Jing Shu · chat.title

Jing Shu really had come home late that day. There had been an impromptu afternoon meeting in the department to discuss the course scheduling for next semester. It was supposed to wrap up by four-thirty, but Chen Yuanzhou and the staff from academic affairs ended up in a row over the general education time slots. Chen Yuanzhou had a booming voice that made the entire conference room buzz with tension. Jing Shu had sat off to the side, passing around tea and smoothing things over. By the time both sides were talked out and an arrangement was begrudgingly finalized, it was almost six-thirty. He had originally planned to swing by the supermarket for groceries, but after stepping out of the campus gates, he remembered there was still half a head of napa cabbage and two eggs left in the fridge, so he just turned back and headed home. By the time he arrived, night had fallen completely. The key had barely turned in the lock when he heard a thud from inside, like something dropping off a table. Opening the door, he found the living room dark, illuminated only by a sliver of streetlight filtering through from the study. He reached out and flicked the switch. The moment the room lit up, he saw the rabbit hunkered beside the coffee table, ears perked, tail turned toward him, its hind legs even scraping twice against the floorboards. "I'm here, I'm here." Jing Shu set his bag on the shoe cabinet, crouched down, and first went to pet its head. The rabbit tilted its head away, dodging him. He chuckled, not taking it to heart, and stood up to head into the kitchen, undoing his coat buttons as he walked. Having been away all day, the rabbit's food bowl and water bottle were mostly empty, and the hay rack on the cage was nearly bare. He fetched the pellet bag from the cupboard, scooped out a portion into the bowl, and carried it toward the corner of the study. The rabbit followed along, trotting briskly, its claws tapping-tapping-tapping on the floor even more urgently than his own steps. Jing Shu set the food bowl down right at the cage entrance and took a step back, waiting for it to eat. Opening its mouth, the rabbit sniffed it once, and then— Hitching both front paws over the edge, it flipped the bowl upward. The bowl overturned, and pellets scattered noisily across the floor. Standing right in the middle of the spilled food, it craned its head up at Jing Shu, ears drooping forward, the black tip of its tail giving an irritated twitch. Jing Shu looked down at the food on the floor, then looked back at the rabbit. "What is this supposed to mean?" A note of amusement colored his voice. He crouched down and began picking up the pellets one by one to put them back into the bowl—they were round and flat, easy enough to gather, just tedