Chapter 58

On the way home, Tang Yi-Bai's breathing was light and easy. Every time he looked at Yun Duo, his gaze would linger a little. Yun Duo really could not take it and so did not dare to look at him.

They arrived home slightly after 9pm. The Tang couple was still awake. Madam Lu was on the couch playing games on a PD{I couldn't find a clear explanation for this, but my best bet is that it's a portable gaming device.} while Daddy Tang was sitting beside her watching tv. The tv was currently broadcasting a basketball game. Madam Lu said "water" and Daddy Tang quickly took a cup half-filled with water from the coffee table and passed it to her. After se finished drinking the water, she passed it back to him and he placed it back on the coffee table.

The two existed in great harmony.

When Tang Yi-Bai and Yun Duo returned, the husband and wife on the sofa perceptively noticed the rose in Yun Duo's hand. The couple exchanged a meaningful look.

Tang Yi-Bai said, "Dad, Mum, I have something to announce."

Madam Lu set down the PD and asked, "You two are together now?"

Yun Duo blushed and looked down.

Daddy Tang laughed and said, "You two little brats. There's no need to brag about ending your single life in front of a married couple. Anyway, this sort of thing is so easy to guess, did you really need to announce it? Tell us something we can't guess."

Tang Yi-Bai facepalmed. "Yun Duo, you go."

Yun Duo said, "Uncle, Auntie, Tang Yi-Bai has actually saved my life. The little kid he saved at Qixia Mountain when he was 7 years old was me."

The married couple seemed stunned by the news. They sat motionless on the sofa, staring at Yun Duo in astonishment.

Yun Duo said softly, "It's true."

"So you're saying that," Daddy Tang looked rather dazed, "Doudou saved you when you were little, and then the both of you came to the same city, and then you just so happened to rent a room with us?"

"Yes, that's basically it."

Daddy Tang rubbed his chest. "It feels like God is helping us to choose a daughter-in-law! If we don't let you two be together, will we be struck by lightning?"

"Cough."

Even someone as calm as Madam Lu found herself speechless for a long while. Yun Duo left them to digest the news while she went off to take a shower. After running around all day, she felt grimy, and with all the emotional ups and downs, she was really feeling quite tired now.

Tang Yi-Bai sat on the sofa, snacking on grapes from the fruit platter on the coffee table. Er-Bai sat beside Tang Yi-Bai and stared intently at him. With a flick of his finger, a grape flew — Er-Bai leapt up to catch it with his mouth, swallowed with hardly any chewing involved, and then sat down again to continue staring at him with his tongue sticking out{Helpful advice from a well-informed commenter: "Please don't give a dog grapes or raisins. Both are highly toxic to our canine pets." We are lucky Er-Bai lives in a fictional world where apparently grapes aren't toxic to silly lovable doggy friends.}.

"Doudou," Daddy Tang came seeking gossip. "You and Yun Duo, who confessed first?"

Even though Madam Lu did not ask the question, she also perked up her ears in interest.

Tang Yi-Bai smiled with downturned eyes, "She kissed me first."

"Ah!" Daddy Tang's jaw dropped. "Wouldn't have guessed that Yun Duo would be so brave."

Madam Lu's eyes narrowed. Looking at her son's smug face, she suddenly said, "Yun Duo ran off to look for you this afternoon saying that she wanted to tell you about the time you saved her life. And then your dad just asked who was the first to confess, but your reply is who kissed who first. So now, it begs the question, did Yun Duo kiss you by her own initiative, or was she pushed into it?"

Although he knew that his mum was meticulous with details, Tang Yi-Bai was still a little frightened at her perceptiveness at this moment. "Mum, can you please not?"

Daddy Tang was enlightened. "Doudou, you're so mean!"

Let him be mean — Tang Yi-Bai did not really care. He tossed another grape to Er-Bai.

After her shower, Yun Duo was passing by the living room when Tang Yi-Bai saw her. He immediately got up and chased after her. Madam Lu shook her head and said to Daddy Tang, "Why do I feel like he's even more thick-skinned than you?"

Daddy Tang considered it seriously. "We're at least at the same level."

Yun Duo was followed by Tang Yi-Bai all the way to her bedroom door. She was rather surprised, towelling her hair dry with her back to the door as she said, "Is there anything else?"

Tang Yi-Bai looked at her with a half-smile. "Aren't you forgetting something?"

"What?" She stopped drying her hair, peering at him with her head tilted.

Tang Yi-Bai stepped forward until the two of them were almost attached to one another. Yun Duo could not help but retreat backwards and ended up with her back against the door. She looked up at him. Under the faint yellow lighting of the corridor, his figure slowly pressed down. His face could not be seen as it was against the light, but his eyes shone as bright as crystals, shimmering with endless tenderness.

She was rather flustered.

With Tang Yi-Bai’s hand braced against the door, a small enclosed space was formed between Tang Yi-Bai's body and the door. Yun Duo was stuck in this small space, surrounded by him. His breath was warm, clean, and comfortable, but she suddenly found herself feeling very nervous. Her back was flat against the door, her body stiff and frozen in place. She watched as he slowly leaned down and then he asked her softly, "Do you remember now?"

Yun Duo lowered her head. And then she felt his other hand cup her face. His warm fingertips stroked her skin gently, and when his fingers touched her earlobe, he pinched it lightly.

"Ha!" Yun Duo could not hold back a laugh.

Tang Yi-Bai took the opportunity to lift her jaw and before she could put up any resistance, he had already swooped in and their lips ended up locked together.

The voices of uncle and auntie Tang could be heard coming from the living room — Yun Duo was extremely nervous. Her heart was pounding wildly, like a jackhammer. She instinctively tried to push him away, but then her arms were captured as well. He clasped her arms to his chest, and so she could feel his heartbeat. His heart was pounding just as hard and just as fast.

