Chapter 78

Jiang Ji didn’t know why he had come to Honglu Slope Street tonight. Huang Ying had already booked a new resident singer, and he hadn’t been here much in the past month.

Qin Qingzhuo still hadn’t replied to that message. He probably wouldn’t reply.

Even though he had already accepted this fact, why couldn’t he help but glance at the phone screen over and over again?

Also, he had had a cigarette in his mouth for half an hour, yet why hadn’t he lit it? What unrealistic expectations was he still holding onto?

He plugged in his earphones, irritably flicking the lighter open and closed, watching a stray dog across the street bark at him a couple of times.

Then he noticed someone approaching not far away.

The dim streetlight cast long shadows, so the shadow approached, but the person hadn’t yet.

Jiang Ji didn’t turn his head. He didn’t want anyone to bother him right now.

But the person approached anyway, just a few steps away, stopping and staring at him.

He had wanted to be left alone, but now he couldn’t ignore it.

He frowned, about to ask “What do you want?” in a harsh tone, but when he turned to see the person, he couldn’t bring himself to say it— the person standing a few steps away was actually Qin Qingzhuo.

Jiang Ji furrowed his brow, his expression unpleasant, still biting the cigarette in his mouth, looking like someone not to be messed with, just standing there like that.

For a moment, he doubted if he was dreaming. Otherwise, why would Qin Qingzhuo suddenly appear on Honglu Slope Street in the middle of the night?

Could it be because of wishful thinking?

They locked eyes for a moment, and Qin Qingzhuo took steps toward him.

He stopped in front of Jiang Ji and reached out to take the cigarette from his mouth.

“Smoking again ah…” Qin Qingzhuo sighed lightly as he looked at the cigarette in his hand.

Jiang Ji stood up straighter, looking down at him slightly, “I haven’t smoked.”

He noticed that Qin Qingzhuo was wearing an earring on his earlobe today, silver in color, shining under the streetlight.

He realized that this might be the first time he had seen Qin Qingzhuo wearing an earring, and it looked very good, even better than he had imagined.

He wanted to reach out and touch it, but after realizing this, he put his fingers back in his pocket and clenched them gently.

“Why aren’t you smoking?” Qin Qingzhuo looked up at him.

The slightly deep-eyed young man looked a bit thinner than a month ago, with slightly shorter hair, but his gaze remained the same.

Direct, dark, as if weighted.

“I don’t know.” After a moment of silence, Jiang Ji said.

Qin Qingzhuo held the cigarette, after a few seconds, asked again, “What are you listening to?”

Jiang Ji took off the earphone from his right ear and raised his hand to put it into Qin Qingzhuo’s ear.

As his fingers touched his ear, a bit cold, Qin Qingzhuo suddenly remembered the third match, when he helped Jiang Ji clean the coffee stains off his back in the bathroom. Jiang Ji also did this, gently putting the earphone into his ear.

But this time, the song in the earphone wasn’t his, it was a British rock song. Qin Qingzhuo realized that he was actually feeling a bit disappointed.

Maybe because he had been drinking, his mind wasn’t very clear. He heard himself saying this thought aloud, “It’s not my song…”

Jiang Ji looked at Qin Qingzhuo, the Qin Qingzhuo who said this looked a bit sad, but Jiang Ji felt that this might just be his own illusion.

Then Qin Qingzhuo put the cigarette he was holding between his lips and reached out his hand to ask for the lighter.

Jiang Ji hesitated for a moment. This was the first time Qin Qingzhuo had smoked in front of him.

With the lighter that had been flicked hundreds of times in his hand, Jiang Ji didn’t hand it to Qin Qingzhuo.

He lit the flame, bringing the flickering flame closer to the cigarette between Qin Qingzhuo’s lips.

Qin Qingzhuo lowered his head slightly, approaching the flickering flame.

Jiang Ji saw that Qin Qingzhuo’s lips were very red, shimmering with moisture, as if he had been drinking.

The cigarette lit up, and Qin Qingzhuo took a deep puff, exhaling white smoke.

—Giving oneself a moment with a cigarette isn’t too much, right?

Through the smoke, he looked at Jiang Ji and said, “Let’s take a stroll together.”

They walked aimlessly along the alleys near Honglu Slope, the songs in their headphones playing one after another, but neither paid attention, nor absorbed any of it.

Finally, Jiang Ji spoke first, “Happy birthday.”

“Thank you,” Qin Qingzhuo whispered.

“And this is for you.” Jiang Ji handed the record box he was holding to Qin Qingzhuo. “These are the songs I wrote for you. It’s not much of a birthday present, but keep it as a memento.”

Qin Qingzhuo took it, “Hmm.”

“Can you listen to them?”

“Yeah, I can.”

After saying this, there was another moment of silence.

They walked ahead, and the stray dog from the opposite side of the alley earlier somehow followed them.

When the large black dog, more than a meter long, rushed over, Qin Qingzhuo instinctively took a step back.

Perhaps sensing Qin Qingzhuo’s fear, the snarling dog suddenly became arrogant, stopped, and barked loudly at Qin Qingzhuo.

Jiang Ji grabbed Qin Qingzhuo’s wrist, pulling him to his other side, stooped to pick up a stone, and threw it towards the dog while scolding, “Get lost.”

