AUS Chapter 47: In Liu Jiang’s cabinet…

In the end, I still tossed the Attendant’s momentary expression to the back of my mind.

In the late autumn season, the streets of the capital had a cold, dusty smell that was reassuring. Liu Jiang and I walked together under the streetlights, feeling the spicy taste of the meal we had just eaten slowly dissolving in our stomachs.

We were now going to take the subway to a mixed-use commercial and residential building five stops away. Liu Jiang’s apartment was rented there.

After leaving the small restaurant, that sense of unworthiness that had been occupying my abdomen had vanished into thin air. Although the Liu Jiang beside me was still flaunting his presence in a carefree manner, I had already quickly learned to match his rhythm to accommodate him.

He said: “Next Thursday I am going to interview with the next record company. They have a few recommended band lists, but the one I have my eye on, I do not know if they are available or not. The producer has helped me a lot, I feel too embarrassed to ask.”

I said: “Mmm, that is nice.”

He said: “Actually, it is not bad for me to remain a free agent like I am now. Hao Zi said the other day that they are short of resident singers at the bars over in Liancheng. If I get tired of struggling here, I will just go back to Liancheng to do odd jobs. Will you come and keep me company then?”

I said: “Mmm, that is nice.”

He stopped in his tracks and asked me: “Are you not listening to what I am saying?”

I finally pulled myself out of the deep thought I had been in with my head down the whole way, and replied to him: “No, I am just a little cold.”

That was the truth. Walking out from the warm interior, and passing through the windy gaps between buildings, there were several times I wanted to interrupt Liu Jiang to tell him to be careful not to choke on the wind, but the density of his words left me no room to interject.

Liu Jiang did not answer. He seemed to be genuinely feeling the temperature in the air, but in the next second, my arms, which were hanging at my sides, were enveloped by something fluffy.

Liu Jiang had opened his sweater and, with the speed of lightning, wrapped me inside it, not even giving me time to react.

“Wait,” I immediately called for a stop, firstly because this was on a public road, and secondly because with him like this, I really could not maintain my balance.

Not only because my movement was restricted, but also because in this position, every breath of hot air he exhaled hit the back of my ear, without deviation, without exception.

As expected, the two of us were now a four-legged creature stuffy inside a sweater—the kind that had just grown legs. After stumbling a few steps, my hip bone slammed hard into a bicycle parked on the side of the road.

At the moment I was squatting by the roadside enduring the pain, Liu Jiang stood beside me, scratching his head in embarrassment.

When I stood up again, he switched to a more convenient and feasible method. He chose to directly hold my hand.

Just like in the past, just like in reality, when he held hands, he still liked to grab from behind, still in that same awkward posture—hooking my pinky and ring finger with his index and middle fingers.

This posture was awkward, but at least it was much better than the four-legged creature from just now.

When we reached the subway entrance, he still did not let go. It was not until we found a standing spot in a corner by the subway car door that he finally released me. We were quiet with each other for the duration of five stops.

After getting off the subway, it was a ten-minute walk to the apartment Liu Jiang rented.

Perhaps it was because people run out of energy at night, his mouth was no longer running nonstop. The two of us walked shoulder to shoulder, through the small path leading to his residence, and arrived at the apartment building he rented.

By the time he found the key to open the door, that baseless nervousness and excitement materialized in my chest.

That should not be right?

I already knew our current relationship, and I understood the fact that we were constantly getting better. So what was I nervous about? Was I nervous about something like staying the night?

Alright, I was indeed nervous for a moment.

We were not sixteen or seventeen-year-old high school students anymore. We were not in Liu Jiang’s old house. We did not need to go downstairs to get a drink. Liang Yi, Hao Zi, and the others would not come knocking on the door at any time.

Once the door was closed, it would just be him and me in the room.

In the blink of an eye, the door behind me had already closed. While hanging up his jacket, Liu Jiang asked me the same question for the second time: “What are you spacing out for?”

I subconsciously wanted to take off my jacket too, but then I realized I was wearing a hoodie. After hesitating, I chose to sit on the footstool by the door. While untying the laces of my combat boots, I said to him: “Nothing.”

The room was not big, a studio of about fifty square meters. As soon as you entered, you could see the electric guitar and mixer placed in the corner, as well as the recording equipment on a bar table on the side—everywhere was filled with Liu Jiang’s presence.

He had already changed into slippers and rushed past the entryway first, turning on the floor lamp in the inner part of the studio.

He still disliked the main light so much.

“How is it?” he asked me. “You have not given your evaluation yet, my apartment.”

Liu Jiang had also prepared a pair of the same slippers for me. I shrugged my shoulders: “Not too bad, I guess.”

A moment later, I voiced my true thoughts: “I quite like your old house too.”

Liu Jiang clearly held the opposite opinion, drawing out his voice to complain: “How can that place be as good as this—”

The heating in the room was very strong. I took off my outer shirt, leaving only the base layer I was wearing underneath. I opened the closet to hang up my hoodie, and my hand paused in the motion of taking a hanger.

Liu Jiang’s wardrobe was different.

Not in terms of messiness. His current wardrobe was also messy, just that it was in the initial stage of messiness. The wardrobe in his old house in Liancheng was the completed form of messy, with clothes tangled together, as solid as a fortress.

Now, because it had not been long since he moved, the clothes still maintained a state of being separate from each other—what I meant by different was the quality of the clothes, in other words, the tier.

The short-sleeved shirt of the same brand that he had once saved up several performance fees to buy for me, there were now many pieces of it hanging in the closet. Judging by the style, it did not seem like I had bought them for him; he should have bought them himself.

