Drifting on a String - Chapter 66
Chapter 66
The sound of the central air conditioning suddenly grew louder, humming as it blew out air, perhaps sensing that the room had become too tense, too overheated.
It turned out that speaking these words from the heart was even more mortifying than doing indecent things in front of Tao Jin.
Even though Chen Piaopiao was impeccably dressed, even though she was as beautiful as a porcelain doll that had never been harmed.
Tao Jin gazed at her, her brow having furrowed at the first sentence and never relaxed since. How could I not have known? Director Sun had said Chen Piaopiao took this role very seriously, always talking about it even during meals; Arick had said that on her first day with the crew, Chen Piaopiao had asked her how to write the character's biography; the day after the livestream, her exhaustion was plain to see, yet she still came to the theater, wanting to stay a little longer.
If Tao Jin truly didn't believe her, why would she have patiently guided her time and again? Why would she have stayed behind alone to write out her cue points?
But everyone has their pride. She, too, had tossed and turned at night, wondering if Chen Piaopiao was trying to use her as a stepping stone. She wanted to hear her say it—just a simple "no" would have been enough.
But maybe, she had hoped even more for her to say "yes."
She had anticipated every possible answer, but she never expected that last sentence. Tao Jin was stunned.
Chen Piaopiao didn't dare to look her in the eye. Just a fleeting half-glance was enough to make the fine hairs on the side of her neck stand on end, like a self-defense mechanism.
How had she cried back then?
It must have been after she flew back to Beicheng from Jiangcheng and got off the plane. She had booked the flight late that day. Beicheng was much colder than Jiangcheng, and Chen Piaopiao was so cold waiting in the taxi line that her bones seemed to shrink. When she finally got into a car, the heater blasted her until she was dizzy. There was also the smell of cheap tobacco. The ride was quite long. She reclined her seat a little, lying back to gaze out the window.
She remembered the first time she had properly looked at Beicheng's nightscape through a window. It was with Tao Jin. She had been half-drunk, half-sober, and when she saw a street vendor selling egg-filled pancakes, she thought, settling down in Beicheng wouldn't be so bad.
Later, Tao Jin really did buy her an egg-filled pancake.
Chen Piaopiao listened to the banter in a thick Beicheng accent on the radio, an unfunny crosstalk performance that was so grating she suddenly burst into tears.
She lay silently in the passenger seat, her head turned to the window as tears streamed sideways from the corners of her eyes, one after another. She didn't wipe them away, letting them soak into her hair. She swallowed desperately, like trying to clear her ears during a plane's descent.
She had gone to find Tao Jin in a state of utter helplessness, but she had disguised it well, even bringing a box of pastries from Daoxiangcun.
Tao Jin took her to a big house—a huge one. The kind that social media algorithms had never even thought to show her, the kind that if you did scroll past it, you'd have to joke, "My bank account balance must be getting ideas above its station."
A 180-degree view of the river, right on the Bund. Below, tourists were taking photos for their check-ins, and this building itself was probably a landmark worth commemorating in their pictures.
Chen Piaopiao scratched her forehead. She sat on a sofa that looked like it belonged in a model home, in a living room so large it could be described as cavernous. She placed the Daoxiangcun box on the coffee table. There were a few cardboard boxes in the corner.
Washing her hands, Tao Jin said, "The tenant's lease was up, so I just moved in. I haven't had time to unpack yet. Where should we go to eat later?"
Chen Piaopiao looked up at the beautiful chandelier. "This is your apartment?"
"My family bought it."
"You bought it after graduation?" Chen Piaopiao was a bit lost for words. She had bookmarked a two-bedroom apartment on a rental website as something to strive for, but she doubted it was worth even a fraction of Tao Jin's place.
"No," Tao Jin said with a gentle smile, drying her hands as she walked over. "Before that."
It was the one her mother had given her for her eighteenth birthday.
It had always been rented out; she had almost forgotten about this apartment. When she first came to Jiangcheng, she had rented a studio apartment near the theater. Last week, her mother had called to say the tenant wasn't renewing the lease and told her to move in herself. So Tao Jin had started moving, though she wasn't finished yet and hadn't given up the studio.
She had her first major play coming up at the end of the year and was so busy she could only move her things in bits and pieces.
She had mentioned to Chen Piaopiao that she was moving, but Chen Piaopiao had assumed she was just moving from one rental to another.
Before that… Chen Piaopiao murmured the words to herself.
Bought before graduation.
