Sheng Renxing walked out of the office under Director Li’s iron-gray stare. He had a feeling his other phone would receive a complaint message from the dean at any second.
He didn’t particularly care. He had already drafted a reply in his head. There was something else he was more curious about.
“Do you have any tattoos?” Sheng Renxing asked Xing Ye.
It was already the first class of the afternoon, but Xing Ye still hadn’t returned to his own classroom. He was sitting naturally in Sheng Renxing’s seat, and no one said anything about it.
The weather wasn’t very cold yet, so plenty of young bosses around campus had their arms and legs exposed. There really were quite a few students with tattoos, including Jiang Jing and the others. Sheng Renxing had seen theirs before.
Jiang Jing had a line of English letters and a rose on the inside of his wrist. Sheng Renxing didn’t know who had designed it, but it looked pretty good.
Yellow Hair had more. Behind his ear, on his arms—several in total.
One glance and you knew he wasn’t exactly a respectable citizen.
It wasn’t as though no one in Sheng Renxing’s old circle had tattoos either. Big-Head Qiu had once gotten matching tattoos with his first girlfriend.
After they broke up, every subsequent girlfriend who demanded to know about the tattoo was told it had been “for a brother.” Sheng Renxing was the unfortunate brother he blamed it on.
But tattoos had levels too. Most of the ones people at school had were hideous. Every time Sheng Renxing saw one, he would frown and look away.
Xing Ye’s group, though, had probably all gone to the same tattoo artist. Their designs looked good, on an entirely different level from those other people’s.
“No,” Xing Ye answered softly.
The classroom was unusually quiet, so the two of them unconsciously lowered their voices too.
“Why not?” Sheng Renxing asked.
“Nothing I want tattooed.” Xing Ye kept working as he answered, still finishing the part of the drawing on Sheng Renxing’s arm that he hadn’t completed earlier.
“Don’t you work security at those places? You could get a full sleeve. You’d look more intimidating.” Sheng Renxing examined his face. “Fewer people would come looking for trouble.”
Xing Ye had once told him about a group of middle-school kids who came to play games at a place he was watching and nearly started a fight. Xing Ye went over to intervene, but the kids wouldn’t listen to him at all. It wasn’t until he picked one boy up and threw him straight off a dance machine that the others finally shut up, abandoned the machines they had already paid for, and fled with their tails between their legs.
Sheng Renxing had laughed at him, saying they must have thought his face looked too young and that he didn’t look like someone who could fight. He should tattoo the character for “king” on his forehead; then no one would dare provoke him.
“Don’t need it,” Xing Ye said without looking up.
He wasn’t afraid of people coming to cause trouble.
Ignoring him, Sheng Renxing reached out and tapped a scar on the side of Xing Ye’s neck. “Get one here. It’d cover the scar.”
Xing Ye raised his eyes and met his gaze, then abruptly slapped Sheng Renxing’s hand away with a sharp smack. “Done.”
“Hiss.” Sheng Renxing pulled his hand back and lowered his head to study the design, then compared it with the image on his phone.
Xing Ye hadn’t copied the reference. He had changed a lot of it.
And he had only used linework. Compared with the original image, it instantly looked more sophisticated, the tacky edge completely gone.
Sheng Renxing stared for a while, then turned and praised him. “You’re way too good at this.” He handed him the phone. “Take a picture for me!”
Xing Ye didn’t say anything. He took the phone and photographed Sheng Renxing’s arm.
Sheng Renxing was still marveling at it. “That settles it. Tonight I’m wrapping my arm in a plastic bag when I shower.”
“Just wash it off.” Xing Ye finished taking the photo and handed the phone back, lips pressed together. He was clearly a little unused to such direct praise.
“How could I bear to?” Sheng Renxing looked at the photo for a while, then had a sudden thought. “Don’t tell me you designed Jiang Jing and the others’ tattoos?”
“…” Xing Ye said, “No.”
Sheng Renxing tilted his head and studied him. He had only tossed the question out casually, but Xing Ye’s reaction was a little suspicious.
By evening, he had his answer.
“Brother Xing drew all the original designs for us.” In the middle of all the noise, Yellow Hair smugly rolled his sleeve above his arm and held it out for Sheng Renxing to see. “Brother Liang almost took him on as an apprentice back then.”
They were sitting at an open-air food stall.
“Who’s Brother Liang?” Sheng Renxing stared at the tattoo on Yellow Hair’s arm. It was a grotesque face worked into a sleeve design and looked fairly frightening at first glance.
“A tattoo artist,” Jiang Jing answered. “Brother Liang is one of the best tattoo artists in Xuancheng.”
“If we hadn’t benefited from Xing Ye’s connections, the waiting list alone would’ve been two years.” Dong Zhuo laughed and tugged down his collar to reveal a tattoo near his collarbone.
Sheng Renxing asked, “Why did he almost become an apprentice?”
