LBC |Love Beyond Control/Chapter 27

Chapter 27

Before dawn had fully broken, the faint morning light seeped into the room through the gap beneath the curtain.

The room was somewhat messy. Several towels, already dried by the air conditioner, had fallen onto the floor, and half the blanket had been kicked off because the temperature had been too high.

The bed was no better. Xiang Zhuifeng had already done his best to keep to the edge of the bed, but Xin Yuan was still extremely tactless, hugging his arm. The fluffy top of his head also moved from time to time, and the tips of his hair kept scratching against Xiang Zhuifeng’s chin.

Because they were so close, Xiang Zhuifeng confirmed that Xin Yuan’s body temperature had returned to normal.

Not only that, Xin Yuan was also sleeping very soundly.

As if very satisfied with the temporary pillow he had found, the moment Xiang Zhuifeng tried to pull his arm out, Xin Yuan pouted at the corners of his mouth, and then immediately hugged Xiang Zhuifeng’s already numb arm even tighter.

To make Xin Yuan regret his taking things too far, Xiang Zhuifeng made no further unnecessary moves.

He closed his eyes and pretended that he was also sleeping very peacefully.

About twenty minutes later, Xiang Zhuifeng heard the breathing in front of him become a little unsteady. Xin Yuan’s head rolled back and forth in his arms, and then he gave a groggy hum.

Xiang Zhuifeng waited very patiently for a few more minutes. At a certain point, the body that had been pressed tightly against him suddenly stiffened, then, as if electrocuted, it threw away his arm and hurriedly recoiled backward.

For several full seconds, Xin Yuan did not move at all, as if he had been completely stunned by everything in front of him.

At this moment, if Xin Yuan had been able to observe carefully, he could have easily spotted the flaw in Xiang Zhuifeng’s pretending to sleep.

But because the fact that he had spent the entire night sleeping in Xiang Zhuifeng’s arms was too shocking, Xin Yuan’s full attention was on how to escape quickly without waking Xiang Zhuifeng. In his retreat, he even failed to notice that his elbow had knocked into the glass cup on the bedside table.

With a sharp crack.

The glass cup fell to the floor and shattered all over the ground.

Xin Yuan was so frightened that he jerked his head around, only then realizing that he had somehow already backed all the way to the edge of the bed, and that in a position with nowhere to hide, he was about to fall toward the glass shards.

However, before the pain could arrive, the wind that suddenly swept up in front of him came first.

Xiang Zhuifeng somehow suddenly sat up, and before he completely fell off, he lunged forward and tightly grabbed Xin Yuan’s wrist.

“Weren’t you already making enough trouble last night? The moment you open your eyes, you’re already preparing to add new trouble for me, is that it?”

With a forceful pull, Xiang Zhuifeng yanked the dazed Xin Yuan back in front of him, looking at him with a very sullen expression.

After one shock after another, Xin Yuan’s already dazed mind began to grow confused again.

At the mention of last night, the messy memories suddenly rushed into his head like a revolving lantern. It was as if he had been stuffed into a washing machine drum, and for a moment he simply could not remember which parts were real and which parts were hallucinations caused by his drunkenness.

“Sorry, sorry…”

No matter whether the other things were true or false, at least the fact that he had spent the night in Xiang Zhuifeng’s arms was real.

Xin Yuan did not dare look into Xiang Zhuifeng’s eyes, and desperately tried to recall the last clear scene in his memory:

“Last night I was on set. Did I drink too much, so Xiaonuan called you and asked you to send me back?”

Faced with this question that was obviously pretending not to know, Xiang Zhuifeng could not even be bothered to give a cold laugh.

Xin Yuan also knew that he had said something pointless again, and lowered his head even more. “Then last night, did I…”

Before he could finish the words, Xin Yuan’s voice had already started to tremble. He comforted himself that perhaps everything was just an illusion, and only then did he gather a little courage to ask:

“I drank too much, I wasn’t really clear-headed. Did I say something to you…?”

Actually, it was not only Xin Yuan who did not want to bring up last night again, Xiang Zhuifeng did not want to either.

But seeing Xin Yuan so nervous now, Xiang Zhuifeng suddenly felt that last night had not been so bad after all, so he withdrew the answer he had already prepared and instead asked back:

“You were talking nonsense last night, and you told me so many things. Which sentence are you asking about?”

Xiang Zhuifeng slowly leaned closer to Xin Yuan, his tone deliberately casual. “Was it that I was very annoying, and that I shouldn’t touch you, or was it that you suddenly burst into tears and threw yourself into my arms, telling me, you…”

“What?”

Xin Yuan suddenly raised his head, his pupils shrinking sharply into tiny points as he stared fixedly at Xiang Zhuifeng. “What did I say to you?”

In the few seconds of Xiang Zhuifeng’s silence, Xin Yuan experienced the longest wait of his life so far.

Xin Yuan did not dare imagine it at all. If those memories were not an illusion, then he had, while knowing full well that Xiang Zhuifeng hated him, shamelessly begged Xiang Zhuifeng to forgive him, and also told Xiang Zhuifeng that he liked him.

Not to mention how much Xiang Zhuifeng would look down on him and despise him, even he himself would no longer be able to face Xiang Zhuifeng for even a second from now on.

As if he knew what Xin Yuan was thinking, Xiang Zhuifeng deliberately prolonged the silence.

He stared at Xin Yuan’s trembling eyelashes, feeling as if he had become the executioner in charge of Xin Yuan’s life. As long as he said even one sentence about the truth of last night, Xin Yuan would collapse immediately.

Just before Xin Yuan’s lips could no longer hold back their trembling together with his gaze, Xiang Zhuifeng finally answered:

“You were drunk like that last night, who could hear what you said clearly.”

