5. Red Part 2

Lu Zhengming woke up on the recliner in the studio, wrapped in a blanket that resembled a congealed whirlpool of red, freezing his stiff body along with it.

He glanced at the clock on the wall and realized he had spent the entire night in the studio. It had been a long time since he last worked continuously for over twenty without rest, until he collapsed onto the recliner, already half-conscious.

This reminded him of his student days when he had stayed up for an entire week to complete a hyper-realistic assignment. Locked in his dorm room, he used a size-zero brush to fill a fifty-centimeter canvas bit by bit, painstakingly working until the painting became as detailed as a photograph.

Back then, Lu Zhengming had stubble on his face, dark circles under his eyes, and opened the door while stepping over cigarette butts scattered across the floor. That was how he looked the first time he met Yin Yan. He remembered how Yin Yan bent over to examine the painting, staring at it for a long time before looking up and giving him a smile he could never forget.

It wasn’t admiration. It was mockery.

Lu Zhengming rubbed his temples, driving the useless memories out of his mind. He lowered his feet to the ground and sat on the recliner, studying the large painting he had finished the day before.

Red.

Layers of deeper red stacked upon red.

The closer to the center of the canvas, the darker the color became, as if an obscure, winding passage extended infinitely inward. The frame resembled the entrance to an abyss or a door to another dimension.

Suddenly, he felt a bit dizzy and wanted to lie back down and sleep a few more hours. But his phone showed it was already early Monday morning, and he had no choice but to get up and pull himself together.

The accident two years ago had made his relationship with Yin Yan delicate and had also marginalized him within the oil painting department. Lu Zhengming never obtained the qualifications to be a postgraduate mentor and remained at the same level as newly appointed lecturers, still taking attendance in undergraduate classrooms, grappling with tardiness and early dismissals, and handling evaluations and assessments.

This month, he was assigned to teach fourth-year students how to paint the human body. Next month, they would begin their graduation projects, and every day, students came to him with their proposals, asking him to “give some advice.”

Lu Zhengming had a shadow in his mind when it came to those three words. Every time he faced their eager expressions, he felt suffocated. He could only summon his strength and limit his comments to technical aspects, never delving deeper, and certainly never discussing the motivations or values behind their creations.

If he did, most of the students’ perspectives would be unacceptable to him. Some entered the academy with motivations he found too utilitarian. Talking to them required him to spend a great deal of effort maintaining his patience and politeness, forcing himself to focus on the works themselves to avoid delivering overly critical, soul-piercing comments.

At times like these, he couldn’t help but think of Yin Yan.

This person, in private, was just as sharp-tongued as Lu Zhengming himself. Back in their student days, Lu Zhengming had often been reduced to feeling utterly worthless by Yin Yan’s harsh critiques. Yet, in public, Yin Yan would act like some endlessly tolerant priest, with a level of patience that Lu Zhengming found unbearable.

If Yin Yan were present, he would undoubtedly first affirm the student’s motivations and actions, guiding them step by step before offering more precise suggestions. He had the uncanny ability to transform a student’s anxious unease into full, admiring confidence. By the end of it, the student would leave, brimming with enthusiasm, ready to dive back into their creative work.

But once the student was out of sight, Yin Yan’s smile would quickly lose all warmth, leaving behind a hollow shell of a grin, a mask clamped over his face.

Lu Zhengming had seen that expression on him more than once.

Now, he had no choice but to emulate Yin Yan, forcing a calm and collected smile when faced with yet another unimaginative proposal, the kind that repeated itself year after year.

The first to approach him was a female student carrying a pile of selfies and snapshots of her daily life. She intended to blow them up to window-size proportions.

“Narcissistic personal narrative,” Lu Zhengming silently swallowed the critique before it escaped his lips. Students like this popped up every year. Their narrow social circles and shallow life experiences rendered their work hollow and tedious. To an audience, viewing such pieces would elicit little more than a disengaged, “Oh,” followed by nothing else.

After hearing her explanation, Lu Zhengming flipped the photos over, borrowed a pen from a nearby student, and began writing the girl’s name on the back of the photo paper.

“Since this is about narcissism, pardon me, ‘the self,’ you might as well distill it further. Push it to the extreme. Painting photos is classical studio work. Here, I allow calligraphy. Do it this way, and I guarantee that anyone leaving the gallery will remember your name.”

