Don’t Pretend to be Poor with Me - Chapter 47

Song Yan, I like you

Clearly, it was a sentence that should have invoked a beating from Song Yan, but in that moment, Song Yan didn’t know why, but he suddenly felt a sense of guilt for no reason at all, not wanting Xia Zhiye to continue the following sentence.

Although he couldn’t tell what the source of this guilt was, his subconscious instinct overruled his sober emotional cognition. He always felt that the following words shouldn’t be said by Xia Zhiye, and that he also shouldn’t listen to them.

Fortunately, the sightseeing bus just happened to arrive at the medical tent, and he pushed Xia Zhiye’s hand away: “You’re the one who’s the idiot.”

Then his long legs unfurled towards the ground, and he quickly escaped from the sightseeing bus.

But as a result, he moved too quickly, and his movements were too sudden. Just as he touched the ground, his waist softened out of pain, and he nearly stumbled to the ground. Fortunately, a pair of familiar palms steadily supported him.

“Are you still going to run?”

Xia Zhiye’s tone was as if he was a bit angry, but also as if he found it funny.

With a wooden face, Song Yan replied: “Let go.”

“You just continue to be stubborn.” This time, Xia Zhiye didn’t succumb to Song Yan’s abuse of authority at all, directly supporting Song Yan and placing the other onto a bed in the medical treatment room, “Doctor, he seems to have strained his waist, can I bother you to help check it out.”

Only then did Song Yan realize, if they were purely comparing physical strength, then he probably really was no match for Xia Zhiye. He could only lay on the bed, burying his head into the pillow, pretending that he couldn’t hear anything or see anything, just avoiding all possible conversation that might follow.

It was the first time that Xia Zhiye saw a certain someone so arrogantly demonstrate this kind of ostrich posture1. He stood next to the bed, watched as the other jerked around because the doctor was pressing against his waist, gently grit his teeth, really wanting to pick a certain someone up to teach them a lesson.

But fortunately, the situation wasn’t that serious, and the doctor quickly produced a professional judgment: “It’s just a trivial muscle strain. Later I’ll get a bag of ice that you can apply to your body. If you rest for a few days you’ll be fine.”

Xia Zhiye was still not reassured: “But he looks like he’s in a lot of pain.”

“Who’s fault is that?” The doctor immediately retorted, “No matter how trivial the strain is, you have to rest. If you don’t manage it well then just let it pass, but you even ran off to rock climb. If he doesn’t feel pain, then will you?”

After saying this with a huge eye roll, they turned around and left to get an ice pack.

Xia Zhiye finally felt a bit more reassured, glanced at Song Yan’s entire head buried in the pillow only leaving out the very tip of his ear, then squatted, leaned in close to Song Yan’s ear, and quietly chuckled: “I really am pained.”

Song Yan’s ear trembled.

Xia Zhiye: “I’m distressed for you.”

Song Yan: “……”

After three seconds of freezing silence, Song Yan sat up with gnashing teeth and lifted the pillow up to smack Xia Zhiye’s face: “Can you not be so fucking crude!”

“Am I crude? I can be even more crude, if you want to hear……”

“Shut up! Hiss——”

Song Yan hadn’t finished beating the other up when he collapsed while sucking in a breath of cold air.

This just happened to be seen by the doctor who returned with the ice pack. Seeing as this patient actually attempted an act of extreme violence in the medical treatment room, their face immediately collapsed: “Try beating others up again? If you do it again, you’ll probably have to lay on the bed for the rest of your life!”

“Then when the time comes, I’ll be there to serve you.” Xia Zhiye supported his chin while looking upwards, bending his eyes with an extremely shameless smile.

Song Yan sat on the bed while holding the pillow in his head, wishing he could directly beat the other to death. But there was a third party in the room, so he could only grit his teeth then lay down on the bed again.

The doctor helped him apply the ice pack, then motioned for Xia Zhiye to come over to help him press it down: “Just apply it for 20 or 30 minutes. Apply it again later when you go home tonight, then again tomorrow morning.”

“Okay, no problem.”

Xia Zhiye appeared quite reliable, and the doctor also left after feeling reassured.

The door just closed when Song Yan flew up and kicked Xia Zhiye aside: “Get away from laozi!”

But his ankle was easily caught by Xia Zhiye, who pushed it back down: “If you move again, I’ll sit on your legs.”

“……” Song Yan imagined that scenario, “Xia Zhiye, are you sick?”

“Tell me which one of us is sick.” Xia Zhiye reasonably refuted, “Who was it that clearly knew they had already strained themselves, but still insisted on rock climbing, then wound up here, applying an ice pack on such a cold day? Are you sick or am I sick?”

Song Yan knew he was wrong, and chose to quietly lay back down.

A wise man knows better than to fight when the odds are against him. It won’t be too late to beat Xia Zhiye up after his waist gets better.

