Chapter 221: Night Talk |
On the taxi ride to the hotel, it was very quiet.
The car slowly wove through the brightly lit commercial streets. Outside, everything looked lively and bustling, but inside the car, it was as calm as plain water.
After a few intersections, the car stopped at the hotel entrance.
Without saying much, everyone walked to the front desk and headed straight to their rooms.
Su Muzhi and Lin Yilin were in one room.
Zhang Juntang and Lin Lan were in one room.
Lin Zhu and Jiang Linyuan each had their own room.
"You said that right to your sister's face?"
As soon as she entered the room, Su Muzhi spoke her first words.
Lin Yilin nodded and sat down on the bed.
Then, the two fell into silence again.
After a while, Lin Yilin's voice carried an indescribable sense of grievance, tinged with loneliness:
"Senior Su, could you please let me have Senior?"
"Why?"
"Because... I can't compete with you, Senior."
Lin Yilin lay on the bed, weakly staring at the ceiling.
Senior Su was too terrifying.
In front of her, she could never hold her head high.
"Hehe..."
Su Muzhi laughed.
"I thought you were going to say something like he's not good enough for me."
"I can't bring myself to say that."
Lin Yilin muttered.
"But I can boldly say it."
Su Muzhi smiled as she looked at her; under the light, her entire face was radiant.
"And I'd say it to his face too. He's not good enough for me."
"Don't put down Senior like that! Aren't you afraid he'll run off someday?"
Lin Yilin patted the bed, as if she were hitting Su Muzhi.
"I'm not afraid. He won't run away."
Su Muzhi said casually.
"He's my other half. My mate."
"That's so mushy."
Lin Yilin remarked.
"Hehe, you think it's mushy? I truly believe it from the bottom of my heart. And I'm certain Jiang Linyuan thinks the same way."
Su Muzhi also lay down, sprawling out like a star as she stared at the light overhead.
"If that's the case, then Senior Su should just take Senior Jiang straight to get a marriage certificate."
Lin Yilin punched her pillow, her voice sounding muffled.
"No. When I say 'other half,' I don't mean a lifelong partner. I mean he can never leave me."
"...I don't understand."
"Then let me ask you differently. Lin Yilin, if you had an other half who would never abandon you, what would you do?"
"I'd treat him really, really well. If he's good to me, then I'll be good to him."
Su Muzhi let out a cold laugh.
"If it were me, I'd torment him in every way possible, use him, and drain him dry!"
Lin Yilin was shocked by the unexpected answer. She sat up, looked at Su Muzhi, and asked in surprise:
"Why?"
"Because he'll never leave me, never abandon me. So, of course, I'm going to make full use of that."
Su Muzhi said it as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"Isn't that way too unfair to Senior?"
Lin Yilin said.
"Lin Yilin, a relationship isn't one-sided. It's mutual."
"So?"
"So, the reverse is also true."
Su Muzhi slowly withdrew all her smiles, her face darkening as she said with extreme seriousness:
"No matter what he does, I won't leave him either. I'll just treat him even more cruelly. That way, I'll never lose."
Lin Yilin was dumbfounded. Countless thoughts swirled in her mind before she asked:
"What's the point of that? When you like someone, it shouldn't be about mutual torment. It should be about mutual affection. What's the purpose of two people being together if it's like that?"
"I don't know."
Su Muzhi said.
"The scariest part is that I actually get pleasure out of it."
"Huh?"
"How should I put it? No matter how much I torment him, he won't leave. It's like proof that I'm loved."
Su Muzhi said, also sitting up, smiling sweetly.
"Just thinking about it makes me happy inside. But he torments me too, sometimes even on purpose. I feel awful, but I don't want to leave him either. Because doesn't that just prove he loves me more than I love him?"
"So, I won't leave him. I'll torment him, and then I'll be happy. Even though my heart aches, I'm happy. Even though I'm angry, I'm happy."
"Because he always loves me. He won't leave me."
Lin Yilin listened to this, feeling her mind go completely blank. She asked:
"Senior, have you seen a psychologist?"
"...I'm perfectly normal."
"No, no, no! That's not normal thinking at all! Who proves someone likes them by tormenting their partner?!"
"But that's how it is between him and me."
Su Muzhi said with a faint smile.
"He's always been tangled up with me. Even though I keep threatening him—saying if he dares to abandon me, I'll lock him up—in reality, he has the strength to resist."
"If he wanted to, he could easily leave me and be with you. But he doesn't. He'd rather be tormented and threatened by me, yet still choose to stay with me."
"Whenever I think about that, a feeling of happiness wells up inside me."
Lin Yilin was stunned. She couldn't understand it at all.
She stammered:
"Senior Su, maybe you should take some time apart from Senior to calm down?"
"Hehe, so you can sneak in while I'm gone?"
"No way! Right now, your mental health issues are more important!"
Lin Yilin moved closer to Su Muzhi.
"I'm perfectly normal. That's why I know this relationship isn't normal."
Su Muzhi looked at Lin Yilin, staring into her eyes.
"So, you can give him a normal relationship."
Huh?
Lin Yilin was stunned.
"Let me be clearer. You can be with him."
Su Muzhi said calmly.
"No, no, no! Then... what about you, Senior Su?"
Lin Yilin's thoughts were a mess.
"Me? I'll be just like I am now. I'll get jealous, get angry, and then torment him."
Su Muzhi said.
Lin Yilin sat there for a long while before speaking.
"So, Senior Su's idea is that Senior becomes my boyfriend but still gets tormented by another woman, and I can't do anything about it?"
"Minus that one small detail in the title, that's essentially it."
"Is this what dating is supposed to be like?"
"Who knows? But it's what I am."
Su Muzhi lay back down again, her voice very soft.
"When I was a child, I wasn't afraid of anything. My family controlled me very, very strictly. Even when I was sleeping at night, my mom would watch me from the side to see if I was really asleep."
"It was suffocating. So suffocating it made you want to die."
Lin Yilin didn't know why she was saying this, so she could only try to comfort her.
"But you're doing better now, Senior."
"Hehe, if you don't know how to comfort people, then don't."
Su Muzhi tapped her chest with her index finger.
"Where I am now, I traded this for it."
"What do you mean?"
"I have some problems with my heart. It's the aftereffect of a failed suicide attempt when I was a child."
Su Muzhi said calmly.
"Looking back now, I was so stupid back then. If I had just waited until I was a bit older, it wouldn't have come to this."
"...Are you okay now, Senior?"
"I'm fine while I'm young. But when I get older, what will happen then?"
Su Muzhi turned her head to look at Lin Yilin.
"I got scared. I'm scared of getting old. I'm scared that he'll be left all alone. I couldn't give him the most normal kind of love. I think you can."
Lin Yilin sat there, dazed, for a long, long time without responding.
P.S.: That's all for today.