Hedgehog's Belly - Chapter 48

Chapter 48

In a daze, Yan Qingzhu’s heart beat so urgently that even her gaze trembled. Hearing that person call her name once again was like a gruesome, chronic ailment from the depths of memory being exposed to the daylight; it felt as though only by tearing open all the unbearable bitterness could she obtain the mercy and grace of the person before her.

“Yan Qingzhu?” Luo Mu watched her; seeing that she made no movement, she called her name once more.

Yan Qingzhu suddenly shuddered, finally snapping back to her senses.

“Ah… sorry.” Yan Qingzhu glanced around flusteredly, her gaze settling back on Luo Mu. “It’s been a long time since I heard you call me that. I’m a bit out of practice.”

The twenty-year-old Luo Mu realized that the last time they had spoken properly like this was during the Hundred-Day Oath ceremony back in high school—that scorching summer day mixed with the drone of cicadas. The laboratory building covered in wisteria, the green corridor accompanied by cool breezes. The reserved conversation between two girls sitting by the corridor had become the final signature of their high school years.

“Why come back so suddenly? It must be quite a hassle to travel back and forth,” Luo Mu said as she washed the mushrooms. Her tone was like that of an ordinary friend chatting about daily life, without any hint of being an outsider.

But only Luo Mu knew that if she didn’t even acknowledge it, her self-reproach and regret would carve away at her sanity like a dagger, piece by piece.

“I’m afraid Yan Yu isn’t eating or taking her medicine properly. I wanted to supervise her for these few weeks.” Yan Qingzhu let out a sigh. Luo Mu could hear it—in the end, what that person cared about most was still her younger sister.

That person never considered herself; if only she would save just a little bit of concern for her own sake.

But Yan Qingzhu didn’t.

“Running back and forth over a hundred kilometers is quite exhausting,” Luo Mu murmured with downcast eyes, her voice soft as she used a cloth to wipe the stains off the counter.

Meanwhile, Yan Qingzhu slowly leaned back against the chair, looking up at the crystal chandelier, which cast hazy halos of light.

“I’m used to it,” Yan Qingzhu breathed out wearily. Her eyelashes trembled as she closed her eyes, masking her sharpness and revealing only a sense of calm.

Luo Mu nodded and then focused on the task of brewing the chicken soup.

After putting all the ingredients into the stew pot, she just had to wait for time to slowly steam it. Luo Mu wiped her hands with a towel, only to realize upon looking up that the other woman had been watching her from start to finish.

“When a guest comes over, don’t you offer a cup of tea?” Luo Mu’s lips curled into a beautiful arc as she teased.

Yan Qingzhu followed with a chuckle and nodded. Walking to the living room, she habitually took a box of tea leaves from the coffee table drawer.

After cleaning up the kitchen, Luo Mu walked to the sofa and watched Yan Qingzhu’s tea-making technique; compared to two years ago, she had truly improved a lot.

She immediately noticed the brand on the tea packaging, and the familiar name made Luo Mu’s heart skip a beat.

“Chuan?” Luo Mu frowned, asking with a mix of confusion.

The tea’s name was just one character: Chuan (潺 – gurgling/flowing water).

“What is it?” Yan Qingzhu lowered her eyes, her fair, slender fingers holding the tea bowl. She explained, “A business partner gave it to me before. I didn’t pay much attention.”

“It’s nothing; it’s just a product from my father’s company.” Luo Mu studied the tea packaging, surprised to see her father’s product in Lingyang. Having never understood the family business, Luo Mu had assumed they only produced and sold within Chujiang. The industry had grown large and strong, yet Luo Mu knew nothing of it.

Over the past few years, Luo Mu had tried desperately to find information about the Chuan company, but all attempts had ended in failure. It was only by chance that she met Lin Qiyun and learned a thing or two about the company.

“Is that so, future tea heiress?” The corner of Yan Qingzhu’s mouth twitched into a half-smile. Her sharp eyes studied the person before her as she handed the brewed tea cup to Luo Mu.

