4. The Heartbroken Man on a Snowy Night
Perhaps when Sui Tang said he was going to the hotel, Wang Meili should have taken the hint and followed him.
For him, the hotel was home, and home was a hotel.
Sui Tang's home was even more hotel than the hotel.
#
#
Wang Meili had thought she was stepping into a splendid pleasure ground, only to find herself in a cold graveyard.
Then again, how many good birds were there on a dating app? Even if a bird's hardware passed inspection, you couldn't escape the other fatal flaws.
In the enormous flat, Wang Meili had not even had the chance to see the interior rooms before she was rooted to the spot, watching the owner tear apart his own home.
Sui Tang impatiently took down his ex-wife's enormous art photograph.
A floor-to-ceiling art photograph required two to four people to install or remove. He took a nail-removing tool and a hammer, using leverage to pry it loose bit by bit.
When it was hanging precariously, Wang Meili tried to help hold it steady, but one sharp "Get out of the way" from him frightened her back to the end of the corridor.
The heavy frame crashed onto the mirror-bright marble floor with the sound of an earthquake. She covered her ears, stunned by the shock, nearly deafened. It reminded her of when she was little, when the neighborhood uncles had taken her into the city to watch them demolish buildings and hear the explosions.
Sui Tang's bare feet crushed the frame. He tossed aside the hammer and began taking down the smaller photographs from the wall.
As he raised his arm and hurled the pictures down, the colors on the wall peeled away from the surface bit by bit.
Sui Tang sounded as though he were explaining himself, yet also mocking himself. "I've always been too lazy to come back. These things were too much of an eyesore."
"You were married?" She saw the Republican era style wedding photograph. Sui Tang in the picture wore a rare smile, though it was somewhat stiff, as if Photoshop technology had forcibly pulled the corners of his mouth upward.
"Divorced."
"How long ago?"
"Not long."
Sui Tang had been divorced for three months. His marriage itself had lasted no more than ten days. Eight of those ten days had been spent struggling through the divorce.
The funniest part was that the enormous art photograph, the wedding photos, the wedding ceremony, and the elaborate design and renovation of the house had taken a full year.
At this point, Sui Tang stopped there and said no more about his private affairs.
There were plenty of lonely married men on dating apps. Wang Meili was accustomed to strangers, and she had heard plenty of bizarre love stories, so she did not find it strange.
She rubbed her hair, sat cross-legged on the sofa with her knees propped up, and, seeing Sui Tang slumped against the wall, tried to liven the atmosphere by telling him a story.
She told him about a man she had hooked up with three or four years ago. That night, she had done nothing at all, merely holding that Spanish boy while listening to him cry for an entire night about how his girlfriend no longer loved him.
"He cried all night?"
"Mm. When the sun came up, I opened the curtains, and his eyes were so swollen he could barely open them." She did not mention that she had cried along with him, her tears refusing to stop until dawn.
That was not cool.
He let out a nasal scoff. "Interesting."
"Mm, it really was interesting. If he'd held me and came all night, I might not necessarily remember it. But if he held me and cried all night, I'd probably never forget it for the rest of my life."
Sui Tang stared at the corner of the picture frame. It took him a while to process it before he finally laughed aloud.
Wang Meili crouched in front of him, rocking back and forth like she had ADHD. "How about it? Want to consider becoming the man I can't forget?"
Their eyes met. She smiled and patted her own shoulder, very gallantly. "You can cry on me."
"No need." He glanced at her and got up to wash his hands.
Oh, come on, why not? Wang Meili followed him, bouncing along mischievously. "Why? Are you still in love with her?" Come on, she was willing to hear the story. Let her see the endless twists and turns of a cold-faced man's tender heart.
Water wet his fingers. Sui Tang searched around the sink, opening and closing drawers roughly, the sounds echoing through the bathroom, making quite a commotion.
"Who gets married because of love?" His usual unhurried calm was nowhere to be found in this subject. A lightning fast divorce was probably one of the more regrettable strokes of his life.
Wang Meili found the whole thing absurd. "Who gets married without love?"
Even after witnessing countless marriages collapse with her own eyes, Wang Meili had never doubted that the reason people foolishly rushed into the grave of marriage was because they had been overcome by love. Otherwise, why would anyone, while still young, willingly walk into such a thing?
