CH 31

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Translator: hoenimochi, Rin    Editor: Slumber

It had been two months since the last time they held hands. Lu Yong couldn’t forget that time, and he couldn’t sleep for several nights. He thought about it a lot and couldn’t help but doubt himself. Is that considered holding hands? That shouldn’t count, right? My hand was just pulled, and it was only for a few seconds.

It was so short that it was over before it started.

But this time it was real hand-holding.

——His hand finally held Shen Wenqiu’s, and it was Shen Wenqiu who took the initiative to hold his hand.

Even though Lu Yong clearly knew that Shen Wenqiu’s words didn’t have any ambiguous meaning, the superiority and joy still swelled rapidly in his chest, and his heart beat so fast that it was about to explode.

This was a good reason to hold hands openly, and no one could criticise him. Lu Yong hesitated for a while, as if he was secretly and cautiously trying to hold Shen Wenqiu’s hand back, and said as if covering something up, “Follow closely, follow me closely.”

Even his fingertips were trembling, for fear that Shen Wenqiu would find out his despicable intentions and his hand would be swayed away.

The nearby crowd suddenly swarmed over.

They were like a small boat on a wild wave, being shaken violently. Shen Wenqiu clenched his hand tightly and leaned to his side with difficulty.

Then the waves fell, but they held each other’s hands firmly.

The flow of people was too crowded, as it should be.

Lu Yong came up with a lot of jokes about holding the wrong person’s hand, but he never wanted to hold the wrong person’s hand. Sometimes when it was so crowded that he accidentally loosened his hand, he would have to turn his head to re-confirm and hold his Xiao Baa firmly once again. He was also afraid that he would pull too tightly and dare not to walk too fast.

This was the first time that Lu Yong had travelled independently, and the first time he had taken a train to a distant city.

After hesitating for several days, he made a plan and thought of all kinds of excuses. Collecting the travel expenses by himself, he put it forward with his father uneasily. Unexpectedly, his father agreed very readily, “Well, you are a boy and you are already sixteen years old. You can go out and have a little experience. When Dad was thirteen, I dragged my car from the countryside to sell melons in the city.”

He was worried about him at all. 

But when he knew that he was going to take Shen Wenqiu with him, his father suddenly changed his words, “What? You didn’t say that you were going with Xiao Baa! Did Uncle Shen agree?”

Lu Yong nodded vigorously. “Uncle Shen agreed.”

His dad’s expression became solemn. He warned, “Then you have to be more careful. People trust you so much that they’d give you their precious son… You are going to work, but Xiao Baa is just going sightseeing. You protect him and let him do what he wants.”

After saying that, he asked him again how much money he brought, and he felt that it was not enough. So he gave him a thousand yuan.

Dad said solemnly, “You have to bring him back safely, you understand?”

His dad didn’t have to explain that—he intended to do the same.

So, when Lu Yong came to such a dangerous place, the alarm bell in his heart never stopped ringing.

He was fine on his own, but he was afraid that Shen Wenqiu, a silly and sweet young master, would be abducted by bad people if he was not careful. For example, if he was dragged into some black coal kiln in the mountains, what should he do? At that moment, he was frightened and nervous. He clenched his teeth and concentrated, so the touch of holding hands could be more clearly felt.

He was afraid of using too much force last time, but this time he didn’t dare to relax in the slightest.

They were all boys’ hands, but Shen Wenqiu’s skin was extremely smooth, completely different from the rough hands that were used to doing rough work.

Shen Wenqiu followed behind and suddenly asked, “Dayong, you’re not sick right?”

Lu Yong said, “No, no, what’s the matter? Why are you asking this suddenly?”

Shen Wenqiu said worriedly, “Your ears and neck are so red. I wonder if you have a cold and a fever.”

“No.” Lu Yong wanted to say that it was because it was too hot, but he couldn’t tell a decent lie after a long time. Shen Wenqiu joked last time that his lying was too fake, and he was seen through at a glance. In that case, it would be better to be as silent as a stone directly.

It took a long time just to find the station platform.

The waiting seats were all occupied, so they stood together for two hours. Their legs were numb, and finally, their awaited green-skinned train came.

The crowded lines flowed in like canned sardines, and the ticket inspector held a small pair of scissors while cutting the train ticket and shouted hoarsely, “Check your tickets before entering the platform! Check your tickets first before entering the platform!!!”