“So can you tell me why you had to insist on climbing?” Xia Zhiye didn’t think that Song Yan was such an impulsive and irrational person. He definitely had some special reason which led to him doing such a thing, so Xia Zhiye quietly asked.

Song Yan lay on the bed with his eyelids drooping down, covering up the emotions in his eyes, then replied calmly: “No reason, just that I didn’t want to lose to that Ultraman.”

“Is it because of little mahjong?”

Xia Zhiye didn’t believe Song Yan’s nonsense at all, and directly asked.

Song Yan denied it very quickly: “No.”

Xia Zhiye nodded: “Then later, I’ll tell little mahjong that Yan gege was seriously injured in order to satisfy her wish, and make her feel sad and guilty for the rest of her life.”

“?” Song Yan turned his head to look at Xia Zhiye, “Do you not understand human language2?”

Xia Zhiye turned the ice pack over: “That would only make sense if you spoke human language.”

“……”

Song Yan could tell that the situation today really stirred Xia Zhiye up, and he definitely couldn’t deceive the other, nor did he want Xia Zhiye to mention other things again.

So he once again laid down, “It wasn’t because of little mahjong, it was because of myself.”

His voice was half covered by the pillow, and it sounded a bit smothered and a bit far away: “This is the first time I’ve been to the amusement park.”

Xia Zhiye’s hand holding the ice pack froze slightly.

“When I was younger, my mother was always sick, and my father didn’t really care about me, so I’ve never been to the amusement park. Every time I would see other little friends visit the amusement park with their mothers and fathers and I was always very envious, so I threw a tantrum asking them to take me.”

“That day, my father seemed to be in a good mood, and promised he would take me and my mother that weekend, so my mother was also in a very good mood.”

“I still remember that day. The sky in Beijing was extremely blue, my mother dressed up particularly beautifully, and even had me change into formal attire. We were at home waiting for my father, but ultimately, we kept waiting, kept waiting, until he finally appeared in an event on TV together with another woman.”

“That was the last time I saw my mother, and later, I ended up never visiting an amusement park.”

“It wasn’t because I rejected it, or because it left a shadow on me. Just purely because after I couldn’t obtain the things that I wanted as a child, I didn’t want it after I grew up.”

“So I don’t want to become the kind of person like my father, nor do I want other children to feel disappointed. It’s that simple.”

The words were said understatedly, as if he were just a bystander calmly retelling someone else’s story. He didn’t care, and even found it meaningless. However, when you paid attention to his actions, there was a certain stubbornness and awkwardness that no one could understand.

The finger Xia Zhiye was using to press down on the ice pack was a bit frozen.

Song Yan heard the lack of movement from the other, turned around, then saw the other with his head lowered as if he was daydreaming, then asked: “What are you thinking about?”

Xia Zhiye raised his eyes: “Nothing, just thinking that it seems the fireworks show has already started, do you want to go see it?”

“?”

Without waiting for Song Yan to react as to what those words meant, Xia Zhiye put the ice pack down, helped Song Yan arrange his clothes, then while half hugging, half coaxing, he picked the other up, holding hands as they walked out.

From beginning to end, Song Yan was manipulated about in a daze, not quite reacting as to what was going on.

In his imagination, after he finished saying these things, Xia Zhiye would either say pitying words of comfort, or scold him as an idiot. But what did he mean, having no reaction at all, as if he didn’t hear Song Yan’s words?

By the time he finally reacted, he had already been carried out by Xia Zhiye onto the fairytale street covered in the warm bright lights after nightfall.

People were coming and going around them, and his waist didn’t hurt as much after the application of the cold compress. It was just that he felt burnt by Xia Zhiye’s right hand, their ten fingers intertwined, and the couple’s bracelet between their wrists was dazzling.

Song Yan batted at the other’s hand, wanting to struggle free, but Xia Zhiye’s fingers tightened its grip.

Two big boys wearing the same style of Marvel sweaters holding hands as they walked in the amusement park, no matter how one looked, they kept attracting others’ gazes.

Noticing that several girls around him covered their mouth and giggled without malice, Song Yan felt his ears were a little warm. While gnashing his teeth, he said fiercely: “Xia Zhiye, what do you want to do?”

“Take you to see the fireworks show.”

Xia Zhiye replied quite naturally.

Song Yan unhappily replied: “When did I ever say that I wanted to watch the fireworks show?”

“Didn’t you say you’ve never seen it as a child?”

“I’ve seen Japan’s Fireworks Convention.”

“Who did you see it with?”

“The teacher at summer camp.”

“Then this time is different.”

“How is it different?”

Xia Zhiye’s steps paused, then he turned back, then laughed: “Because this time you’re watching them with me in the amusement park.”

At the end of the fairytale street there was a river bank, and across the river bank was the castle performing the fireworks show.

