Atlas Studios

  Atlas Studios

  Once they had reached home, Xia Qingyi took off her shoes in the front porch of the house. She was wondering if she should tell Mo Han that she regretted her words and wanted to continue to stay here, or to tell him that she would move away like they had agreed upon on the call earlier.

  She was so absorbed in her thoughts that she had not taken off her shoes even after a while. She stopped moving after she had bent down and her leg was hovering in the air.

  “Hey…… your phone is ringing.” Mo Han called her.

  Xia Qingyi turned around before she really heard her phone ringing. She quickly changed into her home slippers and took out her phone from her bag, though she froze with one glance at the caller ID.

  “Are you picking it up?” Mo Han asked her again.

  There was a short glimmer in Xia Qingyi’s eyes as she picked up the phone. “Hello?”


  “I heard from mother that you’re coming back?” it was Han Liang’s voice.

  Xia Qingyi had not thought that her mother would tell Han Liang so soon that she was leaving Mo Han’s place. On second thoughts however, her mother might not have been the one that had told him. Her mother was not that type of a person.

  “No. I had only said that I’d be leaving where I’m currently staying, not that I was going back.”


  “It’s all the same. You don’t have anywhere else to stay at in S City apart from his place, so wouldn’t it be better if you come back? Your mother and I are here. We can take care of you too.”


  Xia Qingyi realized that Han Liang had never given up on the thought of making her go back. He had called her immediately after she had mentioned leaving Mo Han’s place. However, she did not understand his purpose for doing this. “It’s alright. I’m quite happy here.”


  Mo Han, who had seemingly been tidying up things as he sat in the living room, suddenly changed his expression. He kept quiet, though his actions became more exaggerated as the sound of him tidying suddenly echoed loudly in the living room.

  Xia Qingyi glanced at him and cupped her phone while she walked towards the balcony as she thought that he was unhappy that she was speaking too loudly on the phone. She closed the partition door to the balcony and spoke quietly.

  “Did something happen between the two of you? If not, why would you want to move out from there?” Han Liang asked.

  “No. It’s just that I’d been returning home too late as I have to prepare for an exam at school. I felt that I’d been disturbing him a little. That’s why I thought about renting a house to stay outside.”


  “He agreed?”


  “Yes. He didn’t have much to say.”


  Han Liang sneered on the other end of the call, “Humph…… I thought he was better than this.”


  Xia Qingyi furrowed her eyebrows. “What do you mean?”


  “I know that he likes you. I originally thought that you would get together with him immediately after we split up after you found out the truth. Now that I look at it however, I don’t think that is the case.”


  Xia Qingyi did not know why she felt a little unhappy as she listened to his words, though she did not know what else to say and she kept quiet.

  “Never mind. You don’t have to come back if you don’t want to, as long as you’re living comfortably and remember to take time off and visit your mother once a while.”


  “I’ve got it.” Xia Qingyi replied.

  For unknown reasons after they had hung up the phone, Xia Qingyi started to feel frustrated. She pulled open the partition separating the balcony and the living room, though she jumped in shock at the silhouette in front of her. She had no idea when Mo Han had started to stand there.

  “Why are you standing there?” Xia Qingyi’s heart thumped crazily.

  “I wanted to get the clothes, but you were talking on the balcony.” Mo Han leaned on the door as he glanced at the clothes that had been hung up high on the poles.

  “Oh…… I’m sorry. You can go in.” Xia Qingyi walked out.

  “Are you guilty?” Mo Han asked her casually from behind her.

  Xia Qingyi stopped and turned to look at her.

  “It was Han Liang that called you right? …… Are you still in contact with him now?”


  “Yes, he was telling me something.”


  “What was it? Why were you so secretive? You don’t dare to say it in front of me?”


  “It was nothing. He was just asking me when I would go back to visit my mother.” Xia Qingyi said simply, as if she was trying to downplay with situation.

  “Do you know that your fingers keep moving around when you lie?” Mo Han laughed as he said softly.

  Xia Qingyi immediately stopped her moving fingers resting at the sides of her body. It was obvious that Mo Han had seen her movement as he walked over and stood in front of Xia Qingyi. He looked down at her. “Do you really want to leave me and return to him so badly? Have you fallen in love with him?”


  Xia Qingyi shook her head hurriedly, as if she had heard something impossible. “I’m in love with him?! Are you trying to be comedic? How could I like him? He’s my brother-in-law!”


  “Then why are you in a rush to move out?”


  Xia Qingyi could not help it as the words just left her mouth. “Didn’t I tell you in the phone call? The reason for me wanting to move out is because I don’t want to see the way you don’t say anything at home and look as if you wanted to have no relation to me. Isn’t it just you confessing and me rejecting it? We don’t have to not speak anymore, do we? But since you don’t want to see me, I wouldn’t want to stay here and be the victim of your emotional abuse. Can’t we just accommodate each other?!”