The road to the platform felt extremely long and was a great test of patience.

Shen Wenqiu didn’t bring a suitcase—he only carried an Adidas mountaineering bag. Lu Yong said that they would only go for a week or two and would be back before the new year. He didn’t think there was much to bring.

Lu Yong was the same. He carried a large crossbody bag on his shoulders, which couldn’t easily fall off.

Lu Yong was pulling Shen Wenqiu up behind him, and Shen Wenqiu suddenly shook his hand away.

This stunned Lu Yong for a while, and when he turned around, he saw Shen Wenqiu saying to an old grandma carrying bags of small and big, “Grandma, let me help you carry them together.”

Lu Yong also took two steps back. “I’ll do it.”

Although he only had one hand, Shen Wenqiu’s two hands together were not as strong as his one hand.

When he got to the cabin, he could help people lift the suitcase directly onto the high luggage rack with one hand.

The two of them didn’t have much luggage, so they flipped their bags to the front and sat with them in their arms.

The old train had a slow speed, and the cleanliness of the environment was even worse, especially in the sitting cabin. As soon as they sat down, an uncle with a nylon polybag asked if they could share a corner for him to sit for a while, saying that he didn’t buy a ticket before and couldn’t buy it, so he bought the wrong ticket. He was very tired after standing for a long time. Of course, the request was aimed at Shen Wenqiu.

The tall black man next to him looked very difficult to mess with.

Shen Wenqiu was thin-skinned, and seeing the pitiful appearance of others, he gave up half his seat.

Before Lu Yong had time to speak, the uncle sat down next to Shen Wenqiu quickly with a “whoosh”, and his big body suddenly slammed Shen Wenqiu towards the inside.

Where had Shen Wenqiu experienced this kind of incident? Seeing that at least half of his seat was occupied, he was dumbfounded. This was completely different from the small corner that he had promised, and he almost slammed him into Lu Yong’s arms.

Lu Yong was at a loss—his face flushed.

He felt that he was so despicable. Just now he was still angry that Shen Wenqiu was foolish enough to be deceived and bullied. He wanted to stand up and scare the uncle so he would give up his seat. Now he had changed his mind, and he thought the situation was very good.

The uncle stunk. Shen Wenqiu knew intellectually that he should not discriminate against others, but it was really unacceptable physiologically, so he kept leaning towards Lu Yong’s side.

Lu Yong was extremely tormented as if a lovely little lamb was nestled in his arms and his fluffy little head simply rubbed against him. It made him want to reach out and touch it, but he couldn’t. He tried his best to hold it back.

Shen Wenqiu whispered in his ear, “He smells so bad, what should I do, Dayong?”

Even Shen Wenqiu’s arrogant and coquettish dislike of people made him feel that he was overly cute. Lu Yong suddenly started sweating even more. He thought: I seem to be sweating too much as well, will I stink so much that it will affect Xiao Baa?

Sure enough, Shen Wenqiu noticed something was wrong, and even got close to his neck. The tip of his nose seemed to touch Lu Yong’s Adam’s apple as he said, “…You seem to smell a little too.”

Lu Yong froze all over with cold sweat, and he was extremely ashamed, “I’m sorry.”

Shen Wenqiu said, “It’s alright, I’m sweating too, and I’ve got the train stench on me. I’m going to take a shower immediately when we get to the hotel, ugh.”

After struggling for a while, Lu Yong decided to be a gentleman and said, “Change your seat and sit inside. It must be so uncomfortable for you to be squeezed in the middle.”

Shen Wenqiu was not going to act bravado, he had never suffered such a loss in his life. He nodded sullenly, changed seats with Lu Yong, and sat in the inner seat by the window.

When Lu Yong changed, the uncle looked at him, glanced at him, looked out silently, looked again, moved out a little more, and finally stood up and walked away without saying a word.

Lu Yong thought to himself that the other party probably didn’t think he and Shen Wenqiu didn’t know each other at first. Lu Yong pondered bitterly about the times he would be regarded as a worker working in some factory.

As soon as he lowered his head, he saw the hand on his lap and Shen Wenqiu’s hand holding the bag. There was a huge difference in skin colour, one was dark and the other was fair.

He looked at Shen Wenqiu’s right hand a few more times and thought that he was still afraid that his fingers would be too rough when they held hands. It seemed that they would rubbed Shen Wenqiu’s hand red, but it seemed like it didn’t affect him at all.