The dog, realizing that Jiang Ji was scarier than itself, quickly ran away.

“Are you afraid of dogs?” Jiang Ji asked.

“I’m not afraid of domesticated ones,” Qin Qingzhuo said. “These stray dogs without a leash… a bit.”

“Then let’s go farther,” Jiang Ji still didn’t let go of Qin Qingzhuo’s wrist, holding him towards another alley. “Let’s go that way.”

Turning into another even darker alley, Jiang Ji’s fingers traced down Qin Qingzhuo’s wrist and then held his hand.

Jiang Ji’s fingers were quite long, covering Qin Qingzhuo’s entire hand. He felt Qin Qingzhuo’s hand was cold, but also realized that Qin Qingzhuo didn’t try to pull away, so he held it a bit tighter.

For a long stretch, they walked hand in hand. Qin Qingzhuo started to speak, “Lately, you…”

Coincidentally, Jiang Ji also spoke, saying the same words as Qin Qingzhuo, “Lately, you…”

After the initial silence, they collided with each other’s words and then fell silent simultaneously.

After a pause, Jiang Ji said, “You go first.”

Qin Qingzhuo didn’t reject and continued with what he wanted to say, “How have you been lately?”

“The ranking matches are over,” Jiang Ji said. “We are first in this segment, so we can skip the semifinals and directly advance to the finals.”

Qin Qingzhuo nodded.

He was not surprised by this result; he already knew that Jiang Ji was very talented, and Asperatus was also excellent. They should have achieved such results.

“And you, how have you been lately?” Jiang Ji asked. “Is your ear feeling better?”

“Hmm.”

After walking a few steps, Qin Qingzhuo added, “Actually, it’s not entirely an issue with my ears.”

Jiang Ji turned his head somewhat unexpectedly to look at him.

“It’s Eustachian tube dysfunction,” Qin Qingzhuo continued.

He didn’t know why he suddenly brought this up. He had no intention of mentioning it before coming here, nor did he even plan to see Jiang Ji. But now he had a strong urge to tell Jiang Ji about it.

“Continuous tinnitus and ear fullness, enhanced self-hearing during attacks, a distinct feeling of fullness in the ears, accompanied by sharp ringing in the ears and intense dizziness. Sometimes it’s severe enough to cause vocal cord damage, hearing loss, and sensorineural deafness. It has been intermittent for four years, sometimes better, sometimes worse, but it has never completely disappeared. Whether it can be cured or not, the doctors couldn’t give a definite answer.”

Although Jiang Ji had guessed Qin Qingzhuo’s condition earlier, hearing him describe these things so calmly still gave Jiang Ji a dull pain in his heart.

“For how long?”

“More than four years.”

“It’s very painful… isn’t it?”

“At first, I wanted to die,” Qin Qingzhuo said. “Later… I just got used to it.”

Qin Qingzhuo said this in a quiet tone, with a light voice that seemed to carry a hint of indifference. But in Jiang Ji’s mind, many scenes suddenly flashed—

The morning after learning about Ji Chi’s affair, Qin Qingzhuo, unable to hear himself speak clearly, repeatedly looking at his own lips;

Standing on the stage a month ago, pale-faced, unsteady, facing hundreds of interrogating eyes;

After impulsively stopping the car, retching in the bathroom, Qin Qingzhuo sitting on the sofa, rubbing his ears uncomfortably;

There were probably only a few serious episodes like this, and some moments when Jiang Ji might not have noticed…

At the same time, those harsh voices from the internet also rang loudly in his ears—

“Utterly disappointed.”

“Don’t come out here and pollute everyone’s ears.”

“Serves you right, you deserve it!”

“If you had even a shred of love for music left, you wouldn’t let yourself become like this.”

How did Qin Qingzhuo manage to endure this long-standing intermittent torment?

Originally, Jiang Ji had many doubts about the details of that concert four years ago, but now he couldn’t bring himself to ask a single question.

He couldn’t bear to ask, nor could he bear to make Qin Qingzhuo recall that painful experience.

The dull pain grew stronger, and Jiang Ji clasped Qin Qingzhuo’s hand, enveloping it completely in his palm.

They walked a little further, reaching the end of the alley, and their steps coincidentally came to a halt.

The cigarette between his fingertips was about to burn out. Qin Qingzhuo took one last drag, and the white smoke quickly drifted away with the wind.

“It’s been four years already,” Qin Qingzhuo looked at the cigarette. “I haven’t smoked for such a long time…”

The end of the alley was dimly lit, with distant street lights shining. From Jiang Ji’s perspective, he could see the flickering shadows cast by Qin Qingzhuo’s lowered eyelashes.

Since the moment Qin Qingzhuo suddenly appeared in front of him, Jiang Ji felt that tonight’s Qin Qingzhuo was somewhat different from before. He seemed a bit desolate, a bit sorrowful, and a bit fragile. It was another side of Qin Qingzhuo that Jiang Ji had never seen before.

“Why did you smoke today?” Jiang Ji asked.

“I don’t know.”

Qin Qingzhuo looked down at the flickering spark of the cigarette butt. After a few seconds, he said in a very soft voice, “Probably because of you.”