“Brother Xing didn’t want to. Said he didn’t have time because he had school.” Yellow Hair shook his head as he spoke. “Old Li would cry tears of joy if he heard that.”
Sheng Renxing turned toward Xing Ye and raised his brows. Xing Ye met his gaze and said nothing.
“You want a tattoo too?” Jiang Jing asked him.
“Hm?” Sheng Renxing thought for a moment, then nodded. “I haven’t decided on a design yet.”
“Where are you getting it?” Yellow Hair perked up. “Get Brother Xing to draw it! He designed all of ours!”
Sheng Renxing rolled up his left sleeve and exposed the outside of his elbow. “Here.” He pointed to a scar running from his upper arm to his forearm, about seven or eight centimeters long.
“Fuck, how’d you get that? Fighting?” Yellow Hair craned his neck and leaned over, nearly draping half his body across Xing Ye before Xing Ye shoved him back.
“Crashed my bike.” Sheng Renxing didn’t want to say more.
Back then, he had only recently started riding. Sometimes he wouldn’t even wear proper riding gear because he wanted the thrill. Once, while racing someone, that bastard had played dirty. Sheng Renxing had also been far too confident in himself. He didn’t know the road conditions and still refused to slow down. He pushed too hard into a turn, failed to lean properly, and crashed.
Luckily his protective gear had been good, and there was a pile of grass beside the road. Otherwise he could have kissed that arm goodbye. But he had still won the race.
He didn’t want to remember how the whole thing had gone. In any case, very few people dared challenge him to that kind of race afterward.
For a while, Big-Head Qiu had saved him in his contacts as “Death Squad Seeded Contestant No. 1.”
Yellow Hair clicked his tongue a few times. He assumed Sheng Renxing had simply fallen during an ordinary ride and comforted him. “Who hasn’t fallen off a bike two or three times? This asshole”—he pointed at Lu Zhaohua—“gave me a ride last time. Pitch-dark outside, and he was fucking weaving all over the place, copying those idiot street-bike kids and saying he was going to show me what it meant to be a man as fast as the wind.”
“And then the fucker drove straight into somebody’s field!” Even now, telling the story made him indignant.
“Who the fuck stood up on the back seat and started dancing?” Lu Zhaohua wasn’t pleased. He gave Yellow Hair a sidelong look. “I ride a motorcycle, not a plane. You came out with all your limbs attached. What are you still whining about?”
“And which little bastard bragged that his riding skills could beat a plane in the sky and an aircraft carrier at sea? Beat my ass!” Yellow Hair drained the bitter liquor in his mouth. “When I got home, they wouldn’t let me shower or change clothes. Made me kneel outside the front door all night. By the next morning I’d practically turned into a clay Buddha! Mud was falling off me everywhere!”
“You fucking…” Lu Zhaohua had been about to curse him out, but halfway through he broke into laughter. “No, seriously, your parents are incredible!”
Everyone laughed, and the atmosphere became lively and cheerful.
Still simmering, Yellow Hair asked Sheng Renxing, “Did you get punished after your crash?”
“He was hurt that badly. Why would they still punish him?” Jiang Jing rolled his eyes at Yellow Hair and kicked him for good measure. “You think everyone’s you?”
The two of them immediately started arguing. Sheng Renxing raised a brow and said nothing.
Yellow Hair refused to give up and kept asking. Sheng Renxing shook his head. “No. I got sent straight to the hospital.”
Yellow Hair howled. “See? My old man and old lady really are the only ones like this! There’s no fucking way I’m their biological child!”
Jiang Jing looked at him in surprise, visibly hesitating before saying, “Oh. I thought… you already knew.”
“Fuck off!!!” Yellow Hair shouted.
After they finished eating and everyone split up, Sheng Renxing waved a hand in front of Xing Ye’s face. Xing Ye caught it in one grab and raised his eyes to him.
“You’re awake?” Sheng Renxing looked surprised. “I thought you’d fallen asleep.”
After all, Xing Ye hadn’t said a single word through the second half of the meal.
“Am I Cao Cao?” Xing Ye asked speechlessly. Even he hadn’t known he could sleep with his eyes open.
“You know Cao Cao?” Sheng Renxing looked even more shocked.
“…” Xing Ye stared at him coolly. “Drunk?”
Sheng Renxing laughed twice and stood up. “Let’s go.”
It was a little after seven in the evening. At eight, he had evening study with Mooncake in the library. The two of them wandered slowly toward school.
“Where are you going later?” Sheng Renxing stretched and turned his head toward him.
“To watch a place,” Xing Ye said.
“Didn’t you just do that last night?” Sheng Renxing looked at the time on his phone in surprise. “This early?”
Xing Ye nodded. “Different place. I’ll go over early and sleep for a while.”
Sheng Renxing gave him a complicated look. “Where?”
“A card and mahjong room.” When some of its private rooms were empty, he could sleep there for a while.