Shen Wenqiu asked, “What are you looking at?”

Lu Yong retracted his gaze, blushed, and subconsciously said the truth, “Your hand.”

After speaking, Lu Yong realized his impulsiveness, and the heat on his face heated up sharply.

Their eyes met, and Lu Yong felt that Shen Wenqiu seemed to be blushing too. After only a few seconds of contact, they looked away from each other and felt very uncomfortable.

Shen Wenqiu said: “I’m hungry, are you hungry?”

Lu Yong stammered: “H-hungry…”

Shen Wenqiu smiled: “Are you reciting ancient poems? Would you like to continue craning your neck and singing your song to the sky?” 1

Lu Yong’s face turned even redder. Black and red, his honesty and shyness was his true portrayal.

Shen Wenqiu opened his bag, took out two buckets of instant noodles, and said, “Look at the bags, I’ll go cook the instant noodles.”

Lu Yong said immediately, “I’ll go.”

Shen Wenqiu bluntly rejected him, “No matter how strong your hand is, you only have one hand. How can you take two cups at the same time? If you have to make two trips, why don’t I go? You see, it’s still useful to bring me with you, right?”

Lu Yong said dazedly, “Thank you, Xiao Baa. Fortunately, I brought you with me.” He didn’t even think about it at the time. If he was alone, one hand would be enough for a meal.

After Shen Wenqiu was praised, he happily ran to the queue to pick up the hot water.

…

The hot water installations on trains were also more advanced than before, with safety settings to prevent scalding.

The second-class cabins were also much cleaner than before.

Lu Yong said, “Just buy a meal on the train.”

Shen Wenqiu replied, “It’s expensive and unpalatable. I don’t want it. I just want to eat instant noodles on the train.”

So Lu Yong got up and said, “Then I’ll go do it, you sit.”

Shen Wenqiu didn’t let Lu Yong insist. It was already outrageous enough to ask Lu Yong, the boss of a company with a market value of several hundred million, to accompany him on the train. Even if the train had sped up since the previous year, the time to get to the nearest city railway station in town Y was only cut in half.

Lu Yong could completely take the plane and buy first class.

But Shen Wenqiu was blacklisted by the state because of his debts, and a high consumption was restricted. High-consumption travel methods such as high-speed rails and planes were not allowed, so he couldn’t buy the tickets and could only buy a second class ticket.

Shen Wenqiu proposed that they could take different means of transportation to meet each other at the destination, but Lu Yong insisted on being together. Shen Wenqiu said again that he would buy a first-class soft sleeper ticket for Lu Yong, but Lu Yong didn’t agree and wanted to buy a double seat with him.

So now it was like this-

Shen Wenqiu sat by the window, quietly reading a book. Lu Yong left for a few minutes, holding a cup of instant noodles in each hand. They ate just enough for lunch.

They set off at nine in the morning and arrived at the train station just after five in the afternoon.

Then they took a special bus to Town Y. It took two hours on the way. They went to the hotel to check in and drop off their luggage.

Shen Wenqiu followed Lu Yong, and Lu Yong took out his ID card, “Just register mine.”

According to Shen Wenqiu’s current credit, he couldn’t stay in a more expensive hotel. He could only stay in a hotel with minimum consumption, but the management of check-in was not too strict at present, and two people could stay in with one person’s ID card.

So it was not impossible for him to follow Lu Yong like a shadow.

The front desk clerk handled the business skillfully and opened a room for them, “Seventh floor, deluxe double room with a king-sized bed.”

Lu Yong, “Thank you.”

Lu Yong took the room card and the two went upstairs together.

Shen Wenqiu still felt a little guilty in his heart. In fact, the star rating of this hotel was not high. It only had three stars. After all, Town Y was a small place. Because of serious environmental pollution and bad tourism, there were no good hotels. After all, he was someone who was restricted from spending too much. Shen Wenqiu and Lu Yong walked to the door of the hotel room and suddenly said, “I don’t feel very good. I should find another small hotel to stay in.”

Lu Yong says “Hungry” and he stammered, which is “e, e” in Chinese, and this is the same as beginning of the poem “Ode to the Goose” which starts with “e, e” which means swan, and the next line is “qu xiang xiang tian ge” which means “crane your neck and sing your song to the sky”