Chapter 20 - Fox and Beast
Sun Zinan’s eyes were half-closed, kissing the red wounds one by one. He suddenly felt like a hard shell had broken apart in his heart, the pieces falling down, dust and ashes. It revealed a tiny previously hidden corner where he had stored all his deepest desires.
“Don’t be so hard on yourself next time.”
He held Tang Kai’s wrist and said softly, “I’ve received your feelings.”
Tang Kai replied hoarsely, “I…”
“I’m really upset,” Sun Zinan interrupted. “No expensive gift can make up for your pain.”
Making a shining memory was of course important, but Tang Kai was the person who had lit the light in the first place.
Professor Tang’s hands had been seized by Sun Zinan. He had nothing else to say, so could only lower his head to block his mouth.
This was their first real kiss. It wasn’t a fairytale, nor the playful coddling of flirting, but a heavy kiss that lit a fire within both of them.
Sun Zinan had been stunned at first, but once he reacted, he immediately grabbed Tang Kai’s shirt collar and took the lead.
When driven to extremes, even the tongue could be used as a weapon. Tang Kai’s entire body was burning, his heart boiling with the desire to devour Sun Zinan’s alive, his inner self a wild beast. The other party however was not a rose waiting to be picked, but a fox that looked gentle but was hostile enough to scratch.
He had endured time and time again, but Sun Zinan had always provoked him.
When this fox tried to bite him again, the beast within his heart burst through its cage. The wildness and ferocity within its bones were thoroughly aroused. Tang Kai pressed Sun Zinan onto the sofa.
Even his eyes were red, his reason vanishing, looking sharp and dangerous.
But that was what Sun Zinan liked.
He draped his arm against the back of Tang Kai’s neck, not fearing death, losing his fingers amongst his newly cut hair before long, competing for control as he pressed against the back of his head.
Two wild animals tore at each other.
Although Tang Kai was forceful, he still restrained himself, only using a little brute force in attacking this city and gradually became gentler. But Sun Zinan was a crafty fox who liked to bite back; he was born to revolt as long as he didn’t die. Even kisses wouldn’t be let go, he would definitely kiss back twice the amount. The two men entangled for dozens of seconds. Tang Kai’s lips were covered with a few bite marks.
But the fox was only a fox who was reduced to breathing heavily when hiking up mountains while the beast was a beast who lifted weights at the gym every day. Sun Zinan was exhausted after a minute and finally forced to give up. He was blocked by Tang Kai into a corner of the sofa, kissed steadily until he was dizzy.
Because of a lack of oxygen, his limbs were as soft as noodles. At the end of a long kiss, Tang Kai embraced him and he curled up into a cute ball.
A low laughter vibrated in his chest and his warm breath swept across his ears and sweaty bangs. It was like being scratched by the tip of a feather, crisp and numb.
“Thanks for being upset for me.” Tang Kai chuckled despite himself. “A kiss will cure a hundred ailments&#k2014;it really doesn’t hurt anymore.”
Sun Zinan was like a scholar whose soul had been sucked dry by a demon. He gasped like he was on his last breath, “Fuck you…”
Tang Kai carried Sun Zinan into his bedroom and found some loungewear for him to wear. After a peaceful afternoon, it was comfortable to take a short rest or close one’s eyes to refresh one’s mind, especially if one was leaning against someone one liked. The air conditioner in Tang Kai’s apartment was new and the cooling effect was excellent. The two big men did not feel hot despite cuddling with each other.
The soft blanket wrapped gently around their bodies, holding a lazy warmth. No mountain scenery in the world was as peaceful and tranquil as this moment.
Sun Zinan was a bit sleepy and lay there with his eyes half-closed, pondering. Tang Kai abruptly asked, “Speaking of which, I don’t think I’ve ever met your mother.”
His eyelashes suddenly trembled.
“I don’t have a mother.” Sun Zinan’s posture remained the same as he spoke quietly into his quilt.
Before he gave this answer, he knew it would trigger a series of questions, but he didn’t expect Tang Kai’s first reaction would be “Do you mean biologically or social relationship-wise?”
Nothing good could come out of a work-obsessed boyfriend.
“Do I look like a monkey?” Sun Zinan pinched the tip of Tang Kai’s nose and tugged at it. “I don’t have a mother in name.”
Tang Kai wanted to apologize, but was stopped by a hand.
“You don’t need to apologize. My biological mother isn’t dead; she’s living well.” Sun Zinan said, “But it’s none of my business, I don’t even know who she is.”
“The person who gave birth to me wasn’t Sun Ying’s spouse. I’m…the child of a surrogate.”
No wonder.
No wonder the last time they went to the Sun family’s villa, there had been no pictures of a mother figure.
With Sun Ying’s family background and appearance, there would have been many women willing to bear children for him. But he would rather find a surrogate…was Sung Ying also gay? Then where did all of Sun Zinan’s older brothers come from?
Tang Kai lay facing him. He swept his hand across his brows and nose bridge, then across his lips. He pressed lightly at the crease beneath his lower lip. He voiced his sudden realization, “No wonder you’re so handsome, you have foreign ancestry.”
Sun Zinan had been teased into laughing. He pulled Tang Kai’s hand down and kissed his fingertips. “I know you want to ask why. It’s a long story. I’ll tell you slowly in the future. Today’s my birthday, so let’s not mention vexing things.”
Although he didn’t mention any names, the only person who could make Sun Zinan so annoyed was his father.
“Okay.” Tang Kai replied softly, putting his arm around his waist. He whispered lowly, “Take a nap.”
Perhaps his memories had been jogged by the conversation they had before sleeping. In the midst of his daze, Sun Zinan seemed to be six or seven years old again. He knew he was dreaming, but he couldn’t move, as if he were an adult’s soul stuck in a child’s body. His mind was clear, but his physical body couldn’t keep up.
