Fight the Landlord, Fall in Love

Chapter 19 - Holding You In My Hands

In the afternoon, Tang Kai went to the salon for a haircut. There were so many people that he hadn’t finished by the time Sun Zinan got off work. After he called him, Sun Zinan said, “Send me your location on WeChat, I’ll come find you.” He finally finished around six o’clock. When he walked out of the shop, he immediately saw the SUV parked in front of the entrance.

Sun Zinan seemed to like Bentleys very much and had collected many models. The model he drove out this time was the Tianyue one. He also usually drove a silver European model and the other black Mushang flagship model that was often used by the company for the purpose of good first-impressions.

Tang Kai opened the car door and sat shotgun. Like a peacock showing off his gorgeous tail, he stared burningly at Sun Zinan. “You’ve worked hard.”

His hair had been cut short, and he looked younger and more alert. The well-tailored white shirt he wore brought along a few hints of the spring of youth. Good-looking was truly good-looking, but Sun Zinan noticed that his expression was one of ‘quick praise me for being handsome’ and suddenly found it very funny.

It was difficult to imagine that just a few months ago, this man had mocked him with the ‘cornstalks and kelp’ speech. He had said he could not get along with Virgos—who knew that in the blink of an eye, he would suddenly feel pity for a Virgo. If he had known this would happen, he would have recorded that phrase and set it as the car music to play for him at this moment.

“Handsome.” He smiled and pinched Tang Kai’s face, closing his eyes and bragging without any principle, “Our Tang Tang was born a beauty. He’ll look good even if he shaves all his hair off.”

Highly educated individuals feared neither the heavens nor hell, but they did fear the two words ‘shaved head.’ Although Tang Kai didn’t suffer from this condition, it still made his heart sour and he quickly covered Sun Zinan’s mouth with his hand. “Pei, if your mouth is covered, I won’t be bald!”

Sun Zinan didn’t give him any face and cackled in laughter against his hand.

Tang Kai put his hand down resentfully and turned his neck a bit uncomfortably. Sun Zinan noticed and asked, “What’s wrong? Strands of hair in your collar?”

Tang Kai, “En.”

After opening the shirt collar, he examined the inside of the shirt under the faint light of the sky. He finally picked out a few strands of hair that had been left behind by the haircut. “Is it okay now...hm?”

Tang Kai took advantage of this convenient posture and quickly pecked at the side of his face.

Sun Zinan turned around to look at him but before he could show any reaction, Tang Kai moved closer and kissed him again, reaching his hands out to secure his waist.

Sun Zinan decided he might as well quietly follow his actions.

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Tang Kai’s breath was warm and light, his feathery light kisses landing at the side of his face, under his eyes, the tip of his nose, the corner of his mouth...there was no pattern to them, completely dependent on whatever his heart wished. Like a passionate love but without the lust; a pure intimacy that was like the coquettishness of someone in a good mood.

But Sun Zinan could feel what he was trying to convey—I really like you, I want to be close to you.

It might’ve been a conscious confession or it might’ve been an act of intimacy with no further meaning, but whatever it was, it made his heart as soft as a marshmallow.

“Okay, that’s enough...are you trying to wash my face?” A moment later, Sun Zinan finally struggled to push Tang Kai away. “Put on your seatbelt, if we don’t leave the police will stick a parking ticket on the car soon.”

Tang Kai’s face was still buried in his neck, reluctant to part due to not having finished expressing all his views. “Let him stick, he can stick however many he wants.”

Sun Zinan wasn’t afraid of parking tickets, but he was afraid that something uncivilized might happen if they got too intimate. He saw that Tang Kai was still too lazy to move and could only reach his hand out and pull the seatbelt over to buckle him in. “If we really got fined I’ll have to detract it from your food costs. One ticket is two hundred bucks, you won’t be able to eat for a day.”

Tang Kai protested, “Why can’t I just pay out of my own pocket?”