The girl stared at the photo, now covered with her name. “You mean… that’s allowed?”

Lu Zhengming nodded. “If you dare, there’s nothing that isn’t allowed.”

“Professor, look at mine,” a male student interrupted, handing over a small sketch.

Lu Zhengming felt the dizziness return.

This dizziness was different from the low blood sugar he’d experienced earlier. This one was psychological. Lu Zhengming didn’t oppose erotic elements in student artwork, but the piece titled The Gate of All Wonders gave him the urge to back away. To him, “the gate of all wonders” was never meant to symbolize a woman’s vagina. The swirling, psychedelic colors and sprawled bodies created a flowing sense of order. Though Lu Zhengming instinctively resisted it, he could still feel that this was a genuine river of desire, far more sensual than Yin Yan’s cold, detached female nudes.

Awkwardly and with restrained discomfort, he expressed his approval.

“Professor, I don’t actually like this,” the male student said, his blunt honesty more revealing than the artwork itself. “I just want to make money. I want to be like you.”

Lu Zhengming was left speechless, trapped in awkwardness.

He looked again at the painting, which had seemed impressive moments earlier, and suddenly found it dull. Every praiseworthy aspect now felt like part of a carefully crafted trap, a way to extract something completely unrelated under the guise of art.

In a sense, art itself is a kind of deception. Its power lies in its form, not its essence. And once an artist’s tricks are exposed, the allure of form loses its magic, revealing a brutal truth, that the artist’s thoughts may not be any deeper than those of an ordinary person.

“I don’t understand the market,” Lu Zhengming said, steering the conversation back to the classroom. “That’s not my job.”

There were students like this every year, though this one was particularly candid.

Sometimes, depending on what a student was aiming for, he would offer tips on commercial strategies. But overall, Lu Zhengming didn’t have a detailed understanding of how the art market operated. Over the years, he had stumbled into earning some money, but not by pandering to the market. Even now, he wasn’t entirely sure what had brought him success.

When his work was auctioned for the first time a few years ago, Yin Yan had told him he was lucky. At the time, Lu Zhengming had thought Yin Yan meant he was lucky to be embraced by the market. Only after seeing so many people struggle did he realize what Yin Yan had truly meant. His luck was in not having to experience those struggles, nor needing to fake or embellish himself to succeed.

“Alright, back to work. The model has been waiting long enough.”

Lu Zhengming clapped his hands to signal the students to return to their easels, then walked out to the hallway and lit a cigarette. A restless gloom clung to him, and he inhaled nearly half the cigarette in one breath.

Downstairs, the craft and design department was once again working with some toxic materials. When he had come upstairs earlier, he’d passed several students wearing gas masks. Now, the spray paint smell in the hallway was growing stronger, making even the cigarette taste off. Lu Zhengming lifted the lid of a trash can and tossed the half-smoked cigarette inside.

As soon as the cigarette butt hit the bottom, he suddenly remembered that the trash can for the oil painting department was full of oil- and glue-soaked rags and paper scraps, all highly flammable. Lu Zhengming crouched by the trash can and carefully inspected it several times. Once he was sure nothing had caught fire, he finally let out a sigh of relief.

This scene was witnessed by the department head, who happened to be passing by, leading to another moment of awkwardness. Lu Zhengming greeted him with a nod, watched him walk away, and then, unable to suppress his frustration any longer, opened a window and exhaled deeply.

The parking lot was just below the teaching building. He glanced down and saw that Yin Yan’s pepper-white Mini Cooper was parked next to his own car. This particular model and color were more commonly owned by women, but Lu Zhengming didn’t think Yin Yan seemed effeminate.

He just thought he was shameless.

Lu Zhengming rarely saw Yin Yan driving, so he glanced at the car a few more times. To his surprise, the driver’s side door suddenly opened, and Yin Yan stepped out wearing an even more flamboyant light-colored suit. Just as Lu Zhengming was about to mock him in his mind for wearing such impractical clothes to teach in the oil painting department, the passenger door opened, and out stepped a young female assistant instructor from the second studio who had recently been hired by the school.

Lu Zhengming waited in silence as Yin Yan locked the car, then took out his phone and watched as Yin Yan answered a call.

“I’ll wait for you after class.”

That afternoon, when class ended, Yin Yan got into Lu Zhengming’s car.

