Chapter 50: The Sticker Photo Booth Part 2

Cui Qijin glanced at Chi Buyu and suddenly felt the fabric clinging wetly to her own back. She hadn’t even processed it when a sharp “snap” rang out from the machine in front of them.

Chi Buyu grinned mischievously and turned her face—

She saw their faces on the instrument’s display screen, their outlines blurred. Chi Buyu’s makeup was smudged like a ghost’s, and her own complexion was ghostly pale.

But Chi Buyu was laughing, while she sat there dazed.

The image didn’t freeze.

Yet somehow, it felt like the two of them had.

The damp sensation lingered on Cui Qijin’s face, and a faint perfume scent still hovered at the tip of her nose. It must have been the Black Opium that Chi Buyu had mentioned before.

Cui Qijin ducked her head slightly.

She coughed for no apparent reason.

Then quickly stopped.

Chi Buyu tugged at her sleeve. “Hurry, hurry! The second one’s about to snap.”

No sooner had she spoken than—

The machine let out another “snap,” and Chi Buyu’s finger poked her cheek—

Cui Qijin looked up sluggishly. The angle was oddly novel; the two of them appeared trapped in a fuzzy, garishly framed screen, like figures lost in the static snow of an old TV.

The gesture felt so intimate.

The sound faded.

Chi Buyu released her hand and fidgeted with her fingers, twisting them awkwardly. “The real point of a photo booth is the experience, right? Whether it actually takes the picture or not doesn’t matter. Don’t you think?”

Cui Qijin tightened her expression, but her gaze collided with Chi Buyu’s reflection in the booth.

“Yeah… I suppose,” she said, somehow stretching the two words into what sounded like separate sentences.

The photo booth reacted about a second slower than a human.

So Cui Qijin watched as Chi Buyu seemed to double-image, dodging her gaze before the next “snap” brought it back.

Her eyes were damp, shifting about under the flickering lights. The air itself began to blur and grow thick, viscous.

“Snap—”

The machine kept repeating relentlessly.

Chi Buyu pulled a silly face at the screen and flashed a peace sign over her head, her soaked shoulder nearly pressing against the thinnest bone of Cui Qijin’s spine.

The touch was cool, wet, faintly tingling.

“Snap—”

Breaths gradually filled the cramped space. Every inhale and exhale Cui Qijin took was laced with Chi Buyu’s scent. Staring at the increasingly blurry screen, she suddenly spoke up.

“Chi Buyu.”

“Snap—”

Chi Buyu slowly drew back, her shoulder bumping against Cui Qijin’s. Through their two layers of damp, thin fabric, their tangled wet hair brushed gently, accidentally colliding.

Then, with a bewildered lift of her soft, damp eyes, she stared at Cui Qijin in the screen.

“Huh? What?”

“Snap—”

The machine droned on, the hazy overhead light pulsing with each flash. The noise acted like some kind of accelerant. Cui Qijin licked her dry lips, her fingers on her knee curling subtly.

In that moment, as if compelled by some unseen force—

“We…”

“Snap—”

The hand on her knee was suddenly seized. Chi Buyu’s palm was soft and warm, enveloping hers with utter assurance.

“Why didn’t you finish what you were saying!”

Chi Buyu ducked her head, feigning sternness in her tone, the tips of her ears bright red as she clung to her hand.

“Snap—”

Cui Qijin gripped Chi Buyu’s hand in return, tightly, her eyes fixed on the screen just as tightly, her back rigid. In the screen, the two of them looked like they were posing for wedding photos. Where on earth had such an absurd thought come from? Then she heard herself say,

“Want to try dating?”

“Snap—”

In that instant, the screen dimmed a shade, the photo booth transforming into a spaceship hurtling toward a universe of Metal, Wood, Water, Fire, and Earth. If the photo had frozen right then, it probably could have been turned into a hilarious comic strip—

Cui Qijin sat bolt upright, hastily pushing her glasses back up her nose in a tense motion.

While Chi Buyu’s expression blurred in that moment, she suddenly twisted her face over and planted a quick kiss on her lips, like stamping a seal.