Sun Zinan replied coolly, “You eat and drink my stuff every day, I’ve never seen you pay out of pocket.”

Tang Kai immediately caught onto this and said, “Welcome to loan collection, I strongly request I pay with my body.”

Sun Zinan, “...Get out!”

The SUV slowly pulled out of the side of the road and entered the busy, never-resting traffic rush.

Shortly after they drove off, a white Mercedes that had been parked on the other side of the road suddenly started and quietly followed the car that had just left.

When they entered the neighborhood, Tang Kai glanced at his rear mirror by chance and noticed a white car behind the gate that had been denied entry. He didn’t see the license plate clearly but he felt a sense of familiarity, as if he had seen it somewhere before.

Just as he turned his head around to take a closer look at the car, Sun Zinan turned the steering wheel around a right turn. The car drove into the depths of the neighborhood and Tang Kai’s line of sight was completely obscured by the building complexes.

“Hm?” Sun Zinan asked, “Did you see something?”

Tang Kai turned back around, silently keeping his doubts to himself, and shook his head. “I didn’t.”

Sun Zinan’s birthday happened to be the day before Tang Kai started school, on a weekend. Tang Kai purposely moved back to his own apartment two days beforehand, mulling over his plans for days behind Sun Zinan’s back. After working hard from dawn to late into the night, with who knew how many ingredients ruined, he finally produced two barely-acceptable steaks.

Cake, red wine, fresh flowers, gifts...everything was ready except one Sun Zinan.

Sun Zinan, who usually didn’t care too much about anything, actually paid a lot of attention to Tang Kai. Tang Kai had thought his little actions were well-hidden and had completely escaped Sun Zinan’s eyes, but just based on the date he asked to meet up on, it was easy to guess he was preparing a birthday gift for him.

But a guess was merely a guess. This feeling of anticipation was still fresh and exciting; after all, aside from banks and retailers, no one else took this day so seriously.

Thus, Sun Zinan was extremely cooperative that day and uncharacteristically easily agreed to Tang Kai’s request to come to his apartment and cook lunch for him. He drove to the apartment complex next to Tianhai University.

The entire neighborhood had been built in the ’90s and was older. The outside walls were stained with peeling paint and the window sills were contrasted beautifully by the shadows cast by ivy. Green beans and little peppers dried on the downstairs porch while the elderly chatted leisurely by the vegetable baskets. It was peaceful and quiet, like any other old neighborhood.

Only when one walked closer would one hear the topics they discussed—astronomy, geography, mathematics, water conservancy, aeronautics, politics...

Sun Zinan had done his undergraduate studies abroad at a decent university; he had never felt like his studies were lacking. But ever since the last time he had come to Tang Kai’s apartment and coincidentally met two grandmothers discussing silicon-molded pressure sensors while picking vegetables, Sun Zinan purposely chose a side path to enter the neighborhood in fear that some elderly lady might call him over to answer questions.

Tang Kai had only come back from abroad a few years ago and had not settled down yet, so he rented a place near school for convenience. Although Sun Zinan felt like a thief every time he came over, he actually really liked the atmosphere. It wasn’t a problem for the building to be a bit older; the environment was at least full of life.

Tang Kai’s apartment was on the east side of the fifth floor of the second unit. Sun Zinan knocked on the heavy iron door and heard the hurried, quick footsteps on the other side. “Coming!”

The door burst open along with the scent of dew and rose petals.

Sun Zinan raised his brows and smiled as he looked at him.

Tang Kai moved aside to let him in and set a pair of slippers down for him. “Come in.”

Right after Sun Zinan changed his shoes, he was pushed into the living room by Tang Kai. On the dining table was a large vase of scattered red rose petals, like a glass of red wine. The cake was placed on a small platform. When he looked through the transparent cover, he saw a detailed little sugar figurine wearing a suit, looking very refined. It held a piece of candy in its hand and was surrounded by candied fruit and frosting flowers of all sizes. The design was very sweet to the eyes.

