Chapter 22 – Wholehearted Devotion

On New Year’s Eve, Fang Xiao’s takeout remained untouched. Early on the first day of the Lunar New Year, Gu Yiming went into the kitchen and made himself a bowl of noodles, heating the takeout in the microwave before eating it. When he finally drank the congee, he saw the last two lines of the poem on the box. Unlike the heaviness of the previous lines about “boiling and simmering,” these read:

“Fast or slow, watch the fire’s pace,

Sour, sweet, bitter, spicy—drink in the years.”

Not bad.

Gu Yiming hadn’t completely shaken off his training mindset and felt at a loss for what to do. He watched two movies Fang Xiao had recommended and dragged himself through the afternoon until, out of sheer boredom, he went downstairs for a jog. Perhaps thanks to the ban on fireworks, the air quality was surprisingly good. Gu Yiming ran along Jingyin Road toward the Summer Palace. The park was crowded with tourists, but the streets along the way were eerily deserted, with even supermarkets closing early. During his years in Beijing, he had always spent the Spring Festival training, so this was his first time experiencing the capital in such a desolate state. He felt a pang of melancholy but didn’t know how to express it, so he took more photos on his way back.

Beyond the existential loneliness, the empty city had a more practical impact on Gu Yiming—daily necessities were hard to come by. He estimated that Fang Xiao’s stockpile of food would only last two more meals, so he decided to scout for groceries during his morning jog the next day.

He also wondered when Fang Xiao would return. Gu Yiming thought to himself that his cooking skills were decent. If Fang Xiao came back early, he’d put in extra effort and make a proper feast. It would be even better if he could coax Fang Xiao into drinking a little and having a heart-to-heart chat.

Gu Yiming hoped Fang Xiao would return soon, but he didn’t expect it to be this soon. Just after nine in the morning on the second day of the Lunar New Year, he finished his jog and returned to the apartment complex with a bag of groceries, only to find Fang Xiao sitting on a bench in the small garden downstairs, one arm draped over his eyes as he leaned back against the seat.

Gu Yiming asked, “What’s wrong?”

Fang Xiao didn’t respond. Worried, Gu Yiming reached out to touch Fang Xiao’s arm, but there was still no reaction.

Gu Yiming stood there for a moment. Fang Xiao, hearing no movement, thought he had left—until Gu Yiming spoke again: “Then I’ll stay here and keep you company. Are you cold?” Afraid Fang Xiao wouldn’t answer, he added, “If you don’t feel like talking now, I’ll ask again later.”

Fang Xiao lowered his arm and looked at Gu Yiming. His expression was unreadable, and he didn’t seem to have been crying. Gu Yiming hesitated. “Do you… want to go home? Or stay here a little longer? I can also lend you a hug—just a platonic one.”

Fang Xiao opened his arms. Gu Yiming froze for a second before setting the groceries on the ground and stepping forward, letting Fang Xiao pull him into a tight embrace. Gu Yiming had just finished jogging, his body radiating warmth—comforting. Fang Xiao pressed his face against Gu Yiming’s chest and abdomen, arms wrapped around his waist, and murmured, “Platonic?”

Gu Yiming’s face flushed—whether from the run or embarrassment, it was hard to tell. He said seriously, “This time doesn’t count.”

Fang Xiao said, “The day before yesterday, when we were talking about graduation photos, I wanted to tell you a story but didn’t have the nerve. Now I want to tell it. Will you listen?”

Gu Yiming was pleasantly surprised. “Are you… still drunk?”

Fang Xiao laughed into his chest. “Yeah.”

Fang Xiao had majored in automation as an undergraduate and excelled academically. By graduation, he should have followed the conventional path of finding a job, but he suddenly awakened to a passion for music and pursued a postgraduate degree in electronic music. His family, which valued innate talent above all else, strongly disapproved. Long-suppressed family conflicts erupted, and Fang Xiao threw himself into his passion as if fighting against the world. At the same time, in a rebellious act, he came out to his family and recklessly plunged into a passionate relationship with Xing Zongkai.

It was a blazing campus romance—fraught with anxiety yet sweet, teetering between heaven and hell. They hid in the gaps between the closet and the outside world, never given the chance to consider the bigger picture. They loved each other deeply, which meant they knew each other’s deepest vulnerabilities.

Xing Zongkai was Fang Xiao’s senior in the same department, a year ahead of him. After graduation, with his family’s support, he started a record company. Xing Zongkai was steady and mature, hitting all of Fang Xiao’s unspoken preferences. The occasional hints of possessiveness only made Fang Xiao feel valued, never raising any alarms.

