Chapter 65: Bitter Fruit

After class ended in the afternoon, Ming You, Gu Xirui, and Lin Yiyang hurried to review the preliminary rankings. They didn’t leave school for the high-speed rail station until seven in the evening. She had only told Ms. Yang that she would go home on Saturday to stay, but the weekend also included Friday and Sunday nights.

At nine-thirty, when she shouldered her bag, held the bouquet, and used her key to open the door, it startled Yan Ningxi and He Huan, who were sitting on the sofa, into a daze.

She had wanted to surprise Yan Ningxi.

It was a mix of shock and delight.

Ming You herself was also stunned, caught between advancing and retreating. Yan Ningxi stood up and walked to the doorway, gazing at Ming You across the doorframe.

“Sister Yan, should I… come in or not?” Ming You asked softly.

“Teacher He… is staying over tonight.”

Yan Ningxi looked helplessly at the girl who had suddenly returned. She wanted to give her a hug, wanted to kiss her, but Teacher He was right behind her, so she couldn’t.

He Huan’s eyes were red. Before coming, she had contacted Yan Ningxi first to confirm that she was alone in the apartment.

They had agreed that He Huan would stay there for the night, waiting for her to calm down and for Jiang Bin to apologize on his own. Then she would go home the next day or the day after.

“Yan Yan, I’ve disturbed you,” He Huan said as she also stood up, her voice noticeably hoarse.

Yan Ningxi turned around. “Teacher He, you’re not disturbing me. We agreed you’d stay tonight instead of going back. Here, I can keep you company and chat.”

Ming You could also tell that He Huan was in a bad mood. She handed the flowers to Yan Ningxi and prepared to leave. “You keep Teacher He company. I’ll stay at a hotel. We’ll talk on the phone.”

“Mm.”

Yan Ningxi held the flowers as Ming You reluctantly stepped back and turned away.

“Ming You.”

Yan Ningxi set down the flowers and followed her out. Around the corner, she planted a kiss on Ming You’s lips. “Don’t be unhappy.”

“I’m not unhappy.”

Ming You hugged her and ruffled her hair. “Go back inside. It’s cold out here.”

“Message me when you get to the hotel.” Back inside, Yan Ningxi took the bouquet into the kitchen. Meanwhile, the person in the living room sighed deeply in her heart.

The happiness Yan Ningxi possessed, the surprise she received—they should have belonged to her. It was she who had pushed Ming You away, she who had pushed Ming You into Yan Ningxi’s arms, she who had cruelly turned herself into a witness to their sweet love.

She had thought she only regretted not bravely embracing Ming You, but now, she regretted even more that she had never given herself a chance to experience love with that girl named Ming You.

“Sorry, Teacher He. I didn’t know beforehand that she would come back. This week, she was supposed to…”

He Huan covered her face and shook her head. “It’s my own fault.”

They both fell silent for a long time. He Huan’s heartache only grew instead of fading, so she decided to make it hurt even more. “Yan Yan, could you get that thing you’re holding for me?”

“Mm, I’ll go get it.”

Yan Ningxi dragged a stool into the bedroom, climbed onto a tall stool, and strained on tiptoe to retrieve the cardboard box from the top of the closet—the one Ming You had placed there.

This was shortly after school started in September. He Huan had moved into the apartment and said these were some sentimental items that Jiang Bin shouldn’t see. She asked Yan Ningxi to hold onto them for a while.

Yan Ningxi never asked what was inside and never opened the box herself.

She placed the box on the coffee table, took a utility knife from the drawer, and scraped at it while explaining, “I taped it up to make it easier to store.”

Once she confirmed the tape was all cut, Yan Ningxi put away the knife and prepared to step aside. “You can…”

“Stay with me and look.” He Huan grabbed Yan Ningxi’s arm.

“Okay.” Yan Ningxi sat properly beside He Huan and watched as she opened the cardboard box with both hands. Inside were stacks of various-sized unopened delivery boxes.

Her eyesight was sharp. The largest flat delivery box on top had the shipping label facing front, and in the sender field, it clearly read: My.

He Huan picked up one item after another and set them down until she held a box the size of a phone. She stared at the shipping label for a dozen seconds, then reached out to Yan Ningxi. “Lend me the utility knife.”

As the delivery box was opened, He Huan took out the black gift box from a well-known woodcraft brand and rubbed her thumb over the lid.

It took her a good while to lift the lid. “These are the gifts she sent me bit by bit over the two years after high school graduation. There are eleven in total. I never opened them. She only ever told me when she shipped them, never asked if I received them, and certainly never asked if I liked them.”

“At first, I refused and tried to talk her out of it, but you know how stubborn she is. Once she sets her mind, she won’t listen. Luckily, the gifts were all delicate little things, not expensive, so I eventually stopped arguing with her.”

