Winter Wind (YiZhan)

66. Truce

Xiao Zhan awakens the next morning, and is quite surprised to see that he still hasn't received any other messages from Yibo.

After what he had written, and after Yibo's response with a wide eyed emoji (😳), he'd expected him to say something more. Something that would make him feel less abashed at the lewdness of his message.

But as he glances down at his phone, he cannot help but feel disappointed. He had fallen asleep waiting, and now in the light of day, he cannot help but wonder if the ease he had felt with Yibo about their relationship the previous evening, had all been a mirage. He hopes not, and so he gets up, but he cannot resist typing yet another message to him.

"Yibo..."he writes, hoping that with it, the question that he doesn't want to outrightly ask is relayed. However he stares at it longer, and then deletes it.

Maybe Yibo would contact him later upon his silence. And so he rises to his feet, and heads off to get ready for the day.

He feels nervous, he realizes, as he cleans up in the bathroom, and upon further thought he concludes that it is partially because of Yibo, and partially because of his upcoming performance.

As he had said to Nini, there is a lot riding on those few minutes of him on stage, and so he cannot help but feel restless.

He is not very familiar with the song that he has to sing so he downloads it onto his phone, and then slips his AirPods into his ears to listen to it. Afterwards, he checks to see if his mother is in her room, and when he sees that she isn't, begins to head down the stairs.

The current discord in his home, especially at almost being locked out the previous night, is also a part of his worries but he pushes it aside for the mean time, consoling himself that his father hadn't at least come to his room to throw him out.

This is acceptable for now, to him, however when he meets his mother in the kitchen, she doesn't agree.

"You keep avoiding him," she says as he pulls the refrigerator open to peruse for no reason.

"You only show up when he's not home, or when he's in his study. Is this how you plan on reconciling with him?"

He shuts the refrigerator. "I'm trulyjust waking up," he tells her. "Really."

She gives him a hard look, and returns to the shrimp that she is deveining in the sink.

He goes over quietly, picks up a knife from the drying rack and joins her.

She doesn't say a word, but soon enough he finds her hand in the water and holds onto it.

At this, her scowl at him darkens, but then he smiles at her, and just like that she melts. She sighs as she turns away, and brushes his hands off in the water.

Xiao Zhan is pleased with himself. "What do you want me to do ?" he asks. "He's your husband. You know him best."

It takes a little while before she responds. "I don't know," she says.

"We had an arguement last night for not letting you in, and I told him how you were so busy in Beijing but yet you chose to return here. He didn't seem moved. He got up to come throw you out and I got up to to pack my own bags. He stormed out then, and just went down to his study. He was there for a while, but he came back to bed a few hours later."

Xiao Zhan's ease immediately drains as he listens to this, and so he cannot help but go quiet.

Eventually, he only has one sentence in response. "I'm sorry," he apologizes, and she looks at him.