MTMIO Chapter 63

Chapter 63: A Gentle Fall

Someone mistakenly intruded, then retreated. The fire door in the stairwell was pushed and pulled, making two sounds: a creak from the rusted door hinge, and a loud bang.

Shattering the kiss.

Lu You turned her face away, head drooping, leaning against Yue Yunxi’s shoulder.

The moment her forehead touched Yue Yunxi’s shoulder, wind blew in from outside the window, lifting a strand of Yue Yunxi’s hair. It was like the heartbeat in her chest, rising high and falling slowly.

Yue Yunxi breathed long and slowly into her ear, watching the trembling shadows of branches on the ground, unable to calm down.

The oxygen deprivation and slight suffocation still seemed to linger in her lungs.

Faintly, as if reminding her this wasn’t a dream, or like the slight pain tugged with each deep breath upon waking from a dream.

Lu You felt the hand resting behind her ear tremble slightly, as if hesitant and uneasy, wanting to touch but not daring to. The hand intertwined with hers, however, tightened its grip.

She felt the breath falling on her ear, sometimes heavy, sometimes light, trying to capture her scent with each inhale, confirming her existence, and greedily slowing down the flow of time with each exhale.

So cautiously, as if afraid of bursting a beautiful dream.

Lu You’s eyes grew hot.

All the previous resentment and anger vanished in an instant, leaving only the pain and emotion she felt in her heart.

If she hadn’t experienced it herself, how would she know that wearing her shoes, walking the path she had walked, felt unbearable even for a single step?

How could she truly understand that intense emotions cannot coexist with a stable state of mind?

It was the same for herself, and naturally, for Yue Yunxi.

No one spoke. In the silence, you could almost hear the countless little deer running around in their chests.

Lu You raised her face, leaned on her shoulder, and reached out to hug her.

The moment their intertwined fingers loosened, Yue Yunxi’s back stiffened, then softened in the embrace.

On the branches stretching to the window, the sycamore leaves swayed in the aftershocks of the wind. A patch of yellowed leaves detached from the branch, swaying as they fell.

Lu You watched and said softly, “…I saw the fallen leaves this morning and thought of a sentence – the sound of leaves separating from branches is the heartbeat of a cold autumn; summer is long gone.”

Yue Yunxi didn’t speak, but the hand on the back of her neck tightened slightly.

The pressure on her chest felt like it was filling up all the anxieties.

“I was just thinking about when I was little.” Lu You paused and added, “Before I came to my senses.”

Yue Yunxi smiled silently, “I apologize, I was overthinking.”

“Manman is always abroad, and we have different time zones. I rarely see her posts on Moments, so we don’t actually contact each other that much.”

“Unlike you and Feifei, right?” Yue Yunxi’s voice contained a smile.

Clearly, she was teasing her and Chen Feifei for being able to chat and fill up the entire screen in the comments section of Moments.

Lu You didn’t mind if she smiled even more happily, “…Yes, Feifei knows everything. I didn’t tell her in time that I moved to your house, so she joked that I was doing big things in silence, living with you.”

Yue Yunxi chuckled softly.

“Also, the way I introduced you to Manman…”

Her voice trailed off.

Yue Yunxi turned her head, and her soft lips kissed her ear.

The remaining damp touch, with a hint of coolness, wrapped everything in silence.

Lu You couldn’t help but shrink her neck, and when she pulled away slightly, she called out softly, “Yue Yunxi.”

She had never called her by her full name like this in person.

Using her voice to trace the characters, each stroke imbued with intimacy.

Hearing this, Yue Yunxi’s heart beat like a drum, and her body trembled slightly in her arms.

Lu You felt it, her raised eyelashes paused, and her gaze lingered on her lips.

Like burst cherries, still bearing traces of their kiss.

Lu You reached out a fingertip to touch them, truly feeling a subtle sensation. She didn’t know if she had bitten them or if a certain kiss had been too heavy.

“Does it still hurt?”

She called her name with such sincerity, only to be concerned about this.

Yue Yunxi didn’t speak, but grabbed her hand, opened her red lips slightly, and bit the tip of her little finger, her teeth gently grinding, her tongue soothing.

Not the constantly neurotic left little finger.

Lu You felt no pain, only the visual impact, eliciting an imagined sensation, a stinging like an electric shock, the warmth of a hot spring, all reflected in her heart.

Burning and numb.

“It doesn’t hurt anymore.”

“…Oh.” Lu You’s eyelashes trembled, inexplicably slow. “Your lipstick is smeared.”

Yue Yunxi almost couldn’t help but laugh, and she lowered her head, her nose gently rubbing against hers. “Help me even it out?”

Lu You swallowed. “Okay…”

Her nose was a little itchy, and her heart was itchy too.

She had noticed that Yue Yunxi’s seemingly ordinary tone contained a suppressed desire, a restraint of certain desires.

She didn’t know who made the first move, drawing close to the other’s lips. The temperature, not yet completely cooled, rose again.

Unlike before, when the torrent of passion was mixed with bitterness, this kiss was more like a gentle fall.

The phone suddenly vibrated.

Bach’s Well-Tempered Clavier, Book 1, No. 3, BWV 848, which she had set to deepen her memory, sounded like a piece of sheet music with several people talking. It lasted for several seconds, as if urging them to return.

Lu You had to pull away and reach into her pocket for her phone.

Yue Yunxi smoothed the loose hair on her face, her gaze dropping, passing over her lips, which were now even redder, helping her tidy her collar slightly, and finally landing on the loosely tied bow of her shirt. She reached out and casually grasped it. Her gaze returned, inadvertently sweeping over Lu You’s phone screen, and paused.