As He Huan spoke, the agarwood bamboo joint pendant from inside the gift box already lay in her palm.

She tossed the opened delivery box into the trash and slipped the bamboo joint pendant into her clothes pocket. Then she closed the lid on the largest cardboard box again.

To the silent Yan Ningxi, she said, “The rest of these—find a suitable time and return them to her for me. Just say they’re things she left at my place. Return them to their rightful owner. Yan Yan, this is the last thing related to her that I’ll ask you to help with.”

She didn’t dare look at the other gifts.

She hadn’t dared before, and she dared even less now. If she had dared, they wouldn’t be here at this moment.

With those words—”return to rightful owner”—Yan Ningxi’s memory flashed back to October. At He Huan’s wedding, when Ming You asked her to deliver an envelope on her behalf, she had said the exact same thing.

She had agreed then, and this time, it seemed she couldn’t refuse either. Even though it troubled her greatly, she still replied, “Okay.”

…

At the hotel, Ming You lay alone in bed, unable to sleep. She placed an unopened blind box by her pillow and hugged another pillow, still unable to drift off.

Yan Ningxi wasn’t much better off than Ming You. She and He Huan each covered with a blanket, wide awake.

“Have you two… made love?” Seeing how inseparable they were, with Ming You even having a key, their intimate relationship was obvious.

He Huan was a married woman who had just turned thirty. Yan Ningxi wasn’t young either. Between adults, between friends, there was no need to shy away from talk of “sex.”

“Sorry, if you find this offensive, you don’t have to answer. I don’t mean any harm. I just…”

“No.” Yan Ningxi shifted, rolling over to face away from He Huan and curling up her legs.

“What’s it like dating a girl?”

“Do you really want to know?”

Yan Ningxi quickly gathered her thoughts and advised, “Teacher He, some people and feelings—once missed, can never be recaptured. What you missed wasn’t even something you possessed; it was just a past you shunned. It doesn’t count as a loss. You said yourself you had no improper thoughts about her, and you could discard her gifts without a second thought. So why cling to it now and torment yourself?”

He Huan also turned her back to Yan Ningxi, hugging her shoulders, and struggled to speak. “Why am I clinging? I’ll tell you why. Because I’m jealous. Jealous that you have a love I never had, jealous that she favors you, jealous of your courage too…”

“You’ve never tasted the pain of being pinned to the bed and forcibly made love to by a strong man, never tried sleeping next to a snoring beast every night, never been paraded as bragging material by your husband’s family to everyone they meet. And worse, right after your mother was laid to rest, your selfish husband drags you to fulfill your wifely duties just for his pleasure…”

“His family gave me material comfort, and I gave them satisfaction for their vanity. It wasn’t deep love before marriage, and after marriage, don’t even dream of affection…”

“My marriage isn’t the worst, nor have I reached the point of no return. I’m suffering more because I’ve developed divided loyalties.”

“Yan Ningxi, why you? Why did it have to be you that she falls for? Do you know how cruel your little glances are to me? How could you not know? But you still loved each other without a care…”

Listening to He Huan’s lament, her outburst, her grievances, Yan Ningxi felt a pang of sorrow too, but she didn’t think she and Ming You were wrong.

She and Ming You had drawn close only when both were single.

Moreover, when He Huan first told her who Ming You was and about Ming You’s “one-sided crush,” she had vehemently denied ever having feelings for Ming You herself.

On the last day of the National Day holiday, when He Huan invited her for afternoon tea, she said she had cut ties with Ming You on the wedding day itself, severed all contact, and wouldn’t reply to any more messages from her.

She had said it so casually, as if it were none of her business, so Yan Ningxi believed her. But now, it was clear He Huan had been less than honest.

Rather than speculate wildly, Yan Ningxi asked directly, “Teacher He, actually, you also…” like her, right?

“Sorry.”

He Huan apologized hurriedly again, her teeth chattering as if terrified of what Yan Ningxi might say next. “Yan Yan, you’re not wrong. It’s me who’s narrow-minded, greedy for more, drinking poison to quench my thirst, weaving a cocoon around myself…”

“Don’t say that about yourself.” Yan Ningxi put herself in He Huan’s shoes, turned over, and gently patted her shoulder, no longer pressing her.

“Teacher He, life has many forks in the road, and you can’t have both fish and bear’s paw. Whether we choose a path actively or are forced onto it, whatever lies ahead, we have to pay the price ourselves and grit our teeth to keep going. Different roads have different views, different rewards. A blessing in disguise, right?”

“You want to know what it’s like dating a girl? Fine, I’ll tell you. It’s the frustration of our marriage not being legally recognized, our relationship unsupported by friends and family. It’s the fear of ruining her future, so intense it robs me of sleep and appetite, and the dread of dragging her into irredeemable ruin…”

“I won’t deny that we’re in a relationship, but even now, I don’t dare let her know how much I like her. She’s a star in the sky, shining brightly, dazzling, unaware of worldly hardships. I’m just an ordinary person in the mundane world, spinning endlessly every day, month, year to pay off debts.”