Tao Jin was from Beicheng. To suddenly buy an apartment in Jiangcheng, it must have been after she came here for her internship.
Buying property was a major decision, one that required planning and selection. Tao Jin had never told her about it. More importantly, if she had bought a place so quickly, she must have long had the idea of settling in Jiangcheng. Yet at the time, she had still asked her if she wanted her to stay in Beicheng.
It was just as Chen Piaopiao had thought: she had made her decision long ago. Asking her was just a formality.
This apartment proved a theory Chen Piaopiao had held since childhood: that her divorced parents didn't truly want her, and that Tao Jin, in choosing Jiangcheng, had never truly wanted her in her heart either.
She stood in an unattainable district of Jiangcheng, thinking about Tao Jin returning to this home every day, while she herself would end her livestreams and stare blankly at her earnings from donations.
The number of virtual coins on the streaming platform was often inflated compared to the actual monetary conversion, but even at a one-to-one ratio, it would never be enough for a place like this.
For two people like them to now be speaking to each other in the same room was truly a difficult feat.
In her peripheral vision, Chen Piaopiao saw Tao Jin's wrist relax, as if she was about to come over. But she didn't want Tao Jin to approach her. Not at this moment.
She had never imagined that if they were to reunite, she would have to rely on showing weakness to close the distance between them. For some people, the line between compassion and pity was not clearly defined.
If she and Tao Jin were to have another chance, she wanted Tao Jin to desire her, to be attracted to her—to look at her as a woman, not as a stray dog.
Before Tao Jin could speak, Chen Piaopiao said, "But that's all in the past. It's hard to summon that feeling now."
Tao Jin didn't want to let it pass. In a careful, confirming tone, she pressed, "You said you cried because we broke up."
Then why did you break up with me?
"Didn't I tell you before?" Chen Piaopiao picked up a vitamin from the nightstand and swallowed it. There was no water, so she simply chewed it. "It's perfectly normal to cry over a breakup. Who doesn't?"
...
"It's perfectly normal to cry over a breakup, isn't it? Wouldn't you cry if you had your heart broken?"
"Would you let me have my heart broken?"
"I would never make you cry."
...
So she still remembered that conversation. Had she realized she had broken her promise?
Chen Piaopiao chewed the dry vitamin tablet, finally looking at Tao Jin again.
There it was again. That fleeting, indifferent gaze. It was the look Tao Jin most feared seeing when she woke from her dreams, the one that left her feeling the most helpless.
When she received the breakup message on WeChat, Tao Jin had stopped her rehearsal work mid-session. Without a word to anyone, she had gone outside to call Chen Piaopiao.
It was December, and Jiangcheng was freezing. The Bund was still beautiful, with red and green Christmas decorations everywhere and the faint tune of "Jingle Bells" in the air. Wearing only a thin sweater, Tao Jin stood in front of a bakery that was about to close, pleading with Chen Piaopiao.
She asked her why she wanted to break up. Was it just because she had wanted her to go back for her exams?
The voice on the other end of the line said airily, "It's not interesting anymore."
"Not interesting?" Tao Jin gripped her phone tightly, her heart constricting as if it were being vacuum-sealed. She tried her best to remain calm as she asked, "What do you mean, not interesting? Is being with me not interesting anymore?"
"Pretty much," the voice was quiet, as if she didn't want to say another word.
"Then what would be interesting?" Tao Jin asked hoarsely. "Was it only interesting the way it was before? Is that it?"
She was the one who had said they could make long-distance work. So even though they couldn't see or touch each other every day, even though she had to guess at the tone behind every word and endure the constant torment of her own imagination, Tao Jin had kept telling herself that things would be fine once the two years were over.
And now she was the one saying it wasn't interesting anymore. What was interesting, then? The ambiguous game between a senior and a junior? Was it that as soon as she could no longer be by Chen Piaopiao's side, it all became uninteresting?
They had only been together for a short time before the distance separated them. They didn't understand each other well enough, nor were they confident of their place in the other's heart, and so they drifted apart.
A long-distance relationship is a back-to-back relationship; you have to listen carefully to the tone of every single word, because you can never see the other person's expression.
"Yeah, it was more interesting before."
At school, they had slept in the same kind of top bunks, eaten in the same cafeteria, and attended the same classes. They had held hands on their way to the library, the public bathhouse, the supermarket. The biggest difference between them then was merely a dress that cost a few dozen yuan versus one that cost a few thousand.