The wind along the river blew gently, lifted some of the hair on his forehead, and the light along the fairytale street landed on the other’s light brown eyes, following along the gentle slope of his eyes, like a fox spirit trying to deceive a good scholar, he deliberately showcased a gentle and attractive appearance.

Song Yan: “……”

Fuck.

Sure enough, his heart was not good.

In order to avoid getting heart disease, Song Yan’s will to survive made him shake off Xia Zhiye’s hand, but accidentally bumped into a small child amongst the congested crowd.

The little child plopped down, his butt hitting the floor, and tears began pooling in his eyes as if they were about to fall down. Song Yan hurriedly crouched down, wanting to coax the child.

But a pair of arms with folded cuffs of a button up moved faster than him, and gently yet powerfully picked the little child up: “Baby don’t cry, daddy will hug you.”

Next to the man was a woman wearing a skirt and a man’s blazer draped over her shoulders, who hurriedly handed over a stick of cotton candy: “Baby don’t cry, how about mommy feed you some candy?”

The little child’s tears immediately transformed into sniffles, and with a bright smile the child replied: “Okay!”

Only then did Song Yan sigh with relief, then quietly replied: “Sorry, I was careless.”

The gentleman who was only wearing a shirt and trousers lowly chuckled: “No worries, children aren’t that fussy, no need to worry too much.”

After speaking, he held his son while his other hand held his wife’s hand, and they walked along the safety path.

Clearly, he was a mature and prudent businessman, yet he wore a glittering Mickey ear headband on his head, obviously to form a pair with his wife’s Minnie ear headband as well his son’s Donald Duck hat. Meanwhile, his wife held the cotton candy up high, feeding it to the big and small pair next to her while laughing.

With just one look, you could tell that this couldn’t be a more happy family.

This was a tenderness that Song Yan had never experienced in his life, nor would he ever be able to experience it in the future.

For example, ever since he was a child, he couldn’t cry.

Because when he cried as a child, his mother would go crazy.

When he cried after he grew up, Song Minghai would scold him for being useless.

So it was best if he didn’t look at those kinds of scenes. Anyway, he had already passed the childish age when he still wanted such indulgent company. If he couldn’t get it, then it wasn’t the worst.

Song Yan looked away, reaching his hand out to put the hood from his sweater on his head, his eyebrows hidden under the shadow, only exposing a thin and pale lower jaw and a slightly taut lip。

Xia Zhiye saw all this, and silently let out a breath of air from the bottom of his heart. He rubbed the hood and whispered: “Stand here and don’t move……”

He didn’t finish speaking yet when Song Yan interrupted him: “If you dare buy tangerines, you’re dead3.”

“……”

He’s really not cooperative at all.

Xia Zhiye chuckled, “Don’t worry, I won’t buy tangerines. Just wait here for me, don’t run off.”

After speaking, he passed through the densely packed crowd, and forced his way out.

Song Yan felt it was inexplicable, then turned around and leaned against the rails, looking towards the princess castle in front of him.

As a child, he had always thought that the amusement park was the world’s most mysterious place. As long as you entered the amusement park, it was as if you entered a fairytale world and everyone was smiling and blissful.

And in fact, it really seemed that this was the case. The people in the crowd beside him clamored about, some were perfect families of three, others were little affectionate couples, and if not, there were young teenagers jesting about with laughter.

Only he looked like an outcast amidst the crowd just as in the past.

So why exactly did he have to agree to come to the amusement park with Xia Zhiye, and why did he inexplicably have to be dragged to watch this fireworks show.

Song Yan felt on edge, and turned around, wanting to leave.

But it was unknown when the little child Song Yan just bumped into before once again ran back over, wearing that Donald Duck hat, holding cotton candy, facing upwards while blinking his eyes: “Does gege not have a mommy and daddy, how come you’re all alone?”

Despite knowing that the interpersonal relationships of a little child that was two or three years old only included a mother, father, grandma, and grandpa, and that asking this kind of question wasn’t to scold him, at that moment, Song Yan still felt as if he just suffered a critical hit.

He lowered his head to look at the child, was just unsure as to how to reply to this question, when he felt his own shoulder grabbed onto by someone from behind him, immediately followed by a lazy voice that could be heard from next to his ear: “Gege has a big brother, he’s not alone.”

At that moment, Song Yan didn’t know why, but felt that Xia Zhiye’s words weren’t in response to the little child’s question, but was directed at him.

He turned his head, and indeed happened to face Xia Zhiye’s charming and smiling eyes. His heartbeat skipped a beat, then looked away in a panic: “Don’t speak groundlessly in front of a child.”

“When did I speak groundlessly?”

Xia Zhiye’s arm was around Song Yan’s shoulder, and turned his head to look at Song Yan, “What, our Yan ge is shy?”

