CH 212

Although the list of foods to avoid went missing, Yan Suizhi wasn’t truly without scruples. At least in front of Gu Yan, he still put forth a ‘proper’ image of rest and recovery.

After all, the distinguished Lawyer Gu’s face was bitingly cold when taut. 

Quoting the dean, “I’ve already undergone the gene surgery but my hands still get cold so easily. Maybe it’s because I’ve a pet ice sculpture to guard the house. It’s pretty scary if you look at it for too long.”

The ice sculpture cracked a pissed smile, meaning—A load of nonsense. As if you know any fear.

In short, Yan Suizhi’s life of recuperation roughly went like this:

Early in the morning when Gu Yan was around, his cup would always be filled with warm water or milk. 

As soon as Gu Yan’s front foot was out of the door, he would leisurely saunter into the kitchen to brew a pot of coffee, turn on his photon computer, and go through his work emails.

This month, Maze University had been discussing his reinstatement with him. It was mostly there already, just missing some last pages of paperwork and handovers, nothing too tiresome.

Nan Lu Law Firm was aware about his surgery and with Gu Yan watching, no one dared to send cases his way. But this didn’t stop people from bypassing Nan Lu to contact him directly.

There were invitations to conduct lectures at partner schools on other planets, invitations for him to write commentary pieces for legal publications, consult on cases, seek his advice…

And then there was also poetry and downright harassment.

Yan Suizhi, inured to the strange folk, efficiently went through every type of email.

While he did experience the ‘hypersensitive senses’ that Lin Yuan had gone on about, it wasn’t nearly as exaggerated as how the doctor made it out to be. So, after quick deliberation, he decided to follow only half of the medical advice.

He would wear visioncare glasses when going through his emails, adjust the lenses to shield his eyes from harsh light, change the lenses to block out light when resting, and abstain from using his photon computer and smart device for prolonged stretches of time. 

According to Dr Lin’s schedule, from after lunch until about 4 p.m., he had to lie down with a medical eye mask to ensure that his sight was cloaked in darkness and the medicine could work its magic as he rested for upwards of three hours.

But lying like a corpse for three hours was a difficult task to expect of Yan Suizhi. So, in his hands, this piece of medical advice was compacted to an actual execution time of no more than half an hour.

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Recently, Gu Yan had been deliberately curtailing his workload, cutting back on meetings and business trips so that he could return at around three-thirty, clearing work that didn’t require his physical presence from home.

Therefore, Yan Suizhi would watch the time and head to the bedroom ten minutes before that to lie down, wearing his medical eye mask and duping Lawyer Gu.

The esteemed Dean Yan successfully kept up the charade for three days before the ship ended up capsizing into the gutters.

This was because, due to a last-minute change in Gu Yan’s schedule today, he managed to head home before it even hit two in the afternoon. 

The matte black space hovercar drove through Poplar Grove and Lakeside before soundlessly gliding into the garage. Whereas Yan Suizhi was sitting in the study, handling emails while on a call with someone, briefly explaining some work.

By the time he perceived something amiss, Gu Yan had already entered the front door, loosening his tie while heading up the stairs.

It was already too late to slip into the bedroom at this time. The dean calmly threw down a “sorry, I’ve a little family business to take care of” and directly cut the line.

He stuffed the coffee cup on the table into the cupboard and reclined on the long couch. 

He didn’t have the medical eye mask with him. In order to express his sincerity in blocking out light and protecting his eyes, he reached out and snagged a tie from the nearby clothes rack, blindfolding himself just as the door to the study opened.

The tie wasn’t even tied yet. The scene was truly a bit slipshod.

As Yan Suizhi wavered between continuing and abandoning the farce, for some reason, Gu Yan didn’t immediately walk over, standing at the doorway for a while.

The fabric of the tie was too silky. In this inexplicably tense atmosphere, it slid slightly down his eyes. 

At that, Yan Suizhi’s veneer of control finally snapped.

Just as he was about to rip off the tie and sit up, Gu Yan’s footsteps shuffled over to him from the door.

Immediately after, the side of the couch and backrest suddenly dipped down. Warm fingers gently held his chin, and Gu Yan’s kiss pressed down, his body warmth enveloping him.

“You secretly drank coffee,” Gu Yan said. 

“Not true,” Yan Suizhi denied.

“You didn’t wear your eye mask, either.”

“Left it in the bedroom.”

“Why did you use my tie.” Gu Yan’s voice was low and deep, lips fluttering over the faint vein on his neck and then nibbling on his ear. 

Yan Suizhi’s eyes narrowed, and his breathing turned slightly ragged from the kisses. “You were the one who hung it here. Is it against the law to requisition it?”

Right after he spoke, he felt the tie over his eyes being tied tightly.

“Is this a rebellion?” Yan Suizhi couldn’t keep from touching it. The dark colour and patterns of the tie washed out his face and his fingers, setting them in stark contrast.

“No.” Gu Yan’s kiss deepened, and then crowding into his space, he said, “The doctor stipulated that you aren’t to see light before four o’clock…” 

It was only then that Dean Yan finally conceded there was some truth to Lin Yuan’s claim; the ‘hypersensitivity’ wasn’t an exaggeration.

The couch, shirt, tie… anything that touched skin was positively wrecked.

Later, he rested his forehead against Gu Yan, unable to get a word out, the expanse of his neck, shoulders, and back suffused with a flush.

That was when Gu Yan pulled down the tie bearing marks of dampness, pressing a kiss to the mole at the tail of his eye. 

When the dean put on his clothes again to fetch a glass of water, it was already long past four, and the sky was daubed with black.

He leaned against the door frame of the study, staring at the ties strewn across the couch from a good distance away. After a few seconds of silence, he turned his head and said to Gu Yan, “Your ability to squander a family fortune is no worse than mine. Such expensive fabric and you actually laid two to waste in this short span of time.”

Correct. Two.

Besides the one that Yan Suizhi snagged as a makeshift eye mask, there was also the one that Gu Yan loosened when he came home. 

Both were ties that Gu Yan often used. Anyway… they couldn’t be worn out of the house in the future.

Unable to refute him, Lawyer Gu could only accept the black mark.

Then, the dean pointed at various other spots. “There’s also the desk and the couch. The cleaning lady—”

Before he could finish his words, Lawyer Gu coughed into his hand. “We’ll clean it ourselves.” 

Getting the housekeeping for this… would be too shameless.

The dean opened his mouth again. “Also—”

“There’s nothing else.” His handsome face paralysed, Lawyer Gu directly ‘invited’ the other back to the bedroom, stopping him from deliberately pointing fingers at the mess.

The dean was tickled. “I only wanted to ask if there are other places that we need to clean up? That band of people will be running wild over here in a few days. If they see anything… well, I don’t mind, but isn’t our Student Gu generally quite thin-skinned?” 

The ‘band of people’ he mentioned were his students with Laura at their head. Only, it was a bit more special this time, for it included Ke Jin who had just recovered from a long bout of illness and Joe who wasn’t from the law school.

Ever since Yan Suizhi was restored to his former identity, they had been whipping up plans to make up for the gathering that they missed last winter.

There was too much going on before; just the Manson Group case had eaten up a majority of their time. After that, there was Yan Suizhi’s surgery, so they could only postpone it again, setting it for Saturday.