"Mr. Xie... did you know Shuangjian before?"
Perhaps it was because Xie Jinghui had spoken that name with too much familiarity and tenderness, or perhaps the hostility of young men simply arose for the strangest reasons.
Yu Sheng straightened slightly and tilted his head toward Shen Shuangjian, a hint of puzzlement in his voice. "Shuangjian?"
"..."
Yu Sheng's question undoubtedly went unanswered by Shen Shuangjian. Seeing this, Xie Jinghui chuckled softly, relaxing his posture a little as he folded his hands.
"We've met a few times."
It was the same tone and the same expression, yet the impression it left on everyone else was entirely different from the one it left on Yu Sheng.
To the others, Xie Jinghui's words seemed like nothing more than an answer. But to Yu Sheng, who had asked the question, those few casual words sounded like a declaration of war tinged with triumph.
Yu Sheng narrowed his eyes. He felt as though he might be overthinking things. For some reason, he found Xie Jinghui's words grating for no cause at all.
He clenched his fists, trying hard to erase the strange hostility from his mind.
The Shen Family and the Xie Family were both among the capital's foremost wealthy families. Since Shen Shuangjian was a member of the Shen Family, it was perfectly normal for him to have met Xie Jinghui at some high-society banquet.
If there really was something off about Xie Jinghui, surely signs of it would have emerged long ago.
Yu Sheng thought that perhaps he really was being a little sensitive.
"It's so late now. Aren't any of you hungry?" Lin Weiluo rubbed her stomach. The fatigue and hunger from a whole day in the car made it impossible for her to sit still.
"It's already so late, but we haven't even had dinner..."
They would be living together for fifteen days, after all. Song Shi understood what Lin Weiluo meant, so he stood up too, helping smooth things over.
"Exactly! Director, you're not so twisted that you'd make us find ingredients and cook for ourselves this late, are you?"
After an eight-hour drive and all that drawn-out waiting, it was already past ten at night. Naturally, the production team would not spring any more tricks on them.
"Given today's special circumstances, the production team has prepared a lavish dinner for everyone. But that's only for today. Starting tomorrow, you'll have to take care of all three meals yourselves. From ingredients to making fires and cooking, you'll have to earn everything through your own labor."
Lin Weiluo and Song Shi supported this with both hands and feet, while Gu Xuanlin obligingly voiced his agreement a couple of times.
As a non-celebrity participant and guide, Li Yi had little desire for camera time or a prominent role. He was only here for a bit of casual fun in the first place, and was happy to stay out of shot. Ideally, no one would pay him much attention.
Of course, it would be even better if that bastard Xie Qingchi stopped bombarding him with eighty messages a second.
The long journey and exhaustion left Shen Shuangjian with neither the energy nor the appetite to face this dinner.
So Shen Shuangjian rose and lowered his head slightly. "Sorry, I'd like to go back to the room and rest first."
He found his suitcase among the luggage scattered about. Under the others' worried or watchful gazes, he took two steps, then suddenly stopped.
"..."
Shen Shuangjian fell silent for two seconds, then lightly pressed his lips together. But before he could ask, Xie Jinghui rose from the sofa.
"I'm heading back to the room too. I'll go with you."
Shen Shuangjian had not known where he was supposed to stay. With Xie Jinghui saying this, he was spared having to ask.
"Let me."
Xie Jinghui walked around the sofa and came naturally to Shen Shuangjian's side. Perhaps because of the precedent set that morning, taking the suitcase from Shen Shuangjian and wheeling it away was clearly much easier this time.
The small villa's four bedrooms were evenly distributed between the first and second floors. Apart from the shared living room, kitchen, and dining area on the first floor, there was also a bedroom at the end of the corridor around the corner.
That room had been assigned exclusively to the show's only woman, Lin Weiluo.
Shen Shuangjian and Xie Jinghui's bedroom was tucked away at the very end of the second-floor corridor. It was the farthest away and the quietest, sheltered from the wind and warm, though it received little sunlight.
"Mr. Xie, sorry for the trouble."
The bulky suitcase would clearly have been rather difficult for Shen Shuangjian to carry upstairs himself.
But Xie Jinghui was tall and lean and had exercised regularly for years. In his hand, the suitcase looked as easy to carry as a briefcase.
The bedroom in the little villa was not large. At the very least, it bore no comparison to the Shen Residence. The room had an en suite bathroom, but putting two beds in the sleeping area would have made it cramped.
And so, a neatly made large bed stood right in the center of the room. The bedding looked to be of excellent quality, made from expensive, warm fabric.
"Would you like me to run a bath for you?"
Xie Jinghui wheeled Shen Shuangjian's suitcase inside and laid it down steadily. Remaining on one knee, he looked up at Shen Shuangjian beside him as he asked.
In truth, Xie Jinghui could have taken care of these little details silently, rather than bringing them up as though seeking credit like this, and Shen Shuangjian might even refuse.
But he had to do it this way.
He might as well admit, despicable as it was, that when he looked down from a lofty vantage point, someone with Shen Shuangjian's temperament was very easy to understand.
He knew Shen Shuangjian's habitual refusals and his slowness to notice. He also knew that Shen Shuangjian was accustomed to all those quiet, unobtrusive acts of care.
More than that, he knew that someone like Shen Shuangjian needed countless tentative approaches and reminders, conversations and time spent together, before he could clearly realize something.
That he, Xie Jinghui, was not a stranger with no connection to him.
"No, thank you."
Just as Xie Jinghui had expected, Shen Shuangjian refused without a moment's hesitation.
He picked up a change of clothes. After the bathroom door closed softly, the sound of running water gradually began a little while later.
With only a wall between them, Xie Jinghui was keenly aware that the person sharing this room with him now was the very person he had quietly thought of countless times in his idle moments.
Because they were so close, he no longer had to rely on his own deductions to guess what Shen Shuangjian was doing at this very moment.
What he was thinking, and how he viewed him.
Those thoughts, constantly breaking through the cracks, had finally surged into wild growth at their second chance encounter.
He had thought that perhaps, after he missed his first chance, some people were simply destined to be returned to the sea of faces.
A fleeting glimpse, a brief instant-nothing more than a stirring of the heart.
How could he, a stranger, meet him again amid that vast sea of people? A beautiful dream was nothing more than a grand illusion in the mortal world.
And so, over that single short night, Xie Jinghui dwelled on it at length three times. When dawn came the next day, he made a rare appearance at an appointment he had put off for a long time.
He sat in the tranquil garden with a book in his hands. Just as he thought of him again for no reason, Shen Shuangjian rode the gentle breeze back into his world of his own accord.
This time, it was neither a red thread he could not grasp or untangle nor a fleeting encounter that led to nothing but idle fantasies. Xie Jinghui knew that the paths of their lives finally had a line along which they could intersect.
That time, Shen Shuangjian said three sentences to him in all.
Watching his retreating figure, Xie Jinghui, in a rare moment of confusion, gave two replies that did not answer what had been asked. He sat there for a long time, until daylight faded and the cold wind rose again.
A rose petal drifting from far away landed on his book. He lowered his head and looked down. At some point, he had already flipped the pages into disarray, leaving only somewhat blurred words on the paper woven with black and white.
True love was painfully brief; a single moment surpassed a lifetime.