Song Yan wanted to immediately scold ‘fuck off’, but there was still a milky child nearby, and he could only endure the urge to scold the other, then pushed the other off with a slap of his hand: “Don’t bother me!”

“If you wear this, then I won’t bother you.”

“?”

Song Yan raised his head slightly, his gaze pressed under the brim of the hood, then saw a huge cotton candy and an illuminated Mickey headband, waving about in front of his eyes.

“……Go away! I’m not wearing it! Xia Zhiye, I’m really going to hit you, ah……oh.”

Song Yan was in the midst of scolding the other when a piece of a light pink cotton candy was suddenly stuffed into his mouth.

The strawberry flavored, soft, pink threads melted on his tongue, saturating his taste buds. A taste that was originally so sweet it was greasy, was just perfect for dispersing his originally bitter mood.

And in the moment he was startled, Xia Zhiye placed the Mickey headband over the hood on his head.

By the time Song Yan realized what had happened, he was so angry he directly wanted to kick Xia Zhiye to death, but the moment he raised his head, he happened to discover that Xia Zhiye wore a Minnie headband on his head. In contrast with the 187cm tall male, it was actually indescribably cute.

And this cute boy was even smiling while looking at him: “Not bad, our Yan ge is indeed a natural beauty, he looks good no matter what he’s wearing.”

And that indescribable feeling choked Song Yan up, and that breath of air couldn’t go up or down, so he could only coldly say: “Why are you acting crazy again.”

“No reason, just that I feel that our little friend Song Yan should have the things that all the other little friends have.” Xia Zhiye looked at him with his eyes lowered, his eyes bent slightly, and his smile was both indulgent and leisurely.

At that moment, there was an inexplicable sense of guilt and panic that once again rushed up to Song Yan’s head. He didn’t want to face this state of mind, nor did he want Xia Zhiye to continue saying his next words.

With one hand, he ripped off the head band, then with a cold face, he stuffed it into Xia Zhiye’s hands: “I said it already, after I grew up, I don’t want the things I couldn’t obtain as a child. Do you not understand.”

After he said this, he squeezed himself into the crowd, in an attempt to leave this bustling environment that was incompatible with himself.

But his wrist was grabbed onto by a familiarly warm palm: “Was the cotton candy just now sweet?”

It was a senseless question, and Song Yan paused slightly.

Yet his lack of answer was already the clearest answer.

“So you see, what you wanted when you were a child may not be unwanted after you grew up.”

“Xia Zhiye, what do you mean?”

Song Yan asked very coldly.

Xia Zhiye answered patiently and gently: “What I mean to say is that you shouldn’t say you don’t want it because you couldn’t get it as a child, nor should you say you don’t want it after you grew up out of fear that you won’t be able to obtain it.”

For example, cotton candy.

For example, toys.

For example, love and companionship.

“Song Yan, whatever you want, whatever you like, none of it is shameful and there’s no need to avoid it.”

“I’m not avoiding it.”

“Then turn around.”

“……”

Song Yan was so agitated that he couldn’t wait to disappear from here immediately, and he also didn’t know what he would face if he looked back.

But he knew that if he didn’t look back, then he would never be able to prove to Xia Zhiye and himself that he simply didn’t want it, rather than because he was avoiding it.

So he turned around, faced Xia Zhiye, then with an indifferent and calm expression: “Xia Zhiye, what I want, and what I like, what exactly does it have to do with you? Why do you insist……”

“Because I like you.”

Song Yan questioned the other halfway when he was suddenly interrupted. He stared blankly for a moment, his gaze as he stared at Xia Zhiye was brimming with a sense of loss and incredulousness.

Meanwhile Xia Zhiye only stared down at him, each word spoken with confidence and tenderness, as if the other didn’t plan on giving him any chance for him to run away.

“Song Yan, I like you, the kind of like where I want to give you all the things that you want and all the things that you like. So I care whether or not you’re happy, or having a good time. I care if you’re healthy or not, or if you’re having a hard time. I care about what you want and what you like.”

“Song Yan, this is all because I like you, the kind where I really, really, like you. So do you understand now?”

The clock just happened to ring eight times.

Fireworks exploded in the night sky with the most gorgeous and decisive attitude, and then fell in all directions as everyone applauded and cheered.

Only the youth amidst the crowd heard that sentence at that moment that he ultimately couldn’t escape.

Xia Zhiye was right. It wasn’t that he didn’t want it, he just wanted to avoid it.

But the person that liked him was far braver than him.

1. Allegedly, when an ostrich is dodging an attack, it buries its head in the sand, and is thus called the ‘ostrich pose’. Meant to describe a person’s behavior, who believes that as long as they cover their eyes (head) they can escape and no one can see them.

2. ‘Human language’ = sensible and reasonable words

3. A meme. If you buy someone oranges, it means you’re their ‘dad’