The bedroom light was soft.
Chen Shu shifted the bed until there was just enough space between it and the inner wall for a thin mattress, then began making up a bed on the floor.
Ning Qing stood nearby, watching quietly.
Neither of them spoke. Only Chen Shu's shadow swayed across the room.
Once he had spread the sheet, tossed a quilt on top, and taken a pillow from the bed to throw onto it, he turned to Qingqing and said:
"All done. Do you want the bed or the floor?"
"The bed."
"But the floor's great! Look, it's soft, it has a mattress, and all the bedding is new and smells wonderful. It just doesn't have a bed frame. Besides, don't you think being tucked between the bed and the wall, lower down like this, makes it feel really safe?"
"It feels very unsafe."
"Why?"
"Because someone might roll off the bed in the middle of the night."
"How could that happen? There are only two of us in here. Who's going to roll off the bed?"
"..."
"Wait! You don't mean me, do you?" Chen Shu sucked in a sharp breath, making another small contribution to global warming. His eyes widened, and his expression slowly grew pained. "We grew up together, and you don't trust me even this much?"
"Go on."
"..." Chen Shu fell silent for a few seconds, then sighed. "If I'd known I was the one sleeping there, I wouldn't have made it up so nicely. A sleeping mat would've been enough. After all, no mat could be as cold as my heart, or as hard as yours."
"Your lines are getting better."
"That cuts me to the bone."
"Anything else?"
"No... my heart's dead..."
"Then I'm going to wash up."
With that, Ning Qing