Fight the Landlord, Fall in Love

Chapter 21 - Summer Has Passed

Sun Zinan didn’t explain the experience in that much detail and only briefly filled in a few words in a low voice, devoid of any resentment. But Tang Kai was still infuriated.

The social news was filled with terrible accidents like this all the time, but once it happened to someone close to him, he could finally understand what an acute pain it was.

How could an adult do such a psychotic thing towards a child?

Leaving a psychological trauma of bugs was relatively light compared to the fact that he had jumped off the second floor balcony...if Sun Zinan hadn’t lived, he wouldn’t have a partner in front of him at this moment.

“Can I stuff him in a sack and beat him up?” Tang Kai hugged Sun Zinan tightly in his arms, his tone as if he were the one who had been wronged. “I want to break his goddamn legs and send him to the hospital for years, let him experience all your suffering...”

“It’s fine, it’s been so many years.” Sun Zinan ruffled his hair, brushing the words aside as a moment of anger. “Anyways, how can I let him live peacefully? Sooner or later we’ll collect his debts with interest.”

Tang Kai was silent for a while before sullenly saying, “Still want to hit him.”

Sun Zinan didn’t say anything.

Tang Kai hemmed and hawed, asking, “Still want to sleep?”

Sun Zinan didn’t want to sleep at all and lifted his quilt as he sat up. “If I nap too much I’ll have a headache. You should get up and work, Professor Tang.”

Summer vacation ended the next day and the semester opening ceremony was about to start. Tang Kai was the face of the school and had always been pushed forward to speak to new freshmen every year. Sun Zinan was supposed to go after eating together, leaving some time for him to go over his speech notes. Professor Tang truly suffered from procrastination, hugging his waist like an overly clingy dog, refusing to let go and insisting that Sun Zinan stayed to keep him company.

Sun Zinan realized that the fear of the start of a semester was an incurable disease for both students and professors.

Tang Kai grinded through a powerpoint presentation. Once he thought about how he couldn’t loiter around with Sun Zinan every day once school started, he became unhappy and had to resist the urge to buy a house together and move in that night.

Sun Zinan answered emails on his laptop, occasionally raising his hand to rub Tang Kai’s face. When he heard this suggestion, he took it seriously and nodded. “Anyways your job will be stable for the next ten years or so. If you want to buy a house, you should choose one of the newer buildings around school.”

Tang Kai felt that there was another layer of meaning behind his words and asked, “What about you?”

“I...will take it step by step, I guess.” Sun Zinan replied, “I can’t spend my entire life on this little company.”

Tang Kai could roughly understand his concerns. One one hand, Sun Zinan’s position had already reached the ceiling. Once his brothers inherited their positions, they wouldn’t want him to get involved with the group business. On the other hand, his company’s growth was too limited. The entire gene sequencing industry was currently at a bottleneck; if they couldn’t develop new industry sectors, it was only a matter of time before all their resources were used up.

“Do whatever you want to do.” Tang Kai sat up and said with a manly air, “If you don’t succeed, come to me and I’ll support you.”

Sun Zinan rolled his eyes and smirked, “Others take young handsome men to warm their beds. You take young handsome men to cook for you—why don’t you just look for a housekeeper?”

Tang Kai, “I didn’t say I wouldn’t let you crawl into my bed. Come, come whenever you want!”

“&#k2026;”

Seeing that the conversation was running into an indescribable direction, Sun Zinan hurriedly stopped and changed the subject. “What do you want to eat for dinner? The little market in front of your neighborhood seems pretty good. Let’s go buy some groceries in a bit.”

His birthday privileges were only applicable during the day. Sun Zinan still had to cook dinner. Otherwise, he predicted Tang Kai would have cried on the spot.

Sure enough, Professor Tang treasured this last supper and without stopping for breath, performed the entire ’reporting menu’ routine.

Sun Zinan said coolly, “Go back to the lab and gnaw at your petri dishes.”

After the sun started going down, the heat outside cooled off a little. The two of them dallied down the stairs, dressed in casual clothes. It wasn’t too hot outside. They held hands as they shopped at the market.

Sun Zinan rarely came to roadside markets like this; he hated the crowds. But Tang Kai lived in an older, smaller neighborhood and most of the residents were the retired elderly. They were most willing to spend their time in a place where groceries were only 80 RMB, so the business at this vegetable market was booming.

He had lacked normal life experiences since he was a child and always felt like he was out of touch with others. But as he held a person in his hands, he felt like he had jumped from a cold, lofty room into the dusty, noisy world of mortals. His delicate armor crumbled and faded away. Somehow, he suddenly found the courage to shop at a crowded roadside market.

“Should we buy a fish and roast it when we get back? Or make it sweet-and-sour?” Sun Zinan stared at the lively fish in the plastic bin and asked Tang Kai, “Or should we fry it?”

For some reason, Tang Kai looked a little absent-minded. He only came back to his senses after Sun Zinan called out to him several times. “I want pickled vegetables and fish.”

“It’s the middle of summer, are you not afraid of inflammation?” Sun Zinan muttered to himself and went up to the counter, pointing at the bin as he said, “Boss, give me a grass carp.”

The advantage of buying fish at a market was that he could ask the stall owner to clean live fish for them so they wouldn’t have to do it at home. As Sun Zinan waited for the stall owner to kill the fish, he suddenly asked, “What were you looking at earlier?”

Tang Kai, “En?”

“I had to call you many times before you noticed.” Sun Zinan replied.

“It’s nothing, I was probably overthinking.” Tang Kai said, “It feels like someone has been watching me since we’ve left the apartment. I’m probably wrong.”

