiwanese accent on the other end was unmistakable. Xie Xinqi immediately recognized it as the tall girl from earlier: “Xie Xiuchen, if I liked someone like you, there must be something wrong with my taste! You’re nothing but a scumbag!”

Clearly, he assumed Xie Xinqi hadn’t heard and remained composed. “Is that so? Did you get home safely?”

“Xie Xiuchen, you bastard! I’m trying to have a serious conversation with you—what’s this supposed to mean?!”

Xie Xiuchen still smiled with his crescent-shaped eyes. “If that’s the case, then rest early…”

“Still accusing me of acting? You deserve an Oscar for Best Actor!” Xie Xinqi was already in a foul mood, and hearing this woman dare to speak to her brother like that ignited her temper. She snatched the phone and snapped, “Hey, how exactly is my brother a scumbag? Do you know how many girls who like him could line up from Gongzhou’s southern island to its northern one? And yet you dare to talk to him like that? Do you think you can just waltz into our family? You won’t even pass muster with his little sister!”

Xie Xiuchen froze for a moment. He had almost forgotten what Xie Xinqi was like. Perhaps because he had always indulged her growing up, their personalities had grown increasingly different. But watching her angrily argue with the girl on the phone, he couldn’t help but find her adorable, even when she was mad. He didn’t hear what she said; all he could see were her beautiful, slightly moist eyes, her cheeks flushed like spring peach blossoms, and her small, plump lips, which always made him want to gently kiss them… This was the face he had always loved.

In the end, was the abnormality within him, or was it the family? Was he born destined to fall into an incestuous trap, or had the distorted environment turned him into a sick individual? He no longer wanted to look at her and turned his head away. In the past, no matter what kind of smile he wore, he was lonely—his feelings were lonely, and even this twisted form of affection was solitary. But recently, a spark of hope had been ignited.

That day, he and his date had gone to an art exhibition. There, he saw a painting titled Lovers.

On the other end of the line, the girl seemed to have heard of Xie Xinqi’s reputation and lowered her voice, sounding aggrieved: “Xie Xinqi? After leaving the cinema today, your brother told me he has someone he likes and can’t accept me. How is this my fault?”

“What?” Xie Xinqi tilted her head, thinking she must have misheard.

“We’ve been dating for over two months, and now he says this—isn’t he just playing with me?”

“My brother has always been gentle with women; he wouldn’t reject someone casually. He’s a perfectionist who handles things meticulously. If he said that, it’s definitely because you didn’t measure up. Either you’re not pretty enough, not gentle enough, or your emotional intelligence is lacking. In short, the problem lies with you…”

It was utterly domineering and irrational. Xie Xiuchen turned her body toward him. “Xinqi, stop asking. This is my fault.”

Xie Xinqi looked at him, then at the phone, where the person on the other end was still ranting. For a moment, she didn’t know whose words to heed. But just like when they were kids, he took charge as the older brother, cutting off the call and putting the phone away. She waved her empty hands, realizing she had gotten carried away, but an unexplainable joy surged through her again. “Brother, do you really like her or not?”

“No.”

“Then why did you go on dates with her and then reject her? I remember you used to never turn anyone down.”

His phone vibrated again, the person on the other end persistently calling back, but he ignored it. After a long silence, he said lightly, “Because I wanted to forget someone I liked.”

Her heart clenched inexplicably. She didn’t dare ask, “Why do you want to forget?” and instead feigned ignorance. “If that’s the case, and you don’t like this girl, why didn’t you accept the ones I introduced to you?”

“Let’s continue the previous topic—this is why I don’t want you meddling in my private affairs.”

She wasn’t afraid of his cold demeanor, but she feared facing the truth that was about to be revealed. She continued to bury her head in the sand. “Your matters are my matters—you’re my family, after all.”

“Xie Xinqi, how can you be so theatrical?”

He finally turned to look at her, a hint of annoyance in his eyes. No one moved, but this shift in his gaze somehow closed the distance between them. Outside, the wind rustled the trees, and bamboo leaves dripped with dew, amplifying the unnatural silence indoors. In this living room where they had grown up together, she had once seen him act like a miniature adult, holding her hand; they had cuddled close while watching cartoons, she had completed homework under his guidance, she had proudly shown off his model-student awards to classmates, she had fallen asleep drawing snowscapes by the window only to be carried to bed like a princess, and she had cried here, hugging him tightly, saying, “Brother, I don’t want to go to America—I don’t want to be apart from you.” But none of those moments felt as vivid as this one, where she became acutely aware that her brother was now a charismatic adult man. His breath was so close, his tall figure like a painting, his contours more exquisite than any artwork.

She spoke nonchalantly: “I’ve always been a very theatrical person—that’s how the media portrays me. Since you don’t want me meddling, let’s talk about this another time. I’m going to bed.”

But just as she turned around, his voice rang out again: “At first, I thought it was just unrequited love, so I tried to shift my focus.”

“And then?” Stop talking, go upstairs, this conversation is getting weirder by the second—it really can’t continue.

“Until I saw that painting, and the critique…” Realizing he had said too much, his eyes betrayed obvious panic and hurt. He covered his head with one hand, burying his face in his palm. “I don’t know, Xinqi… Maybe I’m overthinking. How can human emotions be measured by a painting? Such ambiguous things… No, I’m just imagining things. I think I need to see a psychologist…”

Xie Xiuchen was what Su Jianian would call a “normal person.” He wasn’t involved in art and refused to believe in emotional evidence. But he still had intuition—and that intuition terrified Xie Xinqi. Pale-faced, she looked frantically at the dark, damp world outside: “I don’t know what you’re talking about. You’re too tired today—get some rest.” With that, she bolted upstairs, locked herself in her bedroom, and buried her face in the blankets, sobbing uncontrollably.

This was the most heartbroken she had ever cried in her life. The feeling of her heart shattering into pieces was something she had read about in countless books—but now, for the first time, she truly understood it.