Don’t Be a Kept Man

sweating buckets by the load late into the deep fall of the night.
And at last, he sheathed his sword with a “qiang” and sat next to Fu Xiu Nian’s feet to rest.

Seeing the sweat dripping down his forehead, Fu Xiu Nian used a towel to help him wipe his face.
Chen Yi let him and even tilted up his head for easier access.
Right now, only his quick and short puffs of breath revealed the turmoil in his heart.

“Not feeling good?”

Fu Xiu Nian slid down from the chair to sit next to him on the floor.
It was only the two of them in the entire dance practice room, and so even a slight movement could create an echo.

Chen Yi didn’t reply and just slumped his body onto Fu Xiu Nian’s thighs.
He hid his face in Fu Xiu Nian’s stomach and reached out to hold him around his waist.
He didn’t move afterwards, as if he had fallen asleep.

Fu Xiu Nian’s long fingers stroked through Chen Yi’s hair and then brushed away the sweat laden bangs off his eyes, quietly sitting right next to him.

At this moment in time, the room only held the sounds of the two of them breathing.
And after a long while, when Fu Xiu Nian’s legs were going numb, Chen Yi finally moved and opened his eyes to look at him silently.He asked, 

“Was my sword dance pretty bad?”

Fu Xiu Nian quickly shook his head, so hard that his hair seemed to be flying, 

“No.
I think it’s really good.
The world’s best looking sword dance.”

“Who asked you if it was good looking or not.”

Chen Yi seemed a bit helpless and couldn’t hold in his words.
After a beat, he couldn’t help but say, 

“…… When I was learning to use my sword, those who taught me back then said the same thing as Tong Lao-shi.”

The first time Chen Yi took up his sword, it was his father who taught him move by move.
Those days, he had been still competitive and hotblooded, wanting to prove that he was better than anyone else, and he learned the ways of the sword that usually would take at least a month within ten days.

He thought his father would praise him, but no, he only received a scolding that he was greedy.

And then afterwards, it was like a vicious cycle.
The more Chen Yi tried to practice his martial arts, the more vicious his father would scold him.
It came up to the point where the two of them became like roosters, fighting as soon as they saw each other.
It was as if they were not father and son, but like enemies filled with a blood grudge.

Fu Xiu Nian poked Chen Yi’s cheek and discovered that he didn’t really have any fat to poke at.
He said out loud, 

“Hmm? Said what?”

Chen Yi naturally said, 

“Said that I was too wound up in my heart, greedy to advance.”

His tone was a bit unwilling to compromise, a bit unwilling to accept.
At first there was no one in the clan who could win over Chen Yi and not a single one of their swords skills were better than his.
Chen Yi thought that his father was too picky, trying to find something from nothing.

Fu Xiu Nian smiled at that, 

“I have had the same thing happen to me before.
I’ll let you know, when I was in fifth grade, I had already studied all the middle school textbooks and a teacher specifically said in class, a certain student should not place his eyes so high, and they need to come back to earth, take one slow step at a time.
If the basics are not mastered, that will be the end…….
blah blah blah and a lot of other things that I can’t really remember.”

Hearing this Chen Yi slightly raised his eyebrow, 

“You’re not angry?”

The smile on Fu Xiu Nian’s face curved his eyes up, 

“Why would I be angry? The knowledge is my own and I myself know that I learned it.
Isn’t that fine? What does it matter what she says?”

Chen Yi said, 

“So you were already so heartless so young.”

Fu Xiu Nian was going to pinch his nose at that but Chen Yi quickly rolled his body over to avoid it.
Seeing him like this, Fu Xiu Nian stood up but as he had sat for too long like this, his legs were numb.
The moment he stood up, he fell right back down onto the ground.

Standing nearby Chen Yi hooked his fingers at him and looked at him provocatively, 

“Come over here.
I’ll stand right here and let you beat me up.”

Who cared about that.
Fu Xiu Nian snorted and didn’t move.

Chen Yi could only walk over and reached a hand out in the air, 

“Let’s go.
Let’s go home.”

Fu Xiu Nian angrily smacked his hand away, 

“No.”

Chen Yi gave him a look, 

“Going or not?”

Fu Xiu Nian: “…… Going.”

