Chapter 6 (1/2)
Warning: This chapter contains NSFW content.
Su Jiawen slept frightfully downstairs for several days. Luo Yu ignored him for most of it.
Unexpectedly at breakfast one day, Luo Yu casually told Su Jiawen, ”I'll take you out for dinner.”
”Where?” Su Jiawen's hand stopped mid-scoop of oatmeal. He lifted his head to look at Luo Yu.
He lived in Luo Yu's home, but Luo Yu felt that he and Su Jiawen had been geographically separated for a long time. The distance between them at the dining table seemed to be eight hundred meters, but Su Jiawen's expression was still so innocent.
”Someone will come pick you up,” Luo Yu said. He suddenly lost interest in eating breakfast. Right now, he both wanted to see Su Jiawen and to not see him. He pushed his bowl away and left the house.
At five in the afternoon, Lu Yi arrived at Luo Yu's house to pick up Su Jiawen. They headed outside the city. Su Jiawen asked Lu Yi, ”Where are we going?”
Lu Yi told him the name of the hotel; Su Jiawen was silent.
The hotel was called Jian Island. It was built on an island close by that was connected to Ping City by underwater tunnel.
”We'll be pa.s.sing through the tunnel soon.” Lu Yi thought he didn't know where it was, so explained.
Su Jiawen said, ”I know where it is. I've been there before.”
”You've been to Jian Island?” Lu Yi was a little surprised. It didn't seem like Su Jiawen could be connected with a seven star hotel like Jian Island at all.
”Our cla.s.s organized a field trip to that island.” Su Jiawen gazed out the window at the view of the streets. He told Lu Yi, ”I've seen the hotel from the outside.”
Lu Yi nodded and asked Su Jiawen, ”I heard you've recently started baking?”
Su Jiawen reached a hand out to adjust the AC vent. He said, ”I did once, but Mr. Luo didn't like it. I haven't baked since.”
Lu Yi realized that every other phrase, Su Jiawen brought up Luo Yu, so lost interest and stopped talking. When the car entered the tunnel, everything became dark. Stirring music played from the stereo as the two remained quiet; because of this, it wasn't terribly awkward.
At the hotel, Lu Yi parked and brought Su Jiawen inside. They got on the elevator and swiped the card, then pressed the b.u.t.ton for the 35th floor.
”The top floor?” Su Jiawen suddenly asked. Lu Yi turned his head to look at him. Su Jiawen's expression was a little conflicted.
Lu Yi had never seen this expression on Su Jiawen's face before. He inquired, ”Is something wrong?”
Su Jiawen shook his head. ”Nothing. I just remembered some things.”
The elevator doors opened. The scenic restaurant, located over a hundred meters in the air, was empty and silent. The lights were dim, and there was only one table set up in the enormous room.
Luo Yu was sitting there, waiting for him. Outside the ceiling-to-floor windows and off in the distsance were the dark sea and Ping City's night view.
Su Jiawen looked at Luo Yu. Luo Yu stood up and waved at him. Su Jiawen walked over to that table.
Lu Yi closed the door behind them and waited outside.
A few waitresses were standing there too. Normally, there would be a continuous flow of dozens of tables of customers for them to serve. Now that the entire restaurant had been booked and the food was being directly brought inside, they could finally catch a break.
Lu Yi had nothing to do either, so started casually chatting with them. ”The top floor isn't normally all booked out, right?”
”I've never seen it,” a girl said. ”What a rich person thing to do.”
”Not normally. Several years ago there was a customer who did.” Another waitress a bit older reminisced, ”I only know of that one instance.”
”Really?” The other servers were extremely curious. They wanted the older employee to tell them about what had happened the last time the restaurant was booked out. Someone guessed that it was for a proposal.
”Not a proposal,” the waitress said. ”That customer booked out the entire floor and seemed to be waiting for someone. But he waited for a whole night and the person never came.”
”A night?” Someone asked in surprise, ”A whole night?”
The old employee nodded sympathetically. ”He booked the whole place, you know, so the hotel didn't feel right kicking him out. However long the customer waited for, we stood outside too. He left the morning after, but I was so tired I didn't see what he looked like.”
”He must've been ugly.” The first girl who had spoken up covered her smile and joked.
But the old employee shook her head. ”Everyone who saw him said he was stunning.”
”Oh……” A couple of girls grouped together, discussing that if someone invited them to a place like this and booked the whole restaurant out, even if he didn't have Tiffany, they would still definitely marry him.
Lu Yi thought of Su Jiawen who was inside. For a moment, he didn't know whether to feel happy or sad for the other.
Su Jiawen hesitantly sat across from Luo Yu. He couldn't taste the exquisite dishes made by the Michelin star chef.
”Jiawen, what are you thinking about?” Luo Yu waved a hand in front of Su Jiawen.