The screen had just switched from a chat window back to the chat list.

At the very top, a ceramic deer head profile picture, with the note “Yue Yunxi” written underneath.

Yue Yunxi couldn’t help but curl her lips, happy for this discovery, and for the fact that she had lived so many years with a steady label, that such a small detail could make her heart flutter with joy.

Her knuckles twisted, joyfully Entangled Lu You’s shirt hem.

The already loose bow fell apart completely.

“Is it your childhood friend coming to rescue you?” Yue Yunxi released the shirt hem, acting out of selfishness, not letting her tie it up again. “Do you want to go back?”

Lu You nodded with an “um” sound, then shook her head, looking at the contact labeled “Eleven” on her phone with a confused expression. “It’s not Manman. It’s a customer from Lost Deer. She made a voice call for no reason. I didn’t bother to call her back, and when I asked her what she wanted, she didn’t reply.”

“Misdialed?”

“Maybe.”

As they spoke, they walked upstairs. When they reached the stairwell, Yue Yunxi’s phone rang again.

Czerny’s Practical Exercises for Beginners, Op. 599, No. 46. Lu You had heard it before. It was the school bell of Nanquan Conservatory of Music.

Yue Yunxi took out her phone, looked at it, and handed it to her without hesitation.

Lu You lowered her eyes.

The two words “Tao Xin” were printed in the center of the screen.

Lu You frowned slightly and looked at Yue Yunxi. “Do you want me to answer it for you? Or, do you want me to hang up?”

“Either way.” Yue Yunxi said, “Whatever you want, you decide.”

Lu You raised an eyebrow, raised her hand to the top of the screen, her index finger hovering over the red hang-up button, and suddenly stopped, looking at Yue Yunxi’s reaction.

Yue Yunxi stared at her calmly, observing the coquettishness, hesitation, and cunning testing in her expression, lively as if watching a movie.

Everything else was insignificant.

Like the ultimate fate of this call.

Lu You moved her index finger away, pressed the answer button, and turned on the speakerphone.

After a moment of silence, a deep breath came from the phone, and Tao Xin spoke, her voice with a stuffy feeling from a blocked nose: “The manager said that when arranging my schedule, they missed a notice… I’m at the hotel entrance now, about to go to the airport…”

The voice paused, not ending naturally, still with unfinished intentions.

It wasn’t hard to guess that she wanted Yue Yunxi to see her off, but for some reason, it was difficult to say.

This was not something she could decide. Lu You looked at Yue Yunxi and turned to pull the fire door open.

The door shaft was a bit rusty, and it seemed heavy to pull it open against the wind. As she pulled it open, Yue Yunxi replied, “Be safe on the road, and send Mom a message when you land.”

Before she could finish speaking, Tao Xin hung up the phone directly. Yue Yunxi didn’t care much, and put her phone in her coat pocket.

Lu You leaned against the door, smiled and said, “I thought you would see her off.”

As Yue Yunxi passed her, she flicked her forehead. “I don’t have enough time to spend with you.”

It didn’t hurt much. Lu You instinctively hissed and touched her forehead.

As soon as she let go of the handle, the door was pushed by the wind in the stairwell and slammed against the door frame with a “bang.”

Before they had walked two steps, they saw a cleaner coming over.

Lu You remembered that someone had opened the door and gone out before, and looked at the cleaner aunt glancing at them before passing them and walking straight to the stairwell door, pulling it open.

The skin behind Lu You’s ears quickly warmed up. She turned her head and asked Yue Yunxi if she had seen anyone at that time.

Yue Yunxi was stunned, her gaze lingering on her flushed face for a moment, then followed her gaze, glanced at the cleaner, and said with a knowing smile, “I saw someone–”

Lu You’s face burned up, and she covered her face with her hands, too embarrassed to face anyone.

“Not wearing this cleaner’s uniform.”

“…Why are you talking like that?” Lu You glared at her and lowered her hands.

Yue Yunxi chuckled softly, turned her head, and the arc of her lips gradually disappeared. The scenery in her vision gradually blurred.

Concealed behind her long eyelashes, a pair of eyes became hazy in the rising memories. She lifted her eyelashes slightly in displeasure and looked towards the stairwell door following the sound.

The door was open, half a person wide. Tao Xin was standing there, with the bright light of the shopping mall behind her, and she looked as if she was covered in shadows, breaking through a ray of spring light, leaving in a panic.

Feeling Lu You hook and play with her fingers, Yue Yunxi came back to her senses and asked softly, “What’s wrong?”

Lu You suddenly put her hand behind her back, twisted her pinky ring, suppressed the urge to touch her nose, and edited out the important content, explaining, “I saw you spacing out, reminding you to come back to your senses.”

Afraid of being seen through, she decided to strike first: “Not even looking at the road, aren’t you afraid of falling?”

“Isn’t that what you’re here for? Would you let me fall?”

“…No.”

Near the door of the private room, the corridor was empty with no passersby. Lu You quickly walked around to Yue Yunxi’s front, intercepted her path, narrowed her eyes, and asked, “So what were you thinking about, walking with me, that could make you so lost in thought?”

Yue Yunxi smiled, not intending to ruin such a good atmosphere by mentioning irrelevant people and things.

“Thinking about…” Her fingertip touched her lips, her eyes flickering, glancing over charmingly.

“How my lipstick got smeared.”

“…”