The photo didn’t freeze.

Chi Buyu wasn’t frozen either.

Chi Buyu was someone who could never be frozen.

The next second, Chi Buyu sprang up abruptly, flung open the photo booth’s curtain without a word, cheeks flushed to her ear tips, grabbed her bag, and bolted off with quick footsteps.

Only Cui Qijin remained frozen.

She stared at her own bewildered reflection in the machine, her neck slowly reddening like an allergic reaction…

Then, quite suddenly, she burst into laughter.

–

A long while later.

Cui Qijin emerged from the alley.

The rain had stopped. Chi Buyu was squatting at the dark roadside, chin raised, eyes narrowed as she peered toward her. She must have been waiting for someone.

Cui Qijin let out a breath of relief.

She hurried after her, flowers in arms.

But Chi Buyu turned away, standing up from the ground. She deliberately avoided looking at her, huffed once, and charged ahead.

It didn’t seem like shyness. More like anger.

Chi Buyu was angry?

Chi Buyu sure loved getting angry.

Cui Qijin trailed behind Chi Buyu, stepping through shallow puddles. After a moment’s thought, she asked cautiously, “Was I too slow coming out?”

Chi Buyu pursed her lips, saying nothing.

Cui Qijin pondered. “Or maybe I shouldn’t have asked that?”

“What shouldn’t you have asked?” Chi Buyu’s memory seemed awfully short.

“Shouldn’t have asked straight-up if you wanted to date?” Cui Qijin probed.

“As if!”

Chi Buyu’s expression grew even more serious. Hands on hips, she resembled an indignant little lion. “If you hadn’t asked, I’d be even angrier!”

“Fine, so you admit you’re mad,” Cui Qijin said, feeling like she’d grasped something.

Chi Buyu huffed through her nose. “I was already mad. I’ve decided—from now on, when I’m angry, I won’t hold it in.”

It sounded like she was laying down some ground rules.

Cui Qijin thought about it seriously. “I think that’s a good idea.”

She went along with her words.

Only then did Chi Buyu seem to cool off a bit. In the dim night, she glanced back, chin pointing into the air.

“So tell me, why was I mad just now?”

Fine, Cui Qijin admitted she wasn’t great at analyzing this sort of thing. In the past, even her apologies had just been silent trailing behind Chi Buyu, no words spoken.

But Chi Buyu looked genuinely aggrieved.

“You idiot Cui Muhuo!”

Chi Buyu called her that again.

But Cui Qijin suddenly wanted to laugh—just like in the photo booth earlier, so weird, so delightful, so inexplicable… She thought Chi Buyu, even when angry…

Looked kind of cute.

Apparently, there was no curing love-struck idiocy.

She stepped to Chi Buyu’s left and said patiently, “You’re really not going to tell me?”

Chi Buyu twisted her head to the right.

Cui Qijin moved to her right. After thinking it over, she surrendered. “Sorry.”

Chi Buyu’s lips pursed.

Her eyes narrowed, as if she was about to lose the battle against laughter.

Cui Qijin spotted it and couldn’t help teasing. “Chi Buyu, why are you holding back a laugh?”

Chi Buyu twisted her head left again.

Cui Qijin followed. Sure enough, Chi Buyu was laughing—and when she saw Cui Qijin keep pace, she laughed harder, unable to stifle it. Finally, with nowhere to hide from her gaze, she stomped her foot, jabbed a finger at her shoulder, and said all aggrieved,

“You weren’t proactive at all just now.”

Her eyes rimmed slightly red, accusing her. “I was the one who grabbed your hand first, the one who kissed first—and even after I ran off, you didn’t chase me right away!”

On a strange street still damp from recent rain, a faint floral scent wafted from somewhere. They stood at the roadside, quarreling over something trivial, apologizing, then dissolving into laughter over some foolish nonsense.

Did everyone in love go through this?

Cui Qijin wasn’t sure.

But she understood why Chi Buyu was angry. She thought for a moment, then methodically set down the flowers in her arms. Spreading both arms, after a brief hesitation, she wrapped them around Chi Buyu—who had spent this whole time feeling so wronged over the matter—and said to her,

“Sorry.”