If he was watching an arcade or somewhere similar, that wasn’t possible. There was nowhere to lie down, and the noise alone would kill him.
“Wouldn’t that still be noisy?” Sheng Renxing patted him on the shoulder. “Why don’t you sleep in the library? I’ll wake you when it’s time.”
Xing Ye thought for a moment, then nodded.
Seeing how subdued he looked, Sheng Renxing suspected this wasn’t merely Xing Ye’s second consecutive night staying awake.
“Have you been watching places every night these past few days?” he asked.
“Mm,” Xing Ye said. “My turn happened to come up.”
Sheng Renxing frowned. “Why not alternate days?” He gestured vaguely toward Xing Ye’s eyes. “Those dark circles are nearly panda level.”
Xing Ye pinched the bridge of his nose. “Switching shifts is a hassle.”
“You even have shifts for this?” Sheng Renxing clicked his tongue.
Xing Ye stopped talking.
Sheng Renxing thought for a moment. “Is that why you didn’t go learn tattooing?”
Xing Ye paused. After a moment of silence, he said, “No time, and no money.” Apprentices didn’t earn anything. In fact, they had to pay.
“But you do like it, don’t you?” Sheng Renxing looked at him.
“It’s all right.” Xing Ye only shook his head mildly.
As he spoke, something seemed to occur to him.
He reached out, pulled Sheng Renxing’s arm over, and pushed up the sleeve to look at the scar.
“Hey!” Sheng Renxing instinctively tried to yank his hand back. “Why are you getting handsy?”
“You mind?” Xing Ye asked.
“Fuck.” Sheng Renxing stopped resisting and obediently let him look. “It’s from years ago. What are you looking at? You want to design something for me?”
“You want me to?” Xing Ye asked in return.
“Yeah…” Sheng Renxing fell silent for a moment. He actually hadn’t decided whether he wanted a tattoo at all. “Depends whether your design looks good.”
Xing Ye laughed softly and released his arm.
“What are you laughing at?” Sheng Renxing pulled his sleeve back down. Xing Ye’s laugh had a distinct flavor of looking down on him.
“A tattoo there hurts,” Xing Ye said, slipping his hands into his pockets.
“You think I’m scared of pain?” Sheng Renxing glared at him.
Xing Ye was silent for a moment. “What kind of design do you like? I can talk to Brother Liang for you.”
“You’re not drawing it?” Sheng Renxing asked.
Xing Ye shook his head. “I’m not good enough.”
“Oh.” Sheng Renxing lowered his eyes to the shadows they cast on the ground. “Then I won’t get one.”
When he looked up, Xing Ye was watching him. Sheng Renxing said, “It’s not like I absolutely need one. I just thought Jiang Jing and the others’ tattoos looked pretty good. If you don’t want to draw it, forget it.”
Xing Ye nodded. For a while, neither of them spoke.
“How did you crash?” Xing Ye asked first, breaking the strange atmosphere between them.
“Fell off the bike,” Sheng Renxing answered.
Another long silence followed. Sheng Renxing cursed inwardly, then said, “I was racing someone. Didn’t know the mountain road well. I pushed too fast through a turn and didn’t notice that bastard cutting me off, so I went down into the grass. A branch scraped my arm.”
“Racing?” Xing Ye asked.
“Mm. Someone organized it.” Sheng Renxing glanced at him. “You thought I fell while learning to ride?” He curled his lip. “If that were how I got this scar, I’d keep it covered for the rest of my life. Anyone who saw it would have to be silenced permanently.”
Xing Ye laughed. “You didn’t get yelled at?”
“You don’t believe me?” Sheng Renxing glanced at him, paused, then sighed. “I got dealt with brutally.”
“Got hit?” Xing Ye asked.
“I’ve never been hit once in my life.” Sheng Renxing lowered his eyes to the ground.
When Sheng Qiong had arrived at the hospital back then, he hadn’t hit him or cursed him. He had only asked one question.
“Only beasts let their emotions control them. Sheng Renxing, are you the same as an animal?”
That cold, mocking face looking down at him had almost made Sheng Renxing climb out of the hospital bed and fight Sheng Qiong on the spot.
Honestly, if he hadn’t ultimately won that race, he suspected Sheng Qiong might have thrown him out of the hospital and left him on the mountain with his motorcycle for half a month.
But this counted as one of Sheng Renxing’s dark histories. Even now, remembering it made him want to drag Sheng Qiong out of the memory and beat him up. There was no chance he would tell Xing Ye about it. He silently looked at his arm, and Xing Ye didn’t ask any more questions.
After a while, Xing Ye said, “I’ll tattoo it for you.”
Cultural Notes
The “king” tattoo joke: The suggested forehead character is the Chinese character meaning “king,” conventionally associated with the stripes on a tiger’s forehead. The joke is that it would make Xing Ye look visibly intimidating.
