One Life, One Incarnation, Beautiful Bones

49

Intent in her thinking, her eyes were fixated upon that piece of paper that had been folded into a little pile.

“It’s not true.”

“Huh?” She stared blankly at him.

“What I said at the end was not true.” He gave a little laugh. “You could not possibly have learned this in primary school.”

Shi Yi finally realized that he had been joking with her. Zhousheng Chen had already risen and stepped into the bathroom and was now turning on the water to bathe. It was not often that he was in the mood to soak in the bathtub . She grabbed some clean clothes for him, and when she brought it to the bathroom, she saw he was removing his pants.

Perhaps because Zhousheng Chen’s mother was very tall, the three siblings were not short in stature either.

Standing there beside the tub, his legs were long, lean, and straight, and as a result of his cultured upbringing since childhood, his standing and sitting postures, including the one right now where he was bent slightly at the waist to test the water temperature, with that curvature in his lower back… were all very good.

Shi Yi placed the clothing into a basket.

After he was sitting and leaning back in the bathtub, she walked over quietly said, “I’ll help you bathe.”

“Alright.”

Amid the faint steam of the room, she poured some shampoo into her palm and began massaging his hair. “Don’t open your eyes.” Zhousheng Chen was very obedient, allowing her to position and direct him until, at the end, she folded up a warm towel, placed it under his neck as a cushion, and, holding the showerhead in her hand, carefully washed out his hair.

His hair was very soft following the rinsing.

After toweling it dry somewhat, he sat up straight. Some shorter hairs slipped down in front of his forehead, messily obscuring his eyes.

“Feels good, doesn’t it?” She amused herself by stretching out a hand to brush away the hairs falling into his eyes.

Those eyes were still and unperturbed,

She lowered her head and placed a kiss on his browbone. “I know you’re sad, but I don’t know how to console you.”

Gently, he took her chin between his fingers, guiding her head down a little lower. “Before, when you were sad, what would you do?”

Shi Yi dug through her memory for a moment and then laughed, “I’d read ‘Explaining Words and Analyzing Characters[2]” because I didn’t need to think when reading it.”

He also chuckled, “Last time, when I asked you whether you had read “Explaining Words and Analyzing Characters’ and you told me that you had read some, I was quite amused. Why do you like…um…” he paused, searching for the right words before continuing, “this ‘dictionary’ of the ancient times?”

She laughed. “I have so much time anyways. I’ll flip through any book that’s available.”

She had used ten years in that huge library tower and still only managed to read two levels of that collection of books.

For the remainder, she could only remember some of the titles.

His hair in front slipped down again.

In those eyes, besides the glow of light, there was only her.

Her hand slid down along his hair, over his face, and to his shoulders and continued to glide down. At last, it scooped up a handful of warm water and poured it gently over him before going back to lightly knead his shoulders. Her hands were hot. His body was also hot. After massaging him for only a short while, his hand reached to grab her wrist. “Shi Yi?”