In a daze, a phrase surfaced in her mind: Corporate Marriage.

“I’m not.” Luo Mu didn’t find it funny; instead, she looked serious. Hidden troubles can naturally rot in one’s stomach forever, but Luo Mu couldn’t help but be honest with herself. And toward Yan Qingzhu, Luo Mu felt a kind of heart-baring trust, as if she wanted to pour out her very life along with her words.

Luo Mu stared at the clear tea water and said softly, “Do you know why it’s called Chuan?”

Yan Qingzhu continued brewing the tea: “The water flows (chuan-yuan) as if within reach; I wish to ask the sound of the reeds.”

Hearing this answer, Luo Mu couldn’t help but laugh. This child was still a bit too innocent.

“It was originally supposed to be called Chan (孱 – frail/weak), but after checking the meaning, my father thought it was unlucky, so he changed it to Chuan.” Luo Mu took a small sip of the tea; it was bitter and astringent in the mouth, which was the characteristic of this tea.

Typical teas lose their flavor after a few steepings, but Chuan tea is bitter at first, and only after repeated steepings can one gradually perceive the tea’s own sweet aftertaste and mellow fragrance. This truly verified the character Chuan.

“But back then, my father didn’t actually understand the pronunciation or meaning of those two characters,” Luo Mu sighed lightly. “He only saw the right half.”

“Many children.” Yan Qingzhu hadn’t reacted yet when Luo Mu finished her sentence and drained the tea in her cup. “He also has an adopted son, so no family responsibility will ever fall on me.”

Luo Mu had struggled painfully with this predestined, drama-like conclusion, but in the end, she had only torn herself apart with scars.

In the empty living room, there were only the two of them brewing and drinking tea. Suddenly, Luo Mu recalled when they were seventeen and had sat in Chujiang drinking tea and talking freely. However, the longing of seventeen was gone; the current estrangement between them had started because of Luo Mu.

“Qingzhu.” After a long time, Luo Mu called her again.

Yan Qingzhu looked up, her gaze like snow melting at the end of winter, bringing the scent of spring.

“If I said… I mean, if…”

Luo Mu desperately wanted to chew up the words she wanted to say and transform that drifting consciousness into simple language. But Luo Mu was not good at expressing herself and didn’t know how to explain her thoughts to the person before her.

Luo Mu wanted to gamble once; she wanted to be the gambler who challenged a predestined diverging path.

The fingertips Yan Qingzhu used to hold the tea cup trembled slightly, her eyes reflecting Luo Mu’s face. All the questions she had once wanted to ask seemed to have found their answers at this moment.

“I’m saying, if I would make you unhappy, would you still choose me?” Luo Mu’s voice was faint, like a yearning echo from a void abyss.

For two years, that chronic ailment had tormented Luo Mu in countless late nights. Now, she chose to expose it to the light, to peel back the ulcer and reveal its true form again.

“I believe in fate myself. If this path is difficult, I accept it.” Luo Mu’s voice was thick with a nasal tone; she couldn’t bear to look at Yan Qingzhu.

But it just so happened that one person appeared in Luo Mu’s life, going to great lengths to understand every bit of her. Someone who would tell unfunny jokes, who would watch meaningless fireworks together in a strange city. Someone who understood the gasping breath of Luo Mu’s survival after falling into self-struggle, who willingly accepted her mysterious distancing without ever slandering her.

That person was willing to be the shining sun in Luo Mu’s dark, numb, and ignorant life.

Luo Mu’s eyes brimmed with tears; a single drop hung in her eye before tracing down her cheek and falling into the cup.

“Since I was a child, people around me said I was cold-hearted; I accepted that.”

“But then I heard that I might even be so cruel as to hurt you. But if you are to bear everything for me, I am unwilling.”

Luo Mu turned her head aside, wiping away the tears with her knuckles. Her eyes were red and her lashes trembled; a strong sob could not suppress the surge of emotion. “I thought that as long as Yan Qingzhu didn’t have Luo Mu in her life, she wouldn’t need to block those unnecessary hardships for Luo Mu.”