Xing Zongkai loved Fang Xiao deeply, but the way he treated Fang Xiao gradually became strange. After Fang Xiao graduated, signed with Xing Zongkai’s company, and they moved in together, their relationship dynamic became unmistakably abnormal.

Xing Zongkai loved him wholeheartedly.

As a manager in the entertainment industry, Xing Zongkai was stern and unyielding with everyone else, devoting all his time outside work to Fang Xiao. He shared every detail and emotion of his life with Fang Xiao and demanded the same in return—Fang Xiao was not allowed to have any independent life outside of him. Xing Zongkai had mild borderline personality disorder tendencies, with extremely rigid emotional needs. He wouldn’t even let Fang Xiao enter the recording studio without him present. Fang Xiao was his one and only weakness, and even an occasional complaint from Fang Xiao under pressure would send Xing Zongkai into agony. His pain was so profound that, despite being the aggressor, it made Fang Xiao feel even more guilty and burdened.

Sometimes Fang Xiao suspected Xing Zongkai did it on purpose. Such malicious speculation eased Fang Xiao’s guilt and left room for communication, but he couldn’t lie to himself. Deep down, he knew Xing Zongkai simply loved him. It was Xing Zongkai’s strength and vulnerability that had drawn Fang Xiao in, and it was this same contradiction that now overwhelmed him. Xing Zongkai demanded endlessly; Fang Xiao resisted endlessly. Two fiercely beating hearts tormented each other until they were both exhausted.

Xing Zongkai tried to train Fang Xiao. The maturity and decisiveness that had initially attracted Fang Xiao were now fully directed at him. Xing Zongkai was a master at manipulating hearts, wielding both candy and the whip with equal skill. He manufactured conflicts to force Fang Xiao’s concessions and devoted all his energy to cutting off Fang Xiao’s escape routes. He tested Fang Xiao’s love through harm. This was Xing Zongkai’s way of loving—devotion and deep affection, testing and training. So Fang Xiao couldn’t fight back.

What could he do? When love itself was the wound, giving up was betrayal, and holding on was despair.

Xing Zongkai held Fang Xiao’s three-year exclusive contract, and his methods of breaking him were simple and direct. After graduation, Fang Xiao had immersed himself in songwriting, accumulating enough material for an entire album. Yet he was given no performance or release opportunities—all the resources stipulated in his contract were withheld under “force majeure.” His only way out was to abandon being a singer-songwriter and sell his songs to others. Fang Xiao had already been denied musical training by his family for lacking talent, and this only confirmed his mediocrity. He gradually accepted Xing Zongkai’s assessment: he was too inadequate, and only Xing Zongkai would ever love him.

But love alone wasn’t enough.

Fang Xiao broke the contract when Xing Zongkai demanded he sell his songs without credit. He snapped, fleeing Xing Zongkai in desperation. Having already severed ties with his parents, he had nowhere to go, so he left Beijing for Shenyang, intending to give up music and return to his original field—applying for a mechanical engineering job at Shenyang Automation Institute. But by chance, he happened to catch the National Games where Gu Yiming was competing.

In the air pistol finals, the host team’s Liaoning shooter led the entire match. By the last shot, he was ahead of Gu Yiming, who was in second place, by 2.1 points. On the final shot, perhaps overconfident, the Liaoning shooter slipped up with an 8.6. The moment his shot landed, the crowd erupted in chatter, and even the commentators wrote Gu Yiming off—he needed a 10.7 just to tie. The rookie Gu Yiming, unfazed, shot a 10.9.

Fang Xiao, sitting in the front row, had been watching the 16-year-old boy in the corner shooting booth the entire time.

Fang Xiao didn’t attend the interview at the Shenyang company where he’d submitted his resume. He returned to Beijing, first auditioning at several major labels with decent results. But when he discovered Xing Zongkai still held his management contract and no new company was willing to pay the breach fee, the deals fell through. Fang Xiao took a week off, then started taking freelance arrangement jobs.

Fearing issues with Xing Zongkai’s contract, Fang Xiao used his cousin¹Female cousin. That’s how he got his rediculous nickname. Fang Tiantian’s ID for two years. During this time, he collaborated once with Tang Shao, who was then a part-time hulusi²Chinese gourd flute player. Tang Shao took on one of Fang Xiao’s Chinese-style recording projects, glanced at the sheet music, and angrily sent it back, saying, “This score’s range is way too wide—it exceeds the hulusi’s range by an entire octave!” After Fang Xiao switched back to his real name post-contract, he worked with Tang Shao again and listened to him complain about how, back in his musician days, some idiot named Fang Tiantian had asked him to play a two-octave hulusi piece. Fang Xiao sheepishly admitted it was him, and the two became friends.

