Chapter 38 Movie

Chapter 38: Movie

It had been a week since they last ate together. Xiang Wei sat at the dining table, having dessert after dinner, and asked, "Have you been busy with work lately? You're always getting home so late."

Shen Jiyue smiled warmly and assured him the busy stretch was over, and that he'd be able to get off work on time from now on.

"Great!" Xiang Wei happily scooped up a big spoonful of ice cream, ate it, then remembered something from earlier that afternoon.

"Oh yeah, Chang Hu came by to see you this afternoon. You weren't here, so I invited him in for tea and snacks to wait for you to get off work. He said he had stuff to do and took off. Do you wanna call him over sometime?"

Xiang Wei was really bothered that Chang Hu missed him and brought it up to Shen Jiyue twice. He figured making friends wasn't easy. Ever since he'd transformed into human form, he only had two close friends, Shen Jiyue and Fu Yunyan, and he wanted to treasure them.

When he heard Shen Jiyue say he'd already stopped by the company, he didn't dwell on it, but he still felt a little bummed. The snake wanted to ask how he'd gotten his pink hair—it hadn't faded one bit after all this time!

The first time Xiang Wei met Chang Hu, he'd noticed that eye-catching pink hair and thought it was super cool. Later, he'd done some serious online research and found that dyeing your hair pink required bleaching, it was hard to get the exact shade you wanted, and the color faded fast. And when it faded, it looked terrible.

The snake had looked at quite a few photos of people's faded hair online and immediately changed his mind. Forget it—the snake's own hair was nice too, so he'd skip the dye job.

But seeing Chang Hu again today, Xiang Wei was surprised to see the pink hair looked almost exactly the same as the first time they'd met. It hadn't faded at all. How did he pull that off?

They hadn't chatted much that afternoon before Chang Hu rushed off, so Xiang Wei never got the chance to ask. He figured if Shen Jiyue invited his pink-haired friend over, the snake could ask for his secret and get a recommendation on where to get it done.

The snake was thinking of dyeing his hair purple—that would look cool too.

Shen Jiyue had no idea his crush was plotting to dye his hair. He said a couple of things about Chang Hu, then changed the subject, asking with a hint of curiosity what Xiang Wei had been up to lately and why he was always out of the house.

After all, Xiang Wei was a total homebody. If there was nothing going on, he almost never left the house, which had Shen Jiyue pretty worried. These past few days had been so unusual, and he wondered what he'd been up to.

Because of his own tangled feelings, Shen Jiyue hadn't been keeping tabs on Xiang Wei's whereabouts, which was why he asked. According to what Chang Hu had said, Fu Yuncen had dropped Xiang Wei off this afternoon. Had he gone to the Fu house today? Had he been going there every day lately?

Shen Jiyue took a sip of mung bean soup, his face calm, but his eyes never left Xiang Wei.

This question was perfect! Xiang Wei immediately lit up, thinking, finally someone asked.

He stopped eating his ice cream, got up, and ran to the living room to grab a small portion of what he'd been putting together these past few days. Luckily, the mall had delivered everything before Shen Jiyue got home—perfect timing!

"Ta-da!" Xiang Wei carried a heavy water basin over and handed it to Shen Jiyue. "You haven't checked the Praise Group, have you? Yunyan, the others, and I went shopping for the snakelet these past few days—haha, we bought so much stuff!"

"Huh?" Shen Jiyue looked at the item in his hands, paused for a moment at his words, then grabbed his phone. Sure enough, he saw the muted group chat. He tapped it and saw 999+ unread messages.

He remembered now. This was the group he'd muted when he decided to slowly let go of his feelings for Xiang Wei and distance himself from anything related to him. He'd deliberately muted it, then forgotten to unmute it.

"This is for the snakelet to drink water from. I got a bigger, shallower one so it can also soak in it. It's heavy enough that it won't get tipped over." Xiang Wei explained.

"That's a great pick. You're really good at shopping." Shen Jiyue praised him, then admitted his mistake: "I was busy with work back then, and when I saw constant group messages, I muted it first. I forgot to unmute it later. Sorry, I missed your discussions and didn't get to join in."

Xiang Wei happily accepted the compliment and waved off the whole muted group chat thing, generously forgiving him.