“Teacher He, my pain, your pain—it’s just a drop in the ocean of countless sufferings. No one’s pain is greater than another’s.”

He Huan squeezed her eyes shut tight, tears sliding from the corners. Every word Yan Ningxi said pierced her heart, and she understood them all. That’s why she had backed off early, choosing what she thought was the easier, more ordinary path.

She had no right to blame heaven and earth, because today’s bitter fruit was all of her own making.

“Yan Yan, are you sure she’s sincere with you? What if—what if she’s only approaching you to get back at me?”

“A good dream. Real or fake, I’ve come out ahead.” Ming You was her dream.

“You’re playing with fire.”

“But it wasn’t anyone else who handed me that fire.”

…

It wasn’t even ten on Saturday morning when Jiang Bin showed up at the apartment with a huge bouquet of red roses, sincerely apologizing and taking He Huan away.

The spark for their fight was that the night before last, he came home drunk. At He Huan’s strong insistence, he took a shower, but then ignored her wishes and drunkenly insisted on having sex with her.

He Huan’s mother had only been buried that past Wednesday morning.

Jiang Bin, with his veteran status and family connections, held an idle job at a government agency. He didn’t do much work, going out drinking and playing cards with buddies every few days, but overall, he wasn’t bad to He Huan and never asked her to do laundry, cooking, or housework.

He wasn’t picky at home and ate whatever. During the day, he could get whatever he wanted outside. His clothes were usually machine-washed, and a part-time cleaner came weekly for deep cleans. His biggest demand of He Huan was in bed.

He Huan could usually endure it, but not that night. So they had a huge fight.

After seeing them off, Yan Ningxi cleaned every corner of the apartment, erasing all traces of He Huan’s stay. She changed and washed the bedding and put the cardboard box back on top of the closet.

She didn’t know how long she would have to wait for that “suitable time.” But it certainly wouldn’t be today, or tomorrow, or the day after.

This cardboard box was heaven’s “punishment” for her.

A knock sounded at the door.

As expected, Ming You came in and gave her a lingering, passionate kiss.

“What time did you get up? Didn’t sleep well last night?” Yan Ningxi’s fingertips lightly stroked Ming You’s eye sockets, where faint dark circles lingered.

“I woke up at eight. Couldn’t hold you, so I couldn’t sleep well.”

“Did you have breakfast?”

“No.” Ming You clung to Yan Ningxi’s body and licked her lips. “But I just ate my fill.”

“You’re being improper again.” Yan Ningxi’s voice was soft and tender, her hands still wrapped around Ming You’s waist. Although none of the worries she had discussed with Teacher He last night had been resolved, this did not diminish her affection and longing for Ming You in the slightest.

Suddenly, her feet left the ground as Ming You scooped her up princess-style. Yan Ningxi let out a small startled cry and wrapped her arms around Ming You’s neck. “Where did you get such strength?”

“I’ve been working out. Besides, you’re in my heart—what’s a little strength compared to that?”

Ming You gently placed Yan Ningxi on the bed, pinned her hands down, and leaned over her. Countless kisses of all sizes rained down like jade beads falling on a plate, light or heavy, landing on Yan Ningxi’s eyes, ears, lips, and chin.

Yan Ningxi wore a round-neck sweater, and Ming You’s moist lips slid across her neck, cool and slick.

Suddenly, she recalled the question Teacher He had asked her last night and posed it to herself in her mind. Undoubtedly, she had no answer.

Of course, she had no experience with men either.

But the genuine reactions of her body and mind were the most convincing. When she was with Ming You, Yan Ningxi had felt that emotional impatience several times.

Yet Ming You never went too far. Even with her gaze burning hot and her cheeks flushed like the evening glow, she always behaved with propriety.

Just like now—the girl simply lay on her side in front of her, quietly listening to her heartbeat, her fingers gently twirling her long hair.

She did not hide the pounding of her own agitated heart. Like soothing a child, she gently patted Ming You’s back and smoothed out her disheveled hair.

Classical books said that women were made of water, pure and clear. Men were made of mud, turbid and murky.

Yan Ningxi had never been this intimate with a man. With women, she had only been this close to Ming You. But in daily life, especially on public transport, she had smelled men’s body odor, and she disliked it intensely. Meanwhile, the faint fragrance on Ming You’s body always made her mind feel refreshed and delighted.

In this comparison, Yan Ningxi truly could not imagine what kind of iron will it would take for her to endure lying on the same bed right now with a man or woman she disliked.

She could not even bear to think about it. But He Huan… was already in hell.