Su Jiawen took a bite of dessert before saying, ”Mr. Luo is suddenly being so good to me. I'm a little unused to this.”
Luo Yu paused. He didn't continue along the topic Su Jiawen had brought up, instead asking, ”Jiawen, do you want to go back to school?”
Su Jiawen's eyes brightened. He responded very quickly, ”Of course.”
”I had someone contact the school for you. As long as you turn in your paper and take the exam, you can go back,” Luo Yu said. He gazed at Su Jiawen from beyond the candle light. For some reason, this procedure of giving Su Jiawen a treat and then hitting him with a stick made it hard for him to breathe.
Su Jiawen stared at Luo Yu. He was so happy it made Luo Yu's heart panic. He asked Luo Yu, ”Then I can go back to school?”
”Not yet,” Luo Yu replied.
Su Jiawen's overjoyed appearance disappeared. He became silent, waiting for Luo Yu to keep talking.
”Go stay with Jiang Qi first,” Luo Yu said. ”He said he'll let you go to school.”
Su Jiawen looked at Luo Yu and didn't say anything.
”Actually, he helped contact the school for you,” Luo Yu continued. As he spoke, his throat felt dry. He picked up his wine gla.s.s and took a gulp.
”Okay,” Su Jiawen said. He lowered his head. Luo Yu could only see the loose hairs on his forehead, his thick eyelashes, and the soft angle of his face from beyond the flickering candles.
Immediately after, he saw a drop of water fall onto Su Jiawen's plate. The other was crying.
Luo Yu lifted a hand to squeeze Su Jiawen's chin. He wanted to raise Su Jiawen's face up, but was met with resistance. Luo Yu stood and walked over to Su Jiawen, then squatted down. He asked, ”Why are you crying?”
Su Jiawen shook his head and used his hands to cover his face, refusing to let Luo Yu see. But his breathing was wet; his lips were tightly pressed together, the tears streaming down his face through the cracks in his fingers. They dripped onto the dark red cloth napkin on his legs.
Su Jiawen felt hopeless. Luo Yu probably couldn't understand what he was feeling. He didn't love Su Jiawen, but watching Su Jiawen cry made his heart feel like it was being covered by a damp and hot towel. He couldn't breathe.
Luo Yu forcefully removed Su Jiawen's hands from his face. Su Jiawen's crying appearance was as pitiful as that of a small child's. He didn't dare to say why he was crying, but couldn't stop.
”That's enough.” Luo Yu unnaturally pulled Su Jiawen up. Su Jiawen was half a head shorter than him, so his head rested against Luo Yu's shoulder and neck. Luo Yu deduced that Su Jiawen was asking for a hug from him, so opened his arms and pulled Su Jiawen into his embrace. ”Stop crying.”
Su Jiawen held onto him and convulsed, as if he were disregarding everything else. Luo Yu felt his suit jacket and s.h.i.+rt get soaked by Su Jiawen's tears before Su Jiawen finally stopped.
Even Luo Yu couldn't recall how he had ultimately coaxed Su Jiawen back. At home, they stood in front of the staircase. Su Jiawen clung onto Luo Yu and asked, ”Mr. Luo, can I sleep upstairs tonight?”
Luo Yu used up the last of his compa.s.sion and held onto Su Jiawen's hand as they made their way upstairs. ”Come.”
That night, Luo Yu and Su Jiawen didn't make love. The two awkwardly laid in bed, trying to prevent any physical contact. Neither slept very well.
The next morning, Luo Yu went to the airport. It was almost Chinese New Year; he needed to go to Europe to spend some time with his parents. The day before, Luo Yu ordered Xing Licheng to go to his house in the morning and pick up Su Jiawen to bring to Jiang Qi.
Strictly speaking, it was all because Luo Yu had been too prideful while on the phone with Shen Qiyin. He said that he would be giving Su Jiawen away and couldn't take his words back. It was also true that he really wanted to prove that Su Jiawen didn't mean much to him, which was why he exchanged the other for two of Zhen Ting's customers and a piece of land after Jiang Qi kept bugging him about it.
Luo Yu and Jiang Qi reached an agreement. They scheduled to meet for dinner and have a proper discussion after Luo Yu returned from Europe.
Luo Yu asked him if Ruan Zheng would be coming. Jiang Qi said that he was an authorized representative of Ruan Zheng. Luo Yu didn't argue.
Before his flight, Luo Yu sat in the waiting room. For some reason, he was extremely antsy.
He looked at his watch; it was ten thirty. He called Xing Licheng and asked him a few questions about work. Xing Licheng answered them one by one, then, as if knowing what he wanted to ask, said, ”I just brought Mr. Su to Zhen Ting's building.”
”Oh.” Luo Yu only made this one sound, but didn't hang up. Xing Licheng didn't dare to hang up either.