“Yan Qingzhu, hate me.” Luo Mu bent over, covering her face which was distorted with grievance.

A cliff-like separation, with all the answers only coming to light two years later. Luo Mu was silent, and Yan Qingzhu was silent. Luo Mu didn’t know how to face Yan Qingzhu, not daring to ask if she had tossed and turned, unable to sleep because of this.

In a daze, Luo Mu was drawn into an embrace, the delicate scent of petitgrain diffusing at the tip of her nose. Yan Qingzhu held her with one arm and gently stroked Luo Mu’s hair with the other. Her sharp jaw rested by Luo Mu’s ear as she whispered—a sound like numbing, intoxicating alcohol, yet enough to make all of Luo Mu’s logic collapse.

That one sentence was enough to strip Luo Mu of her rationality and dignity, yet it bestowed an indescribable relief, like a flock of birds circling the sky.

Yan Qingzhu lowered her eyes: “Actually, I knew everything.”

She actually knew.

She said she knew everything.

“You… really…” Luo Mu buried her head in Yan Qingzhu’s chest; suddenly all her emotions were like a flood of beasts, dismantling Luo Mu’s dignity into fragments.

It turned out Yan Qingzhu had been going along with her; it had always been this way.

“You have an obsession with what you believe in; I never doubted that.”

Yan Qingzhu’s gaze was like the sliver of a waning moon in the thin night, jumping into the mountain colors of late autumn. She pieced together a broken, soulless, pitiful person, telling her that she didn’t need to deny her attachment to her faith.

Trembling slightly in her arms, Luo Mu sobbed quietly, unable to bear dredging up those lost and forgotten things from the depths of her memory.

“But Luo Mu, I’m not afraid at all.” Every word of Yan Qingzhu’s felt like an ancient boulder weighing heavily on Luo Mu’s heart.

“I only want you.” Yan Qingzhu’s lips trembled as she finally uttered the words that should have been said at seventeen.

Luo Mu froze, her breath momentarily stopping.

I only want you.

Yan Qingzhu lowered her head and caught the long-lost woody scent, followed by the slow base note of jasmine fragrance. In that moment, it was as if they were still seventeen, still able to return home together at sunset.

The words “beloved,” Yan Qingzhu kept lingering at her lips, chanting them ten thousand times in her mind.

“But you are free.”

Yan Qingzhu looked up toward the window, where the fluffy feathers of a white bird pushed through the wind’s resistance, flying toward a higher direction. She slowly released Luo Mu from her embrace. Facing Luo Mu’s eyes, which were full of pity yet clear and resilient, Yan Qingzhu decided not to say the words sealed in the depths of her heart.

She didn’t want to use love to bind Luo Mu.

“Go wherever you want to go,” Yan Qingzhu smiled faintly, her tone as calm as water. “Tell me or don’t tell me, it’s fine.”

“If you want to see me, just give me a call. If you don’t want to see me, I won’t disturb you.”

The corner of Yan Qingzhu’s mouth lifted slightly, her gaze appearing to block out all the surging waves and unknown panics. As long as Yan Qingzhu was there, Luo Mu had no need for any fear or trepidation.

“Yan Qingzhu, why…” Luo Mu’s eyes shook; it turned out that from beginning to end, the one deceiving herself was Luo Mu.

Yan Qingzhu smiled faintly and placed a kiss on her forehead.

That kiss was short and hurried, like the endurance of having tasted sweetness in a life destined for sorrow. That kind of delusion was like sleeping in a long river called the mundane, finally looking up to see starlight and no longer being stranded in the dark night.

In this chaotic world, there was finally one person who could disturb her emotions.

In the buzzing of Luo Mu’s ears was the tremor of her heart, plucking at the last of her sanity.

Regarding love alone, Yan Qingzhu spoke not a single word.

“Because I told the divine that Luo Mu must always become herself first.”

She should become herself first.