SM Chapter 10

Chapter 10: Let’s Do It When We Say We Will

His voice was as indifferent as always, with little inflection, but that calm statement made it feel unquestionable.

Understated, yet forceful.

The rest of Qiu Ying’s words were stuck in her throat.

Wei Wang, Hao Hao, and Ran Cai exchanged glances, shrugged, and had a “just as expected” kind of calmness, without a hint of surprise. They were the only ones here who were high school classmates with them, and even knew these two since middle school.

They had seen Tan Zhi Xu climb over the wall to buy Zhu Shihao milk tea, seen Tan Zhi Xu write his own self-criticism after getting caught and still have to help Zhu Shihao write one, seen Tan Zhi Xu fight because of Zhu Shihao…

They had seen too much. Don’t look at Tan Zhi Xu always having a cold and aloof look, as if he didn’t care about anyone. It’s no exaggeration to say that as long as Zhu Shihao’s eyes turned red, Tan Zhi Xu could immediately become violent.

So, Zhu Shihao is a fire extinguisher, specializing in treating the unruly and unrestrained Tan Zhi Xu. But she is also the most untouchable accelerant, able to push Tan Zhi Xu’s terror to the extreme in a second.

Hearing such words directly from the person involved for the first time, Li Chennan couldn’t hide his surprise as he glanced at Zhu Shihao, having a deeper understanding of her.

He randomly put on a smile, breaking the frozen atmosphere, and joked, “Our good Jie is indifferent to fame and fortune and doesn’t lack a house, so Brother Xu has to change to an attractive gift.”

Remembering the sofa that was repeatedly rejected.

Tan Zhi Xu glanced at her and said coolly, “That’s right, you can’t even stuff a sofa in there.”

Hearing his hidden unhappiness, Zhu Shihao patted his arm.

The siblings were too embarrassed to stay any longer and quickly found an excuse to leave. Having already understood the two of them, except for Li Chennan who said a few polite words, no one else spoke, let alone tried to keep them.

Ran Cai even rolled her eyes at their leaving backs. As if anyone didn’t know what they were planning, she didn’t believe that Zhang Zi Ang was completely innocent in this matter.

The group tacitly distanced themselves from Zhang Zi Ang.

Suddenly, a cheer came, followed by clear, rhythmic music, a DJ version of a film and television OST.

Wei Wang recalled something: “Yang Xu seems to have said he was coming back.”

Ran Cai exclaimed, “Ah? Didn’t he have more arrangements later? Has the show finished filming?”

Wei Wang shrugged, pursed his lips, and his expression was full of disdain: “I don’t know, I showed off some delicious food in my Moments a few days ago, and he sent me half an hour of complaints, going over and over the same few sentences. Shouldn’t he be very busy?”

Ran Cai could understand the pain of dieting, but thinking about his remuneration, she felt she wasn’t worthy of empathizing with him, and he wasn’t worthy of her pity.

“Then I have to quickly tell him to help me get an autographed photo.”

Autographed photo?

Thinking of something, Zhu Shihao’s eyes lit up, her voice with a hint of eagerness: “Whose is it? Xu Yan’s?”

Ran Cai’s eyes were also shining, grabbing her hand and nodding excitedly: “That’s right, that’s right. Didn’t he say before that Xu Yan went to their crew for a cameo?”

Zhu Shihao righteously corrected her: “What cameo or not, be professional, that’s called a special performance.”

The Tan Zhi Xu next to her turned his head to look at her, his eyes seemingly calm as water, but a closer look revealed the undercurrents inside. He picked up his wine glass, looked up, and drank a few mouthfuls, emptying it in one go.

Her voice was in his ear.

“Why are you drinking so fast?”

Glancing at her, Tan Zhi Xu placed the empty glass on the table, the crisp sound not very noticeable in such an environment.

“Quenching fire.”

It wasn’t exactly anger, nor was it exactly jealousy, but he just needed this glass of wine to quench it.