Chi Buyu huffed twice, extricating her accidentally trapped hands from between their shoulders. She unceremoniously hugged her waist, holding tight and refusing to let go, rubbing her chin messily against her shoulder as she said in a soft, petulant voice,

“I’m actually a little mad at myself too.”

Cui Qijin held Chi Buyu close, feeling her chest cavity slowly filling with something, bit by bit. And there was a loud, leaping thing inside, thudding against her one beat at a time.

For some reason, she felt both nervous and reassured. But how could reassurance and nerves coexist in the same embrace?

Ever since meeting Chi Buyu, Cui Qijin had encountered so many things she couldn’t quite figure out.

Cui Qijin asked, “Why?”

“Because…” Chi Buyu began to sigh.

“Today my makeup’s all smudged, and I’m not even that pretty, but of all days, this is the one you’ll remember forever—the ugly version of me?”

Chi Buyu’s logic was truly peculiar.

Her grumbled complaints came out soft and sticky, like honey. “Come on, this is our anniversary! It’s super important! And look at how I messed it up, Cui Muhuo!”

Cui Qijin burst out laughing. “Want to reschedule for another day? When you’re feeling prettier?”

“No way!” Chi Buyu turned fierce again. “I already said it—can’t go back on my word!”

“Got it.” Cui Qijin replied.

Then neither of them spoke anymore. They simply held each other quietly, listening to the steady rhythm of each other’s heartbeats, oblivious to whether anyone around them noticed the two silly girls wrapped in a silent embrace.

She didn’t know how much time passed.

Chi Buyu shifted to the other side, resting her head on Cui Qijin’s opposite shoulder. Her arms still locked around her tightly, squeezing her ribs to the point of faint ache. Yet she refused to let go.

It was like hugging a teddy bear—one of those that promised everything would be okay just by holding on, without ever getting tired.

The teddy bear on her shoulder sniffled softly and murmured, “Am I being totally unreasonable?”

Cui Qijin thought, Thank goodness the rain had stopped.

“No,” Cui Qijin said.

“Yeah, right,” Chi Buyu shot back.

“Really, no.”

Chi Buyu wouldn’t let it go. “Hmph, you won’t say it out loud, but you’re totally thinking it in your head.”

Cui Qijin laughed again, amused. “Not even in my head.”

Chi Buyu seemed to believe her a little. “Really?”

“Really.”

“Fine.” Chi Buyu rubbed her chin against Cui Qijin’s shoulder, her warm breath spilling onto the soft skin of her neck.

“But I have to warn you ahead of time—when I’m in a relationship, I get these moods sometimes. I’ll try to work on it, but I don’t know if I can fix it completely.”

“No problem,” Cui Qijin said.

“Why not?”

Cui Qijin fell silent.

She couldn’t very well say it outright—that nothing Chi Buyu did would ever bother her. It was way too sappy; she could never voice something like that.

“Why not?” Chi Buyu pressed.

So Cui Qijin answered, “Because I’ve already prepared myself for it.”

Now it was Chi Buyu’s turn to go quiet.

Cui Qijin called to her. “Chi Buyu.”

Chi Buyu hugged her even tighter, mumbling, “I want to hold on a bit longer. Don’t rush me.”

She must have thought Cui Qijin wanted to be let go.

Cui Qijin patted Chi Buyu’s back. “You still haven’t answered my question from earlier.”

“What?”

Chi Buyu was slow on the uptake. Once the words left her mouth, she remembered and scratched lightly at Cui Qijin’s waist, declaring with exaggerated seriousness,

“We’re dating!”

She said it like she was charging off to battle Voldemort.

Cui Qijin didn’t respond.

Instead, she buried her face in Chi Buyu’s shoulder and laughed quietly.

After a moment, she saw Chi Buyu stomp on their shadows on the ground. Then came the fierce addendum,

“Dating for a hundred years—no take-backs!”

Cui Qijin kept laughing, even as she said, “Yeah, a hundred years. No changes.”