Xing Zongkai never stopped looking for Fang Xiao. Unable to join a studio, Fang Xiao worked solo for years, suffering multiple breakdowns along the way. Too poor for therapy, he attended some peer support groups and self-studied psychology books—earning frequent mockery from Tang Shao. Despite his unreliability, Tang Shao was fiercely loyal, never leaking Fang Xiao’s whereabouts to Xing Zongkai and often referring him jobs, helping him build a reputation in the industry. Slowly, over the years, things settled down.

“When I agreed to his confession, I imagined many obstacles—school, family, public opinion… I just never expected it to start from within.” Fang Xiao’s voice was as light as a sigh. “Neither of us handled it well. I wasn’t strong enough; he couldn’t learn restraint. In the end, I couldn’t keep my promise. It hurt too much… The same malice, from a stranger, is a 1. From him, it’s a 100.”

“It’s not your fault,” Gu Yiming said. Fang Xiao had already let go of him, and Gu Yiming didn’t know whether to crouch down, so he stood stiffly in front of Fang Xiao, frowning. “You didn’t have to spare his feelings.”

“I couldn’t help it,” Fang Xiao said, shaking his head with his eyes closed. “Xing Zongkai… can be a real bastard sometimes, but he has his good points too. He’s not a bad person. We both made mistakes… Xiao Gu, maybe I’m a bit of a pushover. I can’t bring myself to completely vilify someone.”

Gu Yiming mumbled an “Oh,” his tone stiff.

Fang Xiao was a little embarrassed. “Xiao Gu, are you mad?”

Gu Yiming shook his head. He wasn’t angry—he’d always known Fang Xiao was gentle-hearted. Fang Xiao wasn’t biased against his ex, which was fine by him. On the contrary, he thought Fang Xiao was incredible. Fang Xiao had pulled himself together just from watching one of Gu Yiming’s matches. It made Gu Yiming feel like his matches were kind of impressive too. He’d sensed something off about Fang Xiao for a long time—too thin, always smiling, sometimes in a way that made others uncomfortable. He wasn’t angry at Fang Xiao at all. He just wanted to drag Xing Zongkai out and beat him up.

Fang Xiao bent down to pick up the plastic bag of groceries and walked home side by side with Gu Yiming. His gaze was unfocused, fixed somewhere far ahead. “Liking someone isn’t enough. Liking is too frivolous—like having a crush on an idol, it’s one-sided, without real-world pressures. Xiao Gu, I won’t ask if you’re gay right now. You might enjoy spending time with me now, but that might not always be the case. Like with Xing Zongkai and me—taking risks for uncertain things, getting involved with a man, the stakes are too high. Even if the relationship starts perfectly, what about your family? What if your teammates have objections? I doubt you’ve considered any of this.”

Fang Xiao hadn’t planned to say any of this—his past, his views on love—none of it was Gu Yiming’s concern. But now that he knew Gu Yiming was serious, he had to speak up. Maybe Gu Yiming would think these things didn’t matter. Fang Xiao had been that young once, had thought that way too. Later, he realized he was wrong.

“Xiao Gu, I don’t regret dating Xing Zongkai—only signing that contract with him. Love and life were destroyed together. With you, it’s the same. I don’t hold your contract, but I hold your trust and dependence. How could I date you? Relationships are exhausting, draining. I’m not in my early twenties anymore. I don’t have the confidence. I’d ruin you.”

Having said this, Fang Xiao didn’t wait for Gu Yiming’s response and strode toward the building entrance. Gu Yiming stood frozen for a moment before quickly following.

Fang Xiao was right—Gu Yiming hadn’t considered any of this. His family might not care, but his teammates and coaches likely would. He hadn’t thought about it before because it hadn’t occurred to him, and he hadn’t cared. So why had Fang Xiao? Was it learning from experience?

Gu Yiming thought, That’s exactly why Fang Xiao told me about Xing Zongkai—to lay himself bare, to give me more support, to make sure I don’t gamble everything on an uncertain love. It was good advice, but Gu Yiming felt there was more to it. As an instinctive competitor, he quickly sensed Fang Xiao’s shift from rejection to retreat.

Fang Xiao was scared. This was something Gu Yiming hadn’t anticipated. Well, if Fang Xiao was afraid, then Gu Yiming would consider those fears for him.

• 1
  Female cousin. That’s how he got his rediculous nickname.
• 2
  Chinese gourd flute