She was so nervous that she was about to lose all her strength. Her legs felt weak, and so Tang Yi-Bai's hand slid downwards to help support her at her soft waist. He closed his eyes, his eyelashes quivering with excitement. The soft contact of their lips punched deep into his heart. His lips opened just a crack and he inadvertently had a taste of her lips. They were sweet and fragrant, like flower petals.

Her sweet breath lingered in the air, surrounding his nose.

He had no words to describe the bliss of this moment.

But this bliss was very quickly destroyed.

Er-Bai: "Woof, woof, woof, woof, woof, woof!"

The two of them sprang apart instantly. Yun Duo scrambled out of his arms and ran off to the side.

Er-Bai looked up, very satisfied with their reaction. He must think that he had shrewdly defused a violent encounter and should be praised.

However, Tang Yi-Bai's face was dark and his eyes shone with a cold gleam.

Er-Bai sensed danger approaching. His ears laid flat against his head, and he kept his head low as he shifted closer to Yun Duo, hoping she would protect him.

At this moment, Daddy Tang's voice came from the living room, "Doudou, what happened?"

Tang Yi-Bai raised his voice to reply, "Dad, can we stew Er-Bai?"

Yun Duo didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "Stop fooling around!" She leaned down and stroked Er-Bai's head.

Er-Bai happily wagged his tail and stretched out his neck in hopes that Yun Duo would pat him there as well.

Yun Duo deftly scratched Er-Bai on the neck for a while and then, without even daring to glance at Tang Yi-Bai, she quickly turned around and went into her room.

Tang Yi-Bai and Er-Bai were left behind to glare at each other. Neither had any intentions of making peace, so Tang Yi-Bai turned away to go back to his own room, while Er-Bai slipped off without any hesitation as well.

After returning to her room, Yun Duo's emotions settled. She gave her mother a call to tell her that she had already found the person who had saved her life.

Mama Yun was very happy. "Will he come back again? Maybe when your dad and I visit City-B, we can thank him in person. After searching for so many years, we've finally found him. Thank goodness. Duoduo{朵朵: Note that Yun Duo's nickname is Duoduo, while Tang Yi-Bai's is Doudou. Not to be confused. ;3}, you must thank the person properly. If he needs your help with anything, you must go even if it will be very difficult!"

"Yes, yes, I know!"

"I have one more thing to ask you."

"What?"

"Does he have a girlfriend?"

Yun Duo was embarrassed. "Why are you asking about that?"

"Just to see if there's the possibility of you giving him your hand in marriage as thanks."

"...Mum!" Yun Duo wanted to tell her mother that this possibility had already become a certainty, but she was too shy to say it.

In the end, her mother nagged her a good long while, telling her to watch her health, to keep warm, to moisturize, etc etc... before hanging up.

Putting away the phone, Yun Duo sat on her bed and surfed the net to relax. She opened a browser and searched for Tang Yi-Bai's name.

Wow, incredible, so much news jumped out at her in an instant. There were sports news and also entertainment news. Things like 'Tang Yi-Bai is preparing for the Winter Championships', 'Tang Yi-Bai hopes everyone won't focus too much on him', 'Tang Yi-Bai denies he has a girlfriend', 'Tang Yi-Bai interacts with female entertainment host'... in short, Tang Yi-Bai's every move was being scrutinised. Right now, he was being treated almost like how Qi Rui-Feng was being treated.

"Is it because he's so handsome?" Yun Duo was beginning to doubt her previous conclusions. After all, Qi Rui-Feng had become so famous only after becoming Olympics champion, so why was Tang Yi-Bai receiving such a high degree of attention after only becoming champion of the Asian Games? Even if he was handsome, so what? There were many other handsome guys on the team...

She could not figure it out, but the reality was that he was now on fire.

Yun Duo saw the fangirling thread the fans built in the gossip forums. There were even pictures she had taken in there. She browsed through the pictures one by one, and she soon found herself almost drooling over them. She had to stop and chastise herself — this fellow is already your boyfriend, so why are you wasting time fangirling? Buck up, girl!

Seeing how popular her boyfriend was with so many other women, Yun Duo was both pleased and rather anxious. She really felt like stamping Tang Yi-Bai's forehead with "Private property, do not touch!"

Other than this fangirling thread on Tang Yi-Bai, there were also fangirling threads for Tang Yi-Bai and Qi Rui-Feng together. The posts were nothing more than interpreting every move and interaction between Tang Yi-Bai and Qi Rui-Feng with rose-tinted homoerotic glasses. Yun Duo refused to look at those posts even upon the threat of death.

The posts were sorted according to the time of posting. In the recent posts, Tang Yi-Bai was already being called the 'adonis of swimming'.

Some entertainment media even posted some news articles to analyse the reasons why Tang Yi-Bai was now viewed as the 'adonis of swimming'.

After she was done browsing the forums, Yun Duo went on to surf Weibo. As a reporter, she was following many swimmers. Among them, Qi Rui-Feng was the most active on Weibo, followed by Ming Tian and Xiang Yang-Yang. As for Tang Yi-Bai, he was so lazy his Weibo was almost dead...

After surfing for a while longer, Yun Duo found that Qi Rui-Feng had posted a new Weibo post.

Qi Rui-Feng: Tang Yi-Bai is the adonis of swimming, then what am I?

Without even looking at the comments to the post, Yun Duo decisively sent in her own response to the Weibo post.

Reporter Yun Duo: You're the mascot of swimming. b（￣▽￣）d

ryuxenji: Call out to Francheskmpos for being such a consistent commenter. I read all of your comments even if I don't respond to each one; thank you so much for the support!❤️

---

Previous: Chapter 57
Next: Chapter 59

Back to Index