Tang Kai pointed at the cake and said, “This person is you, this piece of candy is me.”

Sun Zinan nodded. “This action...putting you in my hand, burning incense with piety, right? Sounds pretty good.”

Tang Kai, “...You really know how to recognize the main point.”

“Happy birthday, darling.” He hugged Sun Zinan from behind, pressing against his face and solemnly promising, “From now on, I’ll spend every birthday with you. I hope every day of your life will be as sweet as today.”

The little figurine on the cake was surrounded by candied flowers and fruits. Its eyes were soft and lips slightly raised, just like the expression on its real-life counterpart’s face.

Even though he had foreseen it, when he actually saw Tang Kai’s earnestness, Sun Zinan was moved to the point of wanting to support him for the rest of his life. “Thank you. I really like it.”

“Like who?” Tang Kai asked with a smile.

“I like you.”

This affectionate atmosphere lasted until the two of them sat down in front of the table. After Sun Zinan tasted his first bite of the steak, he saw the look in Tang Kai’s eyes, longing for compliments. After a little bit of pondering, he gave unexpectedly high praise. “It’s a pleasant surprise.”

Tang Kai, “Really?”

Sun Zinan, “Why would I lie to you? Although you can’t catch up to me even if you practiced for another eight hundred years, it’s a lot better than when I first saw you cook. Of course I’m surprised.”

To tell the truth, the steak was a little hard, the side dishes were too mushy, and the sauce was bitter with a burnt taste. If he were at a restaurant, Sun Zinan wouldn’t have even swallowed his first bite.

But for a devilish cook like Tang Kai to produce a dish of this quality was really a pleasant surprise—at least, it was a surprise for Sun Zinan.

Forget about a steak of this level, if Tang Kai had presented him a nuclear reactor on a plate, he would have been just as happy.

After all, steak was easy to obtain in this world but earnest feelings were not.

After lunch, Tang Kai went to wash the dishes. The apartment he rented was quite big but the kitchen was extremely small. It was too crowded for the two of them to stand together and there was no space for a dishwasher. Plus, he usually never cooked at home, so all the dishes were hand-washed. Sun Zinan didn’t want to obediently sit at the dining table and insisted on watching him wash the dishes.

Tang Kai rarely saw him so clingy and laughed with his hands covered in foam. “What’s so interesting about washing dishes? I didn’t clean the kitchen, don’t come in, okay?”

Under the rushing water, Sun Zinan noticed several red spots on the wrists that had been revealed from pushing his sleeves up. They were spots from being scalded with splashes of hot oil.

Who knew how long this dummy had been secretly practicing behind his back. The two hands that were so familiar with experiment instruments had suffered a lot from the unfamiliar hot oil and hot pans.

After Tang Kai finished cleaning everything up, wiped his hands clean, and came out of the kitchen, Sun Zinan said, “Give me your hands, let me see.”

“En?” Tang Kai lowered his head to look, and realized that the scars on his hands had been discovered and immediately said, “It’s nothing. I was splashed by oil a few times, they’re all small wounds.”

Sun Zinan didn’t say anything as he reached out and grabbed his wrist, pulling a hand before his eyes.

It was more serious than he had imagined. New wounds covered old ones. Even if he only looked at a few obvious blisters and scab marks, it hurt just to look at them.

“It’s really nothing...” Tang Kai saw his sinking expression and hurriedly tried to soothe him. “I didn’t burn myself today, really. These are old wounds, they’re already healed.”

Sun Zinan lowered his head, gently leaving a kiss on the dark red wound.

Tang Kai could only feel a spark bursting into fireworks at his fingertips. An electric current ran up from where Sun Zinan’s lips had touched and the nerve endings all over his body seemed to have all quickly heated up, his four limbs burning in a way he couldn’t control.

“You...”

His voice was hoarse, as if he had swallowed sand. He felt like his current state was unstably teetering back and forth. If Sun Zinan lit another fire, he might explode at once.