I rummaged through a few pieces to the side and saw other more expensive brands. Although it was not to the extent of my mother’s walk-in closet, it was clear that his identity as a bassist was no longer just for show.

I hung up my hoodie, but did not close the closet door for a long time.

He was no longer a kid who had to worry about living expenses, while it would still be several months before I found an internship position.

Probably because he did not hear any movement from me, Liu Jiang came over and leaned against the wall to look at me: “What is wrong?”

I said: “Nothing.”

And then said: “I just suddenly thought of how you were in high school. I feel like your taste has changed a lot.”

Liu Jiang did not mind: “Then it must be getting more and more handsome!”

He then lifted his chin: “Look at the drawer below.”

He was probably just showing off something like his taste in underwear.

I shrugged my shoulders, squatted down, and pulled open the drawer. A set of things I had not expected and had not dared to imagine appeared before my eyes.

I decisively closed the drawer and turned my face to Liu Jiang. Compared to my righteous demeanor, his gaze and purpose were both not so pure.

He sighed, unfolded his crossed arms, walked towards me, and then squatted down beside me, pulling the drawer open again right in front of my face.

He pointed to the box on the left: “You said last time you liked this model, it is thin enough and does not break easily.”

After speaking, his finger went to flip through the ones on the right, and then he continued: “This flavor is one I like, you do not like it, so we will save it for special occasions, no need to add extra sweetness.”

Finally, our gazes returned together to the middle. He said to me: “We have not tried this toy before. You have not brought over the one you bought yet. Make some space, we will put it here in the future.”

Liu Jiang still had his arm around my shoulder. Even now, if I just turned my head to the left, I could meet that face that was so obviously full of ulterior motives. So I maintained my posture and reached out to close the closet door.

Then I stood up directly.

He remained squatting, his eyes looking up at me. This look was exactly the same as in the past, just like the day he first dyed his hair white, when he hugged my leg and told me to remember to come see him.

It was also like in real life, the day he argued with me in the small garden behind the library.

I said: “I am going to take a shower.”

He said: “Damn, you are so direct.”

“What is wrong?” I had already walked to the bathroom door, yet I still had to turn back and ask him, “Are you a person who is not direct when doing things?”

Upon hearing my words, Liu Jiang was about to come over and beat me. I directly shut the bathroom door, listening to him energetically cursing me outside.

There was a frosted glass pane on the bathroom door. Through the glass, I saw him swaying towards the direction of the main room. My hand was still holding the doorknob, and the smile on my face slowly faded.

I miss him. I really, really miss him. I think about him every second, every minute, every moment.

But when it really came to the final step, I asked myself again—do I deserve to have such a dream-come-true moment?

I turned my back to the door, leaned against it, and tilted my head up to stare at the light-colored ceiling of the bathroom. I suddenly felt the phone in my pocket vibrate once.

Three years had passed since my time in the high school instance. The phone’s screen had gotten bigger, and the model had become thinner. I unlocked the phone and saw a text message from the Attendant.

【System: Level 3-?, Clearance Target: None for now, Clearance Hint: Please enjoy】

I was speechless.

He was doing it on purpose.

Who says bionic systems have no humanity? I think his humanity studies are quite good. He knows how to piss people off and how to be passive-aggressive. If there was an award specifically for this field, he could at least get a hall-of-fame level one.

But I was very annoyed right now and had no desire to think about anything related to him.

I opened the bathroom door and shouted at Liu Jiang: “I am leaving my phone outside first, there is no place to put it in your bathroom!”

Saying that, I threw the phone out the door without a second thought. From the sound of it, Liu Jiang had suddenly rushed over to catch it.

Listening to the next sound, he probably almost did a sliding tackle on the floor.

Before he could start his second wave of curses at me, I shut the bathroom door again.

The shower head turned on. I stood under the downward spray of water, palming away the water droplets on my face, and began to contemplate my current situation.

Because of that system error, I had met a Liu Jiang who seemed to be from reality. From this, I deduced that the program was growing in a slow but continuous manner. If no mistakes occurred, the Liu Jiang in the program now should at some point possess the memories of the real Liu Jiang.

In other words, infinitely close to the real Liu Jiang.

Under the stream of water, I took a deep breath, turned my back to the shower head, and continued to sort out my thoughts.

According to what the Attendant had said before—I must head towards a perfect future and achieve a beautiful ending in everyone’s eyes.

Is it because only the energy generated by a so-called “beautiful” ending can allow Liu Jiang to truly become himself?

I paused for a second at my own hypothesis. The excitement had not yet surged to my throat before it was pushed down by the ensuing suspicion.

If this were true, then why did the Attendant not just tell me directly?

He wanted me to clear the levels, and the result of clearing them was also what I wanted to see. What reason did he have not to tell me the truth?

And, when I was feeling the beauty of this “perfect future,” his expression even held a trace of sorrow.

What was the source of this?

I need to ask him.

I turned around from under the curtain of water, and then immediately realized I had just thrown my phone out to Liu Jiang.

I quickly rinsed the foam from my head, wrapped a towel around myself and wiped down, then put on my pants and base layer, and walked out of the bathroom while drying my hair.

To avoid the posture of heading straight for my phone upon leaving being a bit weird, I tried to make myself walk as naturally as possible.

However, things went against my wishes. My first glance did not spot the phone I had just thrown out.

I feigned that water had gotten into my ear, tilting my head and wiping it with a towel, then turned my head—bad news, Liu Jiang was leaning against the headboard, holding my phone.

Second piece of bad news, my phone seemed to have also recorded a copy of his fingerprint.

Third piece of bad news, he lifted his face from my phone. Under the warm white light, his lips were very red and vibrant.

He asked me: “Who is this person texting you?”