Especially a man like Sui Tang. If not for love, was he submitting himself for money? His bearing was nothing like something money could manufacture.
Sui Tang tore open the packaging of the liquid hand soap and pressed the pump more than ten times. At last, fresh milky white soap came out, carrying a milky fragrance.
A woman had chosen it.
Wang Meili leaned against the doorway, watching his slender, sharply jointed fingers work the foam into a thick lather, crystal bright and round, circling back and forth. It made her hungry enough to swallow a mouthful of saliva.
Sui Tang digested this expressionlessly and said without pain or feeling, "Then... I wish you happiness."
Tch.
Seeing that she had gotten as far as she could, she let it go. If he did not want to talk, then so be it.
"Fine, I'll accept your blessing. You can't give me distant happiness, so give me some immediate happiness first." Wang Meili slipped her hand beneath the faucet, letting the running water flow over their joined fingers. Her palm tightened, their ten fingers interlacing.
Their knuckles rubbed together, the little whirlpool of living water caught between their palms gradually warmed by the heat of their hands.
She did not let her Bodhisattva heart, which had been born to accompany wounded men through heartbreak, come out to save him.
Men were best to fuck when they were heartbroken. She liked melancholic men. Preferably the kind who could cry hard in her arms, then soften in her arms, coming and going while the water never stopped.
#
#
Cold water ran down. She guided his cold hand beneath her sweater, moving upward from the hem without hesitation.
Their breathing fell into the rhythm of animal activity.
She stared straight at him, guiding his hand as it moved back and forth between the narrow openings, controlling his hand so that he could not wander away. Until the masculine strength beneath the sweater rose, taking the initiative in turn and catching her wrist, only then did Wang Meili tilt back her neck, using clever leverage to anchor herself around his waist and jump up, locking herself against him.
She pretended to be a fierce beast, proving through action just how formidable she was. His departure and refusal to add her on WeChat last time had wounded her steel-and-iron glass heart.
They were going to get into bed, but she needed to vent her anger too.
As their clothes fell away, they tangled around their bodies, their feet shifting back and forth.
The gaudy luxury of the gold-and-jewel-bright room was sometimes overexposed, sometimes out of focus.
Amid the flickering light and shadow, Wang Meili threw out verbs, chasing his lips, only to be tossed onto the bed by him and turned over.
This time, he did not test the waters.
Wang Meili was satisfied for quite a while, but somewhere amid the jostling and stumbling, dissatisfaction began to grow. She bit her lip hard without making a sound. Taking advantage of his unpreparedness, she turned around and put him cough... underneath her.
After all, there was a considerable difference between men and women, and her movements were inevitably not quite as nimble.
Between the sheets, the two of them briefly turned the bed into a fighting arena. Their targets were not the same cave. They tore and grappled, embracing and kissing. Sui Tang did not understand at first, but slowly, as he read the anger in her eyes, he began to taste what she meant.
The lights were off, the curtains closed, not even the slightest sliver of light coming through. Everything around them was pitch black.
He braced himself beside her ear, lips pressed together, eyes lowered, his black eyes deep and unreadable.
In their endless gaze, Wang Meili tested him with every breath, then launched a surprise attack with her lips.
What a stubborn girl. Even after kissing him she was still dissatisfied. She pinched his chin and kissed him messily several times, wetting half his face, yet still did not pry open his mouth.
#
#
The roar of mountains and seas came to an end in the darkness.
The white spray retreated in a sudden rush.
Wang Meili pretended to pluck the peony pattern from the duvet cover, bringing it to her nose and delicately smelling the clean fragrance of the bedding.
No one lived in this house, but someone cleaned it.
Being rich really was nice.
While Sui Tang went to shower, she sat dazed for a while, then wandered around the living room with her arms folded.
When she grew bored, she took out the entire set of painting supplies piled in the corner. She found the red paint and quickly sketched a pair of blood red lips on the back of the enormous picture frame that had been smashed apart. She had drawn them rather well. Once inspiration struck, she found the black and added a beauty mark to the lips.
A brand new wolf hair brush, and she had already ruined its bristles like this.
The sound of water had continued for a long time without stopping. Wasn't he taking too long? Was he really that dirty?