The two of them drove in silence. Lu Zhengming didn’t ask about Yin Yan’s relationship with the assistant instructor, and Yin Yan didn’t volunteer any information.

That day was the first time Yin Yan visited Lu Zhengming’s new studio. Lu Zhengming didn’t give him a chance to look around. He shoved him against the door, wedging his knee between Yin Yan’s legs, and kissed him fiercely. Days of pent-up frustration finally burst free in that moment.

Lu Zhengming didn’t care whether Yin Yan responded or not. He was focused solely on plundering his mouth. If those lips pressed together, he pried them apart. If that tongue remained indifferent, he invited it to feel his fervor. He kissed him relentlessly until both of them were breathless, until dizziness blurred his senses.

“You’re turned on,” Lu Zhengming panted, slipping his hand into Yin Yan’s pants and kneading him roughly. “Why?”

Yin Yan closed his eyes. “No… I can’t…”

Lu Zhengming undid the buttons on his shirt and licked along his earlobe. “Yes, you can.”

“I can’t function like a normal person,” Yin Yan said stiffly, using his hand to push some distance between them. “At least… I can’t enjoy it.”

“Bullshit.”

Lu Zhengming didn’t believe him. He tore open the remaining buttons, letting his heated kisses trail down Yin Yan’s chest. He kissed, licked, and bit his way downward, unzipping Yin Yan’s pants with his teeth before teasing him through the fabric with the tip of his tongue.

His voice was low and coaxing, unwilling to give up. “Just try it… You won’t be able to forget…”

“What I can’t forget,” Yin Yan said, his voice turning cold, “is that night. When you stepped on my face… and said those things that hurt me.”

Lu Zhengming froze and looked up at him.

“If you insist on having sex with me the way normal people do,” Yin Yan said evenly, “I’ll be nothing more than a corpse in your hands, lying there motionless, unable to give you the response you’re looking for.”

He calmly met Lu Zhengming’s gaze. “Do you want to try?”

Lu Zhengming slowly rose to his feet, undressing Yin Yan completely before leading him to the workspace.

The only thing on the wall was the enormous red painting. Standing naked before it, Yin Yan looked as though he might be swallowed by that overwhelming sea of crimson. He remained silent for a long time, eventually turning to glance back at Lu Zhengming, as though there were countless things he wanted to say. But in the end, all that escaped him was a soft sigh.

Lu Zhengming walked to the corner, tore a strip from a roll of coarse canvas, and pushed the tall adjustable easel behind Yin Yan. Lifting Yin Yan’s hands, he tied them with the strip of canvas and secured them to the easel. Then, turning the crank, he raised the easel until Yin Yan’s body was stretched taut, his weight balanced precariously on the tips of his toes.

Lu Zhengming left him suspended there, allowing him to sway within that oppressive field of red, and resumed the work he hadn’t finished the previous day.

The colors before him burned like molten lava, while behind him, the air simmered with intensity. He could hear Yin Yan swallowing hard, his breath ragged and trembling, almost like a suppressed moan.

Lu Zhengming removed his shirt, his sweat-slicked torso gleaming under the lights, reflecting a metallic sheen as though he were a living, breathing sculpture.

Two hours later, he threw down his brush. Red paint, vivid as blood, was splattered across his chest. Still radiating heat, he walked over to Yin Yan and untied him.

Yin Yan smiled weakly, his body collapsing forward into Lu Zhengming’s arms.

Lu Zhengming bent down, brushing a soft kiss against his ear. “Did you like it?”

Yin Yan gave a faint nod, his hand resting on Lu Zhengming’s waist, as though they were sharing a lover’s embrace. Then, with deliberate grace, he sank to his knees, unfastening Lu Zhengming’s belt. “As a thank-you, I can give you a blowjob.”

Lu Zhengming halted his hands, gripping a fistful of Yin Yan’s hair and forcing him to lift his gaze. With his other hand, he slid down his pants, pulled out his cock, and began masturbating right in front of Yin Yan’s face.

Throughout the entire act, his expression remained blank, until the moment he came, when a restrained, breathy groan escaped his throat.

Yin Yan knelt at his feet, head tilted back as Lu Zhengming’s cum trickled down his face. His lips curved upward, and from deep within, a genuine smile bloomed.

“I liked it.”