Chapter 148

Huo Jingcheng leaned forward casually, leaning against the desk, and hooked a plump, round orange from the fruit plate.

The June oranges were yellow with a hint of green.

The orange-yellow peel made a slight rustling sound under his fingertips. His bony fingers followed the veins of the orange, peeling the outer skin bit by bit, the juice of the peel splashing onto his fingertips.

Suddenly, a refreshing fragrance burst out in the study, drilling into his nostrils in wisps. As the peel was gradually peeled away, the white orange pith was revealed.

Huo Jingcheng casually broke off a segment of the orange, pinched it to peel away the pith meticulously, and then threw it into his mouth, the fragrant juice spreading in his mouth.

It was sour enough to make one's teeth fall out.

He chewed slowly in his mouth.

Only the sweetest batch of fruit could be served; it was his heart that was sour, along with his mouth.

Huo Jingcheng chewed two segments, then stopped his movements, narrowing his eyes. Thinking that he still had a schedule for the day after tomorrow, his deep, cold pool of eyes rippled with displeasure.

He curled his long fingers, tapping rhythmically but with a bit of irritation on the desktop.

Su Ruoyun urged him to go to sleep.

Huo Jingcheng's left hand, holding the cigarette, rested naturally on the armrest. The fire of the cigarette flickered in the dim light, and blue smoke rose between his clearly defined fingers.

Upon hearing this, he raised his hand and extinguished the cigarette butt in the clock ashtray, the black and white intertwined ash falling leisurely to the bottom of the jar.

Huo Jingcheng dropped a sentence lightly: "Can't sleep."

Su Ruoyun's eyelids were a bit heavy, the frequency of her blinking gradually slowing down, her voice a bit slurred, carrying thick sleepiness: "How can you not sleep?"

His pitch-black eyeballs lifted slightly, his eyelids following, and Huo Jingcheng looked over without blinking, speaking crisply: "Without you here, I can't sleep; I want to sleep with you."

"..." Su Ruoyun.

Su Ruoyun felt a wave of fatigue, so she simply let her eyelids close completely. With her eyes closed, her eyeballs rolled under her eyelids, and she secretly rolled her eyes.

Heh, heh, heh.

Is this "sleep" a noun or a verb?

She didn't even want to talk about it.

Su Ruoyun was just about to open her mouth to retort, the tip of her tongue already swirling in her mouth, brewing words, but the invisible power of her biological clock was truly too powerful.

Instantly, sleepiness struck. Before she could organize a sentence, before she could even utter a complete syllable, her breathing gradually became steady and long, and she fell into a deep sleep.

Huo Jingcheng sat lazily on the office chair, his body leaning forward slightly, just watching her sleeping face greedily for three or five seconds, and then suddenly raised his hand.

His thumb hovered over the hang-up button for a long time without moving. In the end, he couldn't bear to hang up, and while taking the phone into his palm, he stood up unhurriedly.

Ten fingers connected to the heart; the girl's cheeks seemed to become within reach, her obedient, soft, and quiet sleeping face pressed against his hot palm, making his heart stir.

Huo Jingcheng carried the "little sister" in the phone back to his room. In order not to disturb Su Ruoyun's sleep, he considerately muted the phone and placed it on his pillow.

After washing up, he walked to the side of the bed with a refreshed air, wearing only a bathrobe, the loose belt hanging in front of him.

Huo Jingcheng picked up the phone casually to take a look and found that the call interface was still lit, and the sound from the other side was still coming through continuously.

Listening to the barely audible breathing, he unhurriedly lifted the corner of the quilt and put the phone back beside the pillow.

As the bedside lamp turned off, the room fell into a rich, pitch-black darkness.

Only the phone screen beside Huo Jingcheng's pillow emitted a faint cold light.

The two seemed to be sleeping in different beds but in the same dream.

The next morning.

A faint fish-belly white appeared on the eastern horizon, followed by a ray of light leaping up from the distant horizon. The pink-orange broke through the morning mist, and the entire Sijiucheng woke up in the morning light.

Before the light had fully penetrated the room, Su Ruoyun woke up leisurely, her consciousness still a bit hazy. She woke up a bit earlier than Huo Jingcheng.

The first thing she saw the second she opened her eyes was the pitch-black phone, stuck in an extremely clever position between the quilt and the pillow. If it weren't for the button below, she would have almost thought her phone screen had gone black due to a malfunction.

It looked like Huo Jingcheng hadn't woken up yet. She skillfully slid out WeChat, the full-screen video call turning into a small window fixed on the left side of the screen. She checked the weather first.

By the time she exited the weather app and her fingertips tapped into WeChat again, Huo Jingcheng had also picked "her" up.

From pitch black, it turned into an impeccable handsome face.

Su Ruoyun asked him: "Where did you put me?"

Huo Jingcheng raised his hand nonchalantly, his fingers casually brushing the stray hair on his forehead, his gaze falling on the girl in the screen with slightly messy hair. He curled his lips imperceptibly: "On my chest."

"..." Su Ruoyun.

Su Ruoyun had nothing to say. When her gaze touched herself in the small screen in the upper right corner, she was startled.

She wasn't very well-behaved when she slept, always loving to roll around. Her slightly curly long hair was already messily covering her cheeks, looking fluffy and chaotic.

She hurriedly raised her hand to tidy her hair, her fair fingers quickly weaving through the soft hair. Most of the hair was soon smoothed out and draped properly behind her, but a few naughty strands violated physics and stubbornly stuck up, impossible to press down.

Image first, boyfriend second.

Su Ruoyun said: "Okay, okay, I'm going to brush my teeth and wash my face first; hanging up."

Huo Jingcheng replied: "Okay."

Su Ruoyun put on her slippers by the bed and walked into the bathroom. After washing up, Li Ayi also brought breakfast to the dining table.

This morning, they were having *xiaolongbao* and small wontons.

Li Ayi placed the steamer on the dining table, and a heat mixed with the aroma of delicious soup and flour skin rushed toward her.

Su Ruoyun's hand holding the chopsticks paused, remembering something: "Clean my bedroom today too."

She added slowly: "The incense sticks are all finished."

A few days ago, Su Ruoyun's excuse was that she was making incense in the room and was afraid the incense powder would fly everywhere, so she asked Li Ayi not to clean the master bedroom first.

Last night, she had wiped away all the traces Huo Jingcheng had left behind.

Li Ayi carefully avoided Su Ruoyun's direction, slowly lifted the lid of the steamer, and replied: "Okay."

The wontons and *xiaolongbao* were freshly cooked, a bit hot, and full of juice. Su Ruoyun ate very slowly. By the time she finished breakfast, Li Ayi had already tidied up the apartment and left with the trash.

Su Ruoyun walked unhurriedly to the walk-in closet to choose today's outfit.

Just as she pulled open the closet door, a man's tie came into view. Other various T-shirts, hoodies... were categorized, but only the tie was placed quietly and prominently on the shelf.

Su Ruoyun frowned. How could there be an extra tie in her closet? It looked like Huo Jingcheng's, but why would it appear in her closet? She had clearly told Huo Jingcheng to take all his clothes away.

Su Ruoyun immediately thought of the worst and most likely idea: it must have been found by Li Ayi when she was cleaning the bedroom, and then she put the tie in the closet.

Two words popped into her head instantly: It's over.