A moment later, Luo Yu asked, ”How did Su Jiawen seem?”
”……Alright,” Xing Licheng said. ”Not exceptionally unhappy.”
This time, Luo Yu really hung up. He needed to board. Lu Yi trailed beside him. He watched as Luo Yu almost walked into the wrong gate and started lining up behind the pa.s.sengers in economy cla.s.s. After Lu Yi reminded him, he finally walked off in a daze to the business cla.s.s entrance.
The next time they met was two weeks later. It was the second day after Luo Yu had returned from Europe.
There was a groundbreaking ceremony scheduled for the laboratory building Huan An had donated to Ping University. They had invited Luo Yu to attend, but Luo Yu had originally told the vice president of their company to go. Lu Yi had a thought. In the morning when he was going over the schedule with Luo Yu, he brought up this event.
At first, Luo Yu didn't respond. A while later, he called Lu Yi back from where he had almost made it to the office exit. He said, ”I'll go to the groundbreaking ceremony this afternoon.”
Lu Yi turned around and said yes, then left to update the vice president. He also got in contact with the preparatory committee for Ping University's ceremonies. The committee was naturally extremely welcoming upon hearing that Huan An's CEO was coming. They rushed to switch up all the slogans and backdrops for the ceremony.
The groundbreaking ceremony was scheduled for three in the afternoon at an empty piece of land recently demolished on the north side of Ping University.
Luo Yu didn't want to give a speech onstage. He only sat in the audience and watched the entire thing.
The school's princ.i.p.al felt like he was sitting on thin ice as he accompanied Luo Yu. He didn't know why this big Buddha had decided to come to their school today. Ping University was a normal secondary education inst.i.tute. The princ.i.p.al had heard about Luo Yu's reputation; it would've been fine if that vice president had come, but now that Luo Yu was here personally, he was quite afraid that there would be a sudden shoot-out at their school. Everytime Luo Yu's finger twitched, he went into a panic.
The ceremony finally ended as the celebratory cannons fired in sync. Luo Yu maintained a stern expression and stood up. The princ.i.p.al hurriedly rushed to get up too. ”Mr. Luo, we organized a dinner——”
Luo Yu turned his head and said, ”I won't be there for dinner; I have other plans. Have Lu Yi go for me.”
The princ.i.p.al still wanted to follow him, but was stopped by Lu Yi.
The groundbreaking ceremony lasted over two hours. Night fell earlier during the winter, and Ping University was at the foot of a mountain. By the time it was around five or six, the sun had already set behind the looming mountain. Only a wisp of red remained in the sky.
Luo Yu had never visited Ping University before. His car parked close by. The driver sat in the car waiting for him. He didn't directly walk over, though. Instead, he walked around Ping University.
Xing Licheng didn't dare to try and figure out what Luo Yu was thinking. He only dared to follow behind him.
Ping University wasn't large. Luo Yu took 20 minutes to walk around it, starting from the east-most side and ending up at the front gate in the west. Students pa.s.sed through the gate in groups of two and three. Luo Yu slowed his strides. At this time, someone called him to a halt.
”Mr. Luo?”
It was Su Jiawen. Luo Yu and Xing Licheng both turned to look at him. Su Jiawen was dressed very much like a student. He carried his backpack and walked towards the gate. Upon seeing Luo Yu, he was both surprised and happy. ”Why are you at our school?”
Luo Yu had already made Xing Licheng check for him while he was in Europe. Su Jiawen had caught the last train and attended the school's final exam last semester. He had also turned in his paper.
No matter how much he scorned Zhen Ting, Luo Yu had to admit that Jiang Qi treated Su Jiawen very well.
”For business of course.” Luo Yu's face was expressionless, but his person was very obviously relaxed. He wasn't as tense as he had been when walking around before.
Su Jiawen nodded. Luo Yu asked him, ”Have you eaten?”
”Not yet.” After Su Jiawen replied, he suddenly smiled at Luo Yu. ”Are you going to treat me?”
Luo Yu was surprised by this question, but couldn't straight out say no. He was forced to dryly answer, ”Fine.”
Xing Licheng didn't want to hear any more from where he was off to the side. But Luo Yu was his boss, so he could only keep standing there like a door G.o.d.
Luo Yu brought Su Jiawen onto the car and asked what he wanted to eat. Su Jiawen didn't have an answer, so Luo Yu randomly chose a Chinese restaurant located inside a hotel.
They actually only hadn't seen each other for around a dozen days. But maybe because their relations.h.i.+p was different now, Su Jiawen was much more expressive in front of Luo Yu. He stopped being so fearful.
He held onto the menu and looked at it for a long time, but still couldn't figure out what to order. Even the server standing on the side waiting for him was getting tired. In the end, it was Luo Yu who grabbed the menu from him and ordered a few dishes.