"It's cool, you were busy. I can handle the shopping myself."

Besides, they'd had a clear division of labor and shared goal of raising the baby from the start. Shen Jiyue handled incubating the egg, while Xiang Wei handled caring for the snakelet after it hatched. Getting the daily necessities was the snake's job.

He thought it was fine to do it himself, but Shen Jiyue disagreed. How could he let his crush do all the work while he just sat there? If he did that, he might as well stay single forever.

And according to the dating guide he'd put together from a whole afternoon of research, catering to someone's interests was the most important step. This was such a perfect opportunity—he'd kick himself if he let it slip by.

He looked through the items they'd bought with Xiang Wei. He had to admit, even though many of the people offering suggestions were elementary school kids who'd never raised snakes, many hands made light work. Together, they'd managed to buy most of the essentials.

"Should we order a custom bioactive terrarium for the snakelet?" Shen Jiyue said, pulling out his phone and showing him photos.

He explained slowly: "This one is not only big, but it also has an automatic smart climate system. It has separate hot and cold zones, full temperature, humidity, and ventilation controls, and you can monitor it from your phone even when you're away."

"Wow! So pretty!" Xiang Wei's eyes lit up at the photos. So beautiful, such an exquisite home! It had mountains, water, flowers, and trees—the little one could go anywhere it wanted. It looked so nice that he wanted to turn back into a snake and live in it himself.

"Yeah, it's a natural habitat replica. There are tree hollows, rocks, a little stream... mimicking a wild environment. The water flows, so the snakelet can explore better..."

"I want this one! I want this one!" Xiang Wei nodded like a bobblehead, staring at the pictures with anticipation. He earned money to give the snakelet a better environment—buy it! No matter how much it cost, they had to get it!

Shen Jiyue smiled and said okay, sending the photo to his secretary to get it custom-made.

This was something he'd saved when he'd wanted to keep a snake but didn't have the time. He'd followed a few reptile-keeping influencers and saw the big enclosures they made for their pets. He thought they looked nice and saved them, never expecting they'd come in handy now.

The two of them went to check on the snake egg again. Xiang Wei touched the incubator and said happily to Shen Jiyue, "I feel like it's about to hatch!"

He could sense the state of the egg. Its life force had initially weakened, but after coming to the Shen residence, the faint vitality had slowly stabilized and strengthened. Now it was showing signs of hatching. Xiang Wei was beyond excited.

The snake was about to successfully raise his first kid!

"He's so happy." As the egg grew, Xiang Wei could sometimes vaguely sense its emotions. Right now, for instance, he could feel that the egg was happy because the two of them had come to visit.

Shen Jiyue smiled at his childish words, his gaze softening as he looked at the egg. He reached out to touch the incubator and said quietly, "I'm happy too. Hurry up and hatch, little one."

After they turned and left, the egg seemed to wiggle as if in response.

Shen Jiyue's secretary was very efficient. Not long after, the snakelet's new home was delivered. But since the egg hadn't hatched yet, it could only sit in the living room for now, unused.

After the delivery, Xiang Wei often brought the egg to look at the little one's future big house, "selling dreams" to the baby: "You can move in once you hatch! Then I'll take you out to play."

He still didn't know what triggered the transformation and couldn't control shifting back to his original form, but maybe when the egg hatched, he'd be able to transform. And even if he couldn't, he could still play with it.

With such heavy anticipation weighing on him, Xiang Wei found himself distracted in class these past few days, and even after class, he couldn't even enjoy playing on his phone.

Shen Jiyue quickly noticed his state. After thinking for a moment, he asked Xiang Wei if he wanted to go to the amusement park.

His romance plan wasn't going smoothly—it was stuck at the very first step. He suspected Xiang Wei had no idea what romance even was, let alone that men could be together with men.

But how to naturally explain such things was giving Shen Jiyue a headache. He almost wanted to ask Xiang Wei if he'd never seen his peers develop crushes and fall in love during adolescence.

Stuck at this point with no way forward, and unable to find the right opportunity or method to explain things, Shen Jiyue happened to notice Xiang Wei's restless mood and thought he might as well take him out to have some fun.