He lay on his back on the bed, surrounded by darkness. In the deathly silence, the sha-sha sound of something scraping sounded. It was very light, impossible to tell where it came from, but it made Sun Zinan’s scalp tingle in fear.
It was the nightmare from his deepest hidden depths, the one he still hadn’t forgotten.
He knew exactly what was going to happen next and began to struggle frantically, but his four limbs were as heavy as if they had been filled with lead, and gradually even breathing became a burden. The rustling sound came closer and closer, like a person’s footsteps, quickly coming towards the bed. The long, fuzzy limbs were almost draped across the bed—
“Little Nan? Nannan? Wake up…”
At this moment, the burden on his body suddenly eased off.
“Ah!”
Sun Zinan opened his eyes suddenly and sprang up from the bed, hyperventilating. The arm around his waist pulled him back under his quilt. Tang Kai gently clasped the back of his neck, murmuring like he was soothing a frightened little animal. “Don’t be afraid, don’t be scared, it’s nothing…nothing will happen.”
The soul that had flown away gradually gathered back in his body. He breathed a long sigh of relief, his tense muscles visibly relaxing.
“I had a nightmare…” he muttered.
“En, a little bit of sleep paralysis.” Tang Kai said, “You weren’t so obedient when sleeping last time. You kept trying to hide in my arms, and I couldn’t wake you up no matter what.”
Sun Zinan didn’t catch onto the flirtation in his words and instead buried his face in his neck. “I dreamed of something that happened when I was a kid…”
Tang Kai realized something was wrong, and gently patted his back with a hand, asking lowly, “What happened when you were a kid?”
Sun Zinan said, “Bugs.”
Tang Kai knew how severe his phobia of bugs was, but he had never thought too deeply about it. He realized that their conversation before sleeping had triggered him, but he was too afraid to ask more. He could only coax, “There aren’t any bugs, the apartment is very clean. I sanitized and cleaned everything before you came. Don’t be afraid.”
Professor Tang was a knowledgeable person and knew that those with mysophobia would be much more comforted by a bottle of disinfectant at this time than ‘I’m here by your side.’
As expected, Sun Zinan’s breathing stabilized a bit. The rapid heaves of his chest gradually became regular, and the grip on his clothes loosened. His voice lost the faintness of fear.
“It’s not your house, it’s my house.”
Tang Kai asked cautiously, “Do you have bugs in your house?”
It was natural for boys to play and be naughty, chasing chickens and dogs, playing in the fields with plants. It was rare to find someone who was so afraid of bugs. But Sun Zinan hadn’t been like other boys. He was already at the point where he was basically allergic to bugs. He couldn’t even stay in a room that moths had once visited. If there wasn’t a reason for this, it would have been truly baffling.
He was a child Sun Ying had found a surrogate for and had no mother in name. He had been fostered abroad until he was brought back to the Sun family at the age of five. His older brothers and sisters were old enough to be his parents and Sun Ying didn’t bother finding him a companion his own age. He didn’t even know how to speak Chinese fluently and couldn’t communicate with his own family. He was like an orphan that had been picked up off the street, withdrawn and silent, locking himself in his room all day.
At that point his third brother, Sun Ziyan, had just graduated from college. He didn’t study well and spent his entire days being loitering at home. When he heard that there was a new member in the family, he believed with all his heart that Sun Zinan was an illegitimate son of the old man who had been living abroad and had come back to compete for the family inheritance.
He hated Sun Zinan so much every time he saw him, he would glare at him like he wanted to strangle him on the spot.
Sun Zinan learned to take detours every time he saw him, but the more he hid, the more Sun Ziyan wanted to bully him.
One night, Sun Zinan woke up in a daze around midnight, feeling like something was wrong and that something was crawling across his hand. He wondered to himself, and got up to turn on the bedside lamp. He immediately saw seven or eight black spiders the size of coins crawling on his quilt, their backs striped and ugly. They crawled about everywhere under the dim light, and one was even hanging off the sleeve of his pajamas, climbing up rapidly.
Sun Zinan was scared to the point of going crazy. It wasn’t an exaggeration to say his soul was in a state of disarray; he almost died on the spot.
He screamed, leaping out of bed and rushing to the door, but he couldn’t unlock it—Sun Ziyan had locked the door from outside and laughed wildly as he heard his heart-rending cries.
Sun Zinan would never forget this hellish scene.
Fortunately, Sun Ziyan had not completely lost his mind and did not go so far as to throw poisonous spiders into his brother’s room. If he had been bitten, Sun Zinan would have met God on the spot.
He pounded against his door madly. The movements were not small, but not a single servant dared to go upstairs and check. When Sun Zinan realized it was impossible to open the door and that there was no other path of escaping, he opened the window, stumbled onto the balcony, and jumped off the second floor.
This finally shocked the entire family into action.
Sun Zinan had been shocked, then jumped off a building, breaking a bone while having a high fever and almost lost his little life. He spent over a year in the hospital before he could function normally again. His health was still poor to this day. He suffered bronchitis every winter because of the events that year.
Sun Ying gave Sun Ziyan a harsh lecture and kicked him out of S Province in a fit of rage, sending him to an outside company to work for three years. By the time Sun Ziyan had returned to the Sun family with a heart full of vengeance, ready to enact his revenge, Sun Zinan had long been sent to a boarding school by Sun Ying to continue his studies.
In the fifteen years that ensued, the two of them rarely had contact with each other. The two brothers only reunited when Sun Zinan graduated abroad and came back. Many years later, the two of them finally made peace in front of their father, faking their smiles to hide their debts of hatred.