He had always been so obedient with Chen Yi, and so there was no difference this time around; He very obediently grabbed Chen Yi’s hand and stood up.
Chen Yi embraced Fu Xiu Nian as he pulled him up and patted the dust off his back before the two of them put on their masks and hats and left the practice room.

When they got home, Fu Xiu Nian went into the kitchen to cook dinner.
Chen Yi was sitting on the sofa watching the tv and when he turned his head around, he could see his busy body.

Fu Xiu Nian said, 

“What do you want to eat tonight?”

Chen Yi leaned over the sofa to watch him chop up the vegetables and curiously asked, 

“You’ve already started cooking.
Isn’t it a bit too late to ask me now?”

Fu Xiu Nian apologetically smiled, 

“I’m too used to asking it so it’s just a courtesy.”

Chen Yi was too lazy to care about it and returned his gaze towards the tv.
He was not very interested in dramas with the many melodramatic twists and turns for love, and instead he used his phone to connect to the tv and picked out << Crayon Shin-Chan >>.

 

Fu Xiu Nian was a bit speechless and said, 

“Why don’t you watch Ultraman Tiga?”4 

Chen Yi tsked, 

“I like it.”

Fu Xiu Nian mixed up a cold dish and thought to himself that he really couldn’t figure out Chen Yi’s tastes.
He said out loud, talking to himself, 

“And I thought you liked to watch action or fighting films.
Yet you just binge watch cartoons all day.
If this gets out, wouldn’t your image collapse?”

Chen Yi’s brain quickly parsed through unnecessary words and said, 

“Action films? You act in it.
You act in it and I will watch it.”

Fu Xiu Nian paused in his movements as he suspected that Chen Yi was thinking dirty thoughts, but he had no evidence.
So he tossed the food onto a plate and as the congee was also heated up, Fu Xiu Nian said, 

“I’m more suited for the artsy films.
You yourself should act in an action film.”

Chen Yi came over to plate the dishes, 

“Action films have kiss scenes?”

Fu Xiu Nian said, 

“Yes, there is.
With the ground.”

Chen Yi: “……”

These few days Fu Xiu Nian had watched Chen Yi and Deng Zhang Ting practice non stop and he didn’t know how he survived it.
If he doesn’t go, he would worry.
If he does go, he would feel so much pain at the hard work Chen Yi was putting in, and no matter which option he picked, he was stuck between a rock and a hard place.
Thankfully tomorrow that blasted program will be finished, as otherwise Fu Xiu Nian would really blow up.

 

 

Notes:

 

*1 Chen Yi really actually says two “dances” that elementary schoolers learn that, which in english is I think “Radio calisthenics” (kind of like yoga/aerobics where the instructors would call out a stance and the children will follow).
In this case, he references something that would be like “Young Eagle Takes Flight” and “7 Coloured Sunlight”.
You can see the dance movements, which are specific to the name: Eagle 

 

*2 hammered nails on a board: This saying is kind of like the die has been cast, where it’s a statement of fact, something that was bound to happen and would happen in such a way, like hammered nails on a board – it’s “hammered in” already.

 

*3 It’s a common belief or saying that when someone has quite the bad luck, or a series of unfortunate events that caused a “downfall” for a person that they are called to have “culminated” bad luck from their previous lives, meaning that they were such a terrible person before they reincarnated into their current body/life and all the bad things they have done has caught up to them.
It’s almost the same thing around where you would see characters say I must have culminated all my luck in my previous lives to have met you kind of saying, where it’s saying I’ve used up all the luck from my previous lives that I either must have been a very unfortunate person who lived in misfortune/had terrible luck in certain things or the entire life, or they had been such a righteous/good person that their luck has culminated to the point of attaining their partner from this culmination from their past lives.

*4 Crayon Shin-Chan and Ultraman Tiga you may already know from childhood memories (whoopsies, did I spill my age there lol) but they are/were very popular as cartoons.
Based on their name, you can tell that it’s from Japan, but most of the cartoons in China are dubbed and it’s something almost every child is used to.
Crayon Shin-Chan is a bit of a crude cartoon (but hilarious in that way) of a child and his adventures as he goes through kindergarten.
Apparently the manga and the anime are very different, but as far as I know, it is still ongoing.
Ultraman Tiga, now that’s a memorable one, but it’s basically about being a superhero and it’s more of a live action thing rather than anime, like power rangers.