  By the time Xia Qingyi had digested what she had said, she had her hands clasped over her mouth as she shut her mouth.

  Xia Qingyi did not dare to look at Mo Han while Mo Han did not speak and just looked at her. The two of them were silent as they looked at each other.

  “I’m sorry……” Xia Qingyi had not expected Mo Han to speak first.

  He said, “It’s been my problem…… these few days…… you don’t have to move out…… I will slowly adjust.”


  She had never seen Mo Han bow down to anyone before. She had always thought that he was unreasonable and proud of himself. But as she looked at Mo Han’s expression now, that did not seem to be the case.

  “Actually…… I have been thinking…… why did you reject me that day?” Mo Han looked straight into her eyes.

  Xia Qingyi froze for a moment before she looked down immediately. “Actually…… it’s not your problem either. I’m the one who doesn’t believe in love.”


  It was apparent that Mo Han did not understand what she was saying and Xia Qingyi continued, “I don’t know why I’m like this too. When I see sweet couples walking together on the street, I would think about when they will break up. If there were still together after two years, would they still be like how they were now ten years later? Although I admit that my thoughts are rather evil, I can’t seem to control them.”


  “And the truth is that there are couples that I know around me that cannot even last two months.” Xia Qingyi laughed. She stared at Mo Han, appearing to be a little resigned. “And I feel that you don’t seem to really like me that much. Instead of not being able to stay as friends after we get together and then break up after two months, I’d rather we stick with the status quo where I feel more relaxed.”


  “How do you know that we’d break up after two months?” Mo Han said.

  “I don’t know. I just have the feeling that it would be like this.”


  Mo Han was silent.

  “I don’t want to not talk to you, and neither do I want to change the relationship we had before. Can we go back to how we were?”


  Mo Han wanted to reject her at first as he had never wanted to have a sibling relationship with Xia Qingyi. However, as he stared at her expression, he felt as if that she would immediately consider moving out if he were to say no.

  To Mo Han, the two of them had two choices. One of the choice was to become lovers and their relationship would be better than what they had now. However, it was apparent that Xia Qingyi had rejected this choice. That left them with the remaining choice, which was to not see each other for the rest of their lives and act like strangers if they did.

  However, Xia Qingyi wanted to return to how they were before and act as if nothing had happened and stay as an ordinary pair of siblings.

  Mo Han suddenly remembered a saying that to possess is to lose at the same time.

  He seemed to understand a little about what this saying meant.

  “We’ll have it your way then. Let’s act like how we did before.” Mo Han chose to compromise as he gave up the two choices he had. He did not want Xia Qingyi to leave.

  Xia Qingyi smiled as Mo Han watched as he thought sadly that this was the first time he had seen her smile these few days.

  What Mo Han did not know was that Xia Qingyi was not smiling because Mo Han had compromised. She was thinking, “That’s good. I can still stay with you after all.”


  Xia Qingyi thought, “That’s good. My only friend is still with me.”


  If he had let her leave, she probably would not have anyone that she could talk to in the future.

  The two of them returned to their original spot in such an awkward manner. They were both trying their best to put the confession that day in the past as they tried to fill its missing spot with new memories.

  However, the past will always be present no matter what, even if it was buried.

  Xia Qingyi did not leave in the end, as the two of them had seemingly returned to the lives they had before. Xia Qingyi went to school everyday and would call Mo Han when she reached home in the evening to ask him to bring food for her. Mo Han would give her the food after he had returned home from work while she would sit on the carpet in the living room as they ate and watched the television together.

  Mo Han would be in his study for most of the time, though he would occasionally watch television with Xia. On the other hand, Xia Qingyi’s old habit had not changed as she would be so sleepy and fall asleep on the carpet after it was 11 P.M.

  At this point, Mo Han would wake her up and tell her to go back to her room to sleep.

  The days passed in this routine manner.

  On the fifth day after they had reconciled, Xia Qingyi’s schoolmate had asked another friend and her to go watch a movie. Xia Qingyi did not really want to go originally, but she had agreed after seeing that the movie was one that she had wanted to watch recently.

  The movie was scheduled for 8 P.M and they had reached the cinema at half seven. While they were waiting to collect their tickets, one of them beside her got a call and said that she had to rush back as there was an emergency. One minute later, the remaining person had also received a call and said that their professor wanted her to come over.

  After that, Xia Qingyi was the only one left with three movie tickets in her hand.

  She really did not want to watch the movie alone. She stood up, wanting to head home, though on second thought, she called Mo Han under some weird impulse.

  “Are you busy now?”


  “What’s happened?”


  “I have three movie tickets with me for 8 P.M tonight. When will you get off work?”


  “To watch a movie?”


  “Yes. I wanted to watch with two of my friends originally, but something has cropped up suddenly and they had to leave. If you’re free, do you want to watch a movie with me? I don’t want to watch it alone.”