A just-right hint of confusion appeared in Xiang Zhuifeng’s eyes again as he asked, “So then, what were you originally going to say to me?”

Because the scene in his memory was too real, Xin Yuan still did not dare relax, and stared at Xiang Zhuifeng for a few more seconds.

Only after confirming that there was really only confusion in Xiang Zhuifeng’s eyes did he finally dare to confirm that Xiang Zhuifeng had not heard his plea, had not heard those shameful feelings of his.

“No, I don’t remember either.”

The heart that had nearly jumped out of Xin Yuan’s chest finally fell back into place. He lowered his head and inconspicuously widened the distance between himself and Xiang Zhuifeng.

“Sorry, I caused you trouble again…”

Xiang Zhuifeng gave a cold snort. “So you also know to use the word ‘again.’”

The dinner invitation that Qiu Xing had extended last night was originally an opportunity actively handed to Xiang Zhuifeng, one that could have completely settled the dispute between Xin Yuan and Qiu Yu.

But what an unfortunate coincidence, Xin Yuan specifically chose that time to get drunk and cause trouble, leaving Xiang Zhuifeng with no choice but to stand Qiu Xing up.

Although Xiang Zhuifeng had not done it on purpose, in the eyes of the uninformed Qiu Xing, that meant he, Xiang Zhuifeng, had not given him face, and had instead put him in a passive position, owing Qiu Xing a favor.

Thinking that he would still have to handle these matters for Xin Yuan later, Xiang Zhuifeng was not at all polite. “Do you think my job is too easy, so you deliberately caused trouble on set just to improve my ability to handle emergencies?”

Xin Yuan knew what Xiang Zhuifeng was referring to. He had just wanted to explain when Xiang Zhuifeng’s words shoved him back again:

“I’m telling you, Xin Yuan, whether it’s you or your mother, if you want to push me out of my current position, then next time you’d better use some more clever methods. Otherwise, the ones who will end up in trouble will only be you yourselves.”

Xiang Zhuifeng’s words were like fine needles stabbing into his ears. Even after finishing makeup and entering the set, the pain was still echoing in Xin Yuan’s head.

He had no reason at all to refute Xiang Zhuifeng.

Because he understood better than anyone that, just as Xiang Zhuifeng had said, his mother not only hated Xiang Zhuifeng, she also stopped at nothing to cause trouble for Xiang Zhuifeng.

No matter how unwilling Xin Yuan was to get involved in these disputes, in the few phone calls his mother made, she would still repeatedly curse at Xiang Zhuifeng for what he had done recently, what methods he had used, and how that had made Xin Jianye trust him more and more, continuously taking away the power in her hands.

And every call also always ended with her telling him that he must stay far away from Xiang Zhuifeng, and not believe a single word this person said.

Even without his mother involved, Xiang Zhuifeng already hated him to the extreme. Now, with his mother’s various schemes and obstruction added on top, Xin Yuan could not find any reason at all that could make Xiang Zhuifeng give him a good expression.

“Xin Yuan, didn’t you rest well yesterday? Why do you keep seeming off?”

After the third cut on set, Wang Muge, who had always been satisfied with Xin Yuan, finally frowned.

This scene was the confrontation between Liu Yunti and Chen Farren, and it was also the first time since filming began that Xin Yuan had acted opposite Tang Yingfan alone.

In the story, after Liu Yunti gained Xue Huaijiang’s trust and was brought back to Xue Huaijiang’s residence, he could finally follow the plan and further gather information, waiting for the day when he would find Xue Huaijiang’s weak point and wipe him out in one strike.

And only at this point did the audience first learn that all of Liu Yunti’s layered revenge plan had been devised behind the scenes by Chen Farren.

Although in order to avenge his family, Liu Yunti had no choice but to do things according to Chen Farren’s instructions, he also looked down on Chen Farren’s various acts of selling out the country for personal gain.

The current scene had to show both the chill of the two secretly conspiring together and the contrast of Liu Yunti outwardly obeying, while inwardly looking down on it all.

Fortunately, although Xin Yuan had not performed well in the first few takes, after a little adjustment, he quickly found his rhythm again, and before lunch was served, he smoothly got through the scene.

Xin Yuan did not have especially many scenes. Sometimes he would finish filming by noon and wrap up, and in the remaining time he would continue following various veteran actors to learn.

This afternoon was still the confrontation scene between Ren Song and Tang Yingfan. Xin Yuan had originally wanted to keep watching, but he did not know whether it was the effect of yesterday’s alcohol, or because this morning he again had no appetite and had secretly skipped breakfast without telling Xiaonuan, but the pain in his stomach had started to return.

In order not to worry Xiaonuan, Xin Yuan only said that he wanted to rest in the afternoon and told Xiaonuan to go take care of her own things.

He supported himself back to the room. The moment he entered, he weakly slid down to the floor. Leaning against the door, he recovered for a long time before he had the strength to go find the painkillers.

Xin Yuan swallowed them in a jumble with cold water, then dazedly staggered to the bedside, and did not know when he had fallen asleep.

When he woke again, the room had already darkened.

Only a few traces of sunset remained outside the window, like a faded palette of paint.

The stabbing pain in his stomach had eased quite a bit. Xin Yuan found his phone and wanted to check the time, but the moment the screen lit up, several missed calls and messages popped up one after another.

All of them were from Xiang Zhuifeng.

Xin Yuan’s mind was still a little foggy, but his body already straightened reflexively.

He did not know what had happened again and did not dare call back directly, so he first nervously tapped open the messages.

Xiang Zhuifeng’s profile picture was lonely on the same side:

「After you get off work and go back, check whether there’s anything of mine in your room.」
「That red waist chain.」

About twenty minutes later, Xiang Zhuifeng sent another message:

「No matter whether you found it or not, after you see this, reply to my message.」