Zhu Shihao tilted her head: “Huh?”

Tomorrow was Monday, and everyone had to go to work, so the gathering didn’t last too long, and they dispersed around eleven o’clock.

Both of them had drunk alcohol, so naturally they couldn’t drive. They called a designated driver and went back to her place. Ruili, unlike Shenyi, didn’t have a place for Tan Zhi Xu’s car to park, so it could only be parked in an empty space on the side of the road.

After getting out of the car and walking in the night, the wind blew against their faces. It was December, and the weather was getting colder day by day.

He asked: “Are you cold?”

Zhu Shihao looked at him, half her face covered in a scarf, but it didn’t stop her from warning with her eyes: “Not cold, you can’t take off your coat, you’ll catch a cold.”

Tan Zhi Xu saw the convenience store that was still open ahead, and the corners of his lips curled up: “Don’t worry, I can’t catch a cold, I haven’t witnessed your tough disappearance yet.”

Zhu Shihao: “…”

She watched him enter the convenience store, surveying the shelves next to the cashier to make a selection. She rubbed her face, silently moving two steps into the cashier’s blind spot.

Holding the small square box in his hand, Tan Zhi Xu raised an eyebrow and said, “Only one box left, I’ll bring some next time to put here.”

Was this something that should be blatantly held up for all to see?

Zhu Shihao quickly pushed down his raised arm, hugged it, and walked towards the residential area gate: “Young master, can you be a little more low-key and subtle?”

Letting her lead the way, even if she quickened her pace, he simply followed leisurely.

He chuckled, disagreeing with her statement: “We’ve already bought this thing, do we still need to be low-key and subtle? Besides letting me be on you, what use is it for?”

Zhu Shihao’s ears and face were burning, without thinking, she retorted: “You can blow up balloons.”

He looked at her speechlessly, the dark, fluffy back of her head and the small part of her side face exposed under the scarf, long, curved, and dense eyelashes fluttering like butterflies about to take flight.

He suddenly remembered when she was eight years old, she was coaxed by Sister Yi into cutting her eyelashes, and finally, with red eyes that only had short eyelash stubble, she came to him crying. While crying, she said she had become ugly.

Tan Zhi Xu sat with her on the sofa, hugging her, patting her to comfort her, and for the first time seriously got angry with Zhu Suiyi. Seeing her younger sister crying so miserably, she also felt guilty and comforted her together.

Just when Zhu Suiyi was about to cut off her own eyelashes to compensate her, Zhu Yingqing and Liu Ruoyin came back. After learning what happened, they were extremely angry. Twelve-year-old Zhu Suiyi finally got slapped on the palm for the first time in many years, faced the wall for two hours, sincerely apologized to her younger sister, and compensated her with a year’s worth of lucky money from her parents.

After a long silence without hearing his voice, Zhu Shihao turned around to see him spacing out and asked curiously, “What are you thinking about?”

He snapped back to reality, meeting her eyes as moving as autumn water.

“I was thinking if Sister Yi cut her eyelashes, would they grow like that.”

That incident left too deep an impression. She rarely cried like that since she was a child. Tan Zhi Xu could immediately recall the memory as soon as it was mentioned.

Still feeling a little angry when thinking about it, Zhu Shihao glared at him fiercely: “Nonsense, my eyelashes were originally like this. It took a long time for them to grow back after she cut them.”

Thinking she was being fierce enough, but actually, it was very cute.

Tan Zhi Xu didn’t let her lead the way anymore. He shook off the arm she was holding, grabbed her hand in return, put it in his own pocket, and took a step forward to walk side by side with her.

“Yes, Sister Yi was too much, tricking the little kid into crying for so long.”

His lazy voice sounded somewhat perfunctory, as if he was casually comforting a wronged child.

Zhu Shihao suddenly remembered Tan Zhi Xu sitting next to her at the time, clearly still a short little kid, but he could hug her and pat her back, telling her “don’t cry,” “Shihao is still very pretty.”