Back then, Chen Piaopiao wouldn't have felt that ineffably complex emotion—a feeling bordering on fear—upon seeing a large apartment. She certainly wouldn't have wondered if her lover, who had secretly bought property, had ever included her in her plans for the future.
Could they go back to how it was before? Could Tao Jin come back? Was she still the senior who had been within her reach?
Tao Jin held the phone, her hand aching from the cold.
She had felt something similar once before, when she discovered her ex-girlfriend had never truly liked her. But the emotions now were a thousand, ten thousand times more turbulent—a massive tidal wave carrying panic, fear, helplessness, and despair.
Chen Piaopiao had said, in that indifferent tone, that being with her was no longer interesting. She had judged their relationship with the casualness of someone talking about a game, saying it was more fun before.
As if she were saying, "that level was more fun."
But in the beginning, it was Chen Piaopiao who had pursued her, who had wanted to walk into her life. It was also she who had promised she would be very, very good to Tao Jin.
"Piaopiao…" Tao Jin had called her name softly, a sound so humble, so unable to grasp onto anything.
Chen Piaopiao had said coldly, "I'm hanging up. Going to sleep. Let's just leave it at that."
Let's just leave it at that.
After freezing all night, Tao Jin had also thought all night. Had her tone been too harsh when she told her to go back? Had she been too busy when she visited? She took time off and flew back to Beicheng on Christmas Eve.
And then she cried. Just as Chen Piaopiao had said, she cried because her heart was broken, just like any normal person.
Three years later—no, to be precise, two years and ten months later—Chen Piaopiao was back.
She had just spoken of so many things she took seriously, but she had never taken Tao Jin herself seriously. In Chen Piaopiao's list of options, Tao Jin didn't even qualify for a nomination.
That long-awaited admission—that she had cried over the breakup—had finally come. But before Tao Jin could even process it, she had added, "it's all in the past."
Indifferently, carelessly, unconcernedly.
...
They looked at each other in silence. Silence again.
If this were just a play, then there had been far too many blackouts between them.
Chen Piaopiao's heart swelled until it began to ache. She watched the silent Tao Jin from the corner of her eye, and desire began to stir restlessly within her.
For the past few years, her desire had almost always been linked to pain. So much so that at this moment, she couldn't distinguish whether this surging reaction was because of the pain, or because of Tao Jin.
She glanced at the silk pouch on the nightstand.
Tao Jin took in the shift of her gaze, which had been vacant for so long.
Tao Jin raised her eyes. "Are you going to use that again?"
Chen Piaopiao had only glanced at it, as if seeking comfort, but now that Tao Jin had asked, she didn't want to deny it. She had shown too much weakness to Tao Jin today. If she had to explain herself again, she would feel pathetic.
So she reached out and picked it up. With the blanket covering her, she lowered her head and asked in a small voice, "Are you going to leave, or stay here?"
You've seen it once. Do you want to see it again?
She had only meant to drive Tao Jin away, but in the next second, she smelled the scent of cedar and heard the breathing of the one who wore it.
Tao Jin came over and began to kiss her.
Meeting her stunned gaze, Tao Jin looked at her just as she had in the past, then slowly closed her eyes. She took the object from her hand and set it aside, then fumbled on the nightstand for an antiseptic wipe. Without looking, she pressed it into Chen Piaopiao's palm. "Help me wipe my hands."
Everything was so familiar, as if they had never been apart.
Chen Piaopiao's long-suppressed heart felt like it was about to burst from her chest, the pain so intense she thought she might die.
Tao Jin's breath was muffled against her neck, hurried yet suppressed.
She asked, "One finger, or two?"
"Two."
"And everything else," Tao Jin murmured, taking Chen Piaopiao's earlobe between her lips. Her voice was like lapping water, but her expression was calm. "Is it still the same as before?"
Her words made Chen Piaopiao so thirsty she felt she could drink blood. "The same."
She took Tao Jin's hand, slipped the ring from her ring finger, and held it in her own palm, pressing it against her life line. When Tao Jin pushed forward, she tightened her grip; when she retreated, she loosened it.
Her hand ached, and her heart swelled.
Partway through, Tao Jin bit her collarbone and softly tested, "Three?"
Chen Piaopiao said, "No."
They never had. Why would she ask that? Was she trying to ask if Chen Piaopiao had developed habits with other people that she didn't know about?
She caressed Tao Jin's ring in her palm and couldn't resist testing her in return.
"What's wrong? Do you… have this habit?"
"Don't talk. Just focus."
Tao Jin didn't want to hear her speak anymore.
Are relationships always this complicated?....
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