“That’s normal.” Sun Zinan looked around and smiled. “It’s rare to see someone as good-looking as you.”

Professor Tang was unexpectedly teased by him, the tips of his ears turning red.

The stall owner briskly cleaned the grass carp. Sun Zinan scanned the QR code on his phone to pay. Tang Kai took the plastic bag and asked, “Where do we buy pickled vegetables? Can we buy whole pickled vegetables?”

Sun Zinan looked at this handsome fool who was even more ignorant than him, and sighed. “Over there, where you buy spices. Do you see? Go tell the auntie you want two bags of ingredients for pickled vegetables and fish.”

Tang Kai looked at him pitifully, his gaze delicate. “Dear, you won’t come with me?”

Sun Zinan replied lovingly, “Babe, after you buy the ingredients just stand there and don’t go too far. I’m going to buy a few oranges.”

Tang Kai, “...”

There was no end to this!

When Sun Zinan came back carrying a few stalks of celery, Tang Kai was obediently standing under the fruit stand’s umbrella waiting for him. One hand carried the plastic bag while the other hand was opening a chocolate-covered ice cream bar.

He held up the cold ice cream bar in front of him. “Come.”

Sun Zinan bit off a corner.

The chocolate was crisp, the cream was cool, and his mouth was full of the sweet, fragrant taste of milk. Tang Kai handed the ice cream to him and asked, “Sweet?”

Sun Zinan refused to take it and said mysteriously, “Won’t you know if you taste it yourself?”

Tang Kai tsked. “You really can’t read the mood. Take it.”

Sun Zinan had just taken the ice cream bar that was missing a corner when Tang Kai grabbed his chin and kissed him. His lips were slightly bitter from the chocolate but sweet from the cream. They were colder because of the ice cream bar but the icy feeling seemed to burn instead. For Tang Kai, the cold lips were a delicious dessert, more attractive than honey or poison.

“Wu...we’re in public, do you want any face!”

“I don’t like celery.”

“Ah?”

“I’m so pitiful, you should comfort me.”

“...”

The glow of the setting sun set the horizon aflame. At some point in time, the sound of cicadas had stopped. The wind stilled and the leaves stopped shaking. Only the passionate kiss along with the melted ice cream, under the peaceful, quiet shade, became the last vivid memory of summer.

The weather became cooler as autumn arrived. Sun Zinan caught a slight cough. Yu Liang had received a WeChat reminder from Tang Kai in the early morning. He took the hot pear soup that had been delivered to take to Sun Zinan and ran into Wang Geng on the way. He could only stand there and greet, “Hello Vice president Wang.”

Every time Wang Geng saw this guy, he would stand there, trembling. Wang Geng suspected it wasn’t because he was afraid of him, it was probably because he was allergic to all of mankind.

He looked down at the thermos in Yu Liang’s hands. “What are you delivering?”

Yu Liang said quietly, “Pear soup.”

Wang Geng looked at him suspiciously. “Pear soup again? You came to deliver pear soup yesterday. Haven’t you been a little too attentive towards Director Sun these days?”

Silly child Yu Liang said with a straight face, “I meet you every time I come here. That means we both are at the same level.”

You sycophant, what same level!

Vice president Wang’s lungs hurt from this thoughtlessness. He turned his face towards the wall in annoyance, not wanting to talk to him.

The elevator door opened and the two of them walked through the hallway to the door of Sun Zinan’s office. Yu Liang knocked on the door twice. The lock opened automatically. Sun Zinan was currently on the phone and signaled for the two men to wait.

“Okay...I got it. Keep investigating. Send me a detailed report to my inbox when you get back. That’s all.”

He set his phone down. Yu Liang placed the thermos on his desk and said subserviently, “Director Sun, the morning delivery sent this. Please drink it while it’s still hot.”

Wang Geng didn’t know Tang Kai had done this and felt that this was even more suspicious. “Delivery?”

Sun Zinan coughed lowly and smiled. “No, it’s from my boyfriend. Thanks for sending it.”

Yu Liang was less scared of Sun Zinan by now and he nodded, saying “I’m going back to work” before leaving and shutting the door.

Sun Zinan had always put up a clear divide between his public and private life. Wang Geng knew very little about his private life and didn’t realize he was already taken, and by a man at that. For a moment, he was unsure how to continue the conversation.

Fortunately, Sun Zinan had no intention of sharing his joys with this single dog. He screwed open the thermos and got straight to the point. “What did you come for? Is it about the ecological park project?”

“Yes,” Wang Geng replied. “I just received Wan Tang Real Estate’s reply; they also rejected our offers. The only ones left are Jin Ke Real Estate and Jin Yuan Villa. What should we do?”

“Hold them up and discuss slowly.” Sun Zinan said, “Also ask if we can go over and do a field survey.”

“But there’s currently another biotechnology company competing for Jin Ke Real Estate,” Wang Geng responded. “If we both raise the prices, it won’t be good for us.”

“No worries, raise the prices along with them. Whatever they do, just raise the prices.” Sun Zinan finished speaking and saw that the expression on Wang Geng’s face was definitely one of ‘you’re joking.’ He could only add, “Don’t worry, I have it handled.”

Wang Geng looked grave. He wanted to hear how exactly it was handled, but Sun Zinan didn’t say anything else and instead poured out a bowl of steaming hot pear soup. As he took small sips, he asked, “Do you have anything else to say?”

“...”

Vice president Wang gritted his teeth and said, “It’s nothing. Farewell.”

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