The two families were originally colleagues, living in school district housing in the same community, and were even neighbors. They were together from the very beginning. Even if those unforgettable memories were long lost, they were clear since they knew things —

Tan Zhi Xu and Zhu Shihao have always been together.

In this night, in the room filled with warmth, they were made even more passionate by the temperature on each other’s bodies.

Tan Zhi Xu leaned over and stared at her intently, watching her gradually fill with the colors of spring, watching her turn pink, watching her eyes glisten with water, watching the snow mountain sway, shaking out layers of creamy white waves.

Zhu Shihao’s eyes were a little hazy, accompanied by fragmented and suppressed moans: “Zhi Xu, how come it seems like I have you in every memory?”

He just kept getting closer to her, a large palm grabbing the dazzling waves.

“Otherwise? You’re also clinging to my memories.”

Tan Zhi Xu held her lips, and their lips were still rubbing together as he spoke: “Don’t hold back, Shihao, I want to hear your voice.”

Before doing it, he still remembered to let her let him return to his own place, but after he cleaned up, both of them lay on the bed and hugged her, Zhu Shihao, who was already drowsy in his arms, was so at ease that she threw everything aside.

It’s Monday tomorrow, no one in her family can come to her for a surprise attack, right?

Thinking like this, she naturally let him stay overnight, and even relaxed and rubbed against him in his arms.

Lying on this big bed for the first time, Tan Zhi Xu tucked her hair that had fallen onto the pillow behind her, so she wouldn’t pull it painfully, then gently rubbed the back of her head, lowering his voice, “Sleep.”

Zhu Shihao sleepily “mm”ed, and instantly fell into a deep sleep.

After being woken up by the annoying alarm clock, it was already bright outside the window. The person next to her was already gone.

Not finding her phone on the side of the pillow, Zhu Shihao had no choice but to open her eyes, turn over to turn on the light, reached for her phone, turned off the alarm, wondering in her heart where the alarm came from.

The notification bar showed three WeChat messages, and she tapped to open them.

Zhi Xu: [Get up when the alarm rings.]

Zhi Xu: [Ordered food for you, it’s in the kitchen.]

Zhi Xu: [You don’t have to go to work, but you must get up and eat.]

Zhu Shihao pouted, feeling that this person always had this tone, but the corners of her mouth didn’t drop. She sent a message back, stretched, estimating that he was busy and couldn’t reply to her, and prepared to get up.

Passing the trash can on the way to the bathroom, she subconsciously glanced at it and saw the packaging pieces and knotted condom hidden under the crumpled paper. Her face heated up, and she bowed her head and quickened her steps.

The room was obviously cleaned up, of course, not mentioning the bed.

Both were bosses, although her small stall couldn’t compare with Tan Zhi Xu’s, and neither could her diligence, but she still had to go to work. With the year-end platform promotions and the store’s new arrivals, she was really busy lately.

But there was no rush right now. After eating, she changed the sheets and such. Zhu Shihao looked at the dried, spreading stains on the removed sheets, and for a moment didn’t know whether she should throw them into the washing machine.

Hesitating for at least two whole minutes, she somewhat roughly stuffed them in.

She couldn’t help but think of Tan Zhi Xu’s appearance changing the bedsheets, pillowcases, and washing them. What kind of expression would he have? Or would he be expressionless and nonchalant?

She sent Sasha a message saying that she would go to the studio for lunch and that she would treat everyone to lunch today, receiving a string of rainbow farts from Sasha in response.

Feeling a little bored while waiting, and not knowing what to do.

Sitting on the sofa and spacing out for a while, she heard her phone ring. The sound seemed a little far away, so she had no choice but to follow the sound and look everywhere.

Just as the ringtone was about to stop, she finally found it.

Seeing the caller ID, her eyes curved up.

“Hello, Zhi Xu.”