She ruffled her hair absentmindedly, her thoughts drifting elsewhere.
#
#
Sui Tang came out of the shower and looked around.
He saw the pair of lips and glanced at the painting supplies. “You can paint?”
She turned around. “Does it look good?”
“It’s all right.” After all, it was below zero, and the air conditioning had not been turned on. She □□. Sui Tang asked, “Cold?” He casually found a blanket and draped it over her.
A man who liked to keep clean was good, but one who liked to keep too clean inevitably lost some flavor.
The tussle just now had stirred up quite a few of her emotions.
She had not brought any cigarettes, while Sui Tang neither smoked nor drank, and there was not a damn thing in the house. Dispirited, she gathered the blanket around herself. “I have to go.”
Sui Tang raised his eyes, staring into hers to determine how much of that statement was stubbornness and how much was probing.
Snow was falling thickly outside the window. He said, “Why not take a shower before you go?”
Wang Meili did not want to make things awkward, so she teased him sarcastically. “If I go in there and want to do it again, is that okay too?”
“What do you think?” He kissed her lightly.
“Then let’s save me the trouble of going to the bathroom.” She opened her arms and wrapped them around him with particular birdlike dependence, twisting her waist coquettishly. “Just do it directly.”
She clung tightly to him and pulled him into the painting, rolling across those freshly painted crimson red lips.
She felt Sui Tang resisting, and deliberately wanted to tease him too. She giggled foolishly, kissing him here and there, softening him little by little.
Unexpectedly, Sui Tang enjoyed it even more than she did, just not in the places where they were having sex.
The paint stuck to their bodies, pulling at the skin and making it terribly uncomfortable. She was only doing it for the thrill, but there was no way they could actually do anything. Every movement felt like a tape getting stuck.
Of course, the key problem was that they had run out of condoms.
She wanted a cigarette, and she was cold too. The fingertips of her right hand rubbed back and forth, rolling an imaginary cigarette between them.
She asked, “Do you think it'll wash off?”
Sui Tang held her by the waist, fire burning in his eyes. “I don't know... I don't have time to think about that right now.”
Wang Meili pressed against his hard length and hesitated for quite a while. She saw his desire, the way his Adam's apple rolled up and down. Little by little, she slid downward, lowered her head and looked, then fell silent for a moment before choosing to leave.
As she dressed, she chatted with him naturally. Since he wanted to open a high-end bar, he needed to join the Scotch Malt Whisky Society. That way, he could both get good liquor and use it for promotion, killing two birds with one stone.
“Their liquor is only sold to members. It used to be by member recommendation, but business isn't good these days. Even the world's largest whisky club is charging a membership fee and letting anyone in now. There's no threshold anymore.”
“You know a lot about alcohol?” He found what she was saying quite interesting. She did not simply harp on the gimmick of drinking, and what she said was fairly practical. After hearing too much empty talk, her way of putting things actually sounded substantial.
“I can't tell you that. I still have to make money off this little bit of mystery.” She winked at him.
As she wrapped her scarf and changed her shoes, her tongue remained quick and she never stopped talking. Once she was all packed up, she still remembered to pick up the empty liquor bottle. “I'll look into it for you when I get back, but based on the taste I just had, I think it's pretty ordinary.”
“Really...”
“Maybe it's homemade liquor with a label slapped on it. It feels like the alcohol content is higher than what the label says.”
“Okay. I just thought it tasted pretty good.”
Sui Tang was bare-chested, wearing a brand new pair of pajama pants, his hands tucked into his pockets as he paced back and forth. He was completely oblivious to the patches of red and black paint on his body.
Wang Meili looked at him and wanted to laugh, but then thought of her own condition, which was not much better, so she did not make the mistake of laughing at someone whose situation was no better than hers.
Sui Tang wanted to keep her there.
But she insisted on leaving.
It was as though she were angry, yet her face was full of smiles.
He walked her to the elevator and asked, “Are you going straight to sleep when you get back?”
Wang Meili pinched the fringe of her scarf and thought for a moment, then turned and gave him a radiant smile. “I'll go home and Bumble a man to kiss.” She stuck out her tongue, smiling as she disappeared into the narrowing gap of the elevator doors.
With a clang, the elevator descended, and the corners of her mouth fell too.
No comments:
Post a Comment