"The amusement park?" Xiang Wei was indeed excited when he heard this. He'd never been to an amusement park before—only seen them in cartoons.

Instead of going on the weekend when it would be packed, Shen Jiyue got Xiang Wei a half-day off, and the two of them went to the amusement park after their afternoon nap.

Knowing they were going to the amusement park, Xiang Wei had already done his homework on Xiaohongshu. Without waiting for Shen Jiyue to make plans, he announced that he wanted to play the shooting game!

The snake, who had recently gotten obsessed with spy dramas, was completely captivated by the cool shooting—one bullet, one person down. So cool! The snake wanted to be a sharpshooter too!

So the two of them headed straight for the shooting range. Xiang Wei picked up the replica rifle, posed the way he'd seen in TV shows and videos, and whether he could hit the target or not, at least he looked the part—like a seasoned sharpshooter.

"Bang! Bang! Bang!"

Xiang Wei lowered the gun, didn't even glance at the distant target, smiled, and waved his hand.

If Shen Jiyue and the staff hadn't gone to check how he'd actually done, just based on his confident demeanor alone, they would've thought he'd hit every single shot.

Even though the results were indeed quite good, his calm, self-assured, and genuinely skilled demeanor was just too adorable.

The staff member stifled a laugh and praised him: "Sir, hitting this kind of score on your first try at shooting—you're so talented!"

Xiang Wei finally raised his eyes to look. He hit it—not bad, huh? People born in the Year of the Snake really do have talent! He grinned and beamed as he thanked the staff for the compliment.

After a few more rounds, once he'd had his fill, they left.

"Aren't you going to play?" Xiang Wei asked him, even quoting a human saying: "We're already here, might as well."

Shen Jiyue shook his head again. He didn't enjoy these things. He'd grown tired of them abroad in his youth, and after years of self-cultivation, he had even less interest in them now.

The only thing Xiang Wei was really into was target shooting. He hadn't seen or played the other games, so he let Shen Jiyue pick which one to play. When Shen Jiyue said it was too hot out and suggested a movie first, Xiang Wei had no objections.

So they bought tickets for the next showtime and walked into the theater carrying cola and popcorn.

It was a weekday, so there weren't many people. They picked seats in the middle, and by the time the movie started, about twenty or thirty others were scattered around them.

The big screen lit up, and Xiang Wei set aside his popcorn to watch intently. He felt that watching this way had more of a vibe than at home. He was totally absorbed in the film until sobbing sounds broke out around him, and only then did he glance around.

Huh? Why were so many people crying?

Nervously, he instinctively looked to his left. Seeing no tear tracks on Shen Jiyue's face, he sighed in relief. Good, he wasn't crying.

Shen Jiyue turned his head too, silently asking what was wrong.

Xiang Wei pointed at the tissue, pulled one out, and dabbed under his eyes, signaling that a lot of people were crying. Then he tilted his head, puzzled as to why people would cry while watching a movie.

The two of them had a silent exchange, stared at each other for a moment, then both turned back to the screen.

It wasn't until they walked out of the theater after the movie that Xiang Wei noticed more than one person with red, swollen eyes, looking like they'd been sobbing their hearts out. He'd only ever seen that on TV.

"Why are they crying?" Men, women, old, young—why was everyone crying? Weren't they happily watching the movie at first?

He remembered that before the movie started, the two people next to him had sat down smiling, and many in the front rows were joking around until the film began. Even halfway through, there had been laughter around him.

So why were they crying by the end? Human emotions were truly hard to understand.

Shen Jiyue, stared at by a confused Xiang Wei, thought for a moment and slowly explained the film's background, the protagonist's journey, the metaphors and foreshadowing, the laughs and the tear-jerking moments.

"Huh? The male lead died?" Xiang Wei froze.

He had seen the scene of someone falling into the water, but he hadn't expected that to be the end. In every cartoon, TV show, and movie he'd ever watched, the protagonist always survived.

"Oh..." A household losing a strong young worker, a child losing one of their caregivers—what would the other caregiver do? He subconsciously connected it to them.

==========Author's Note:==========

Xiang Wei: Unprompted association, experiencing human emotions entirely through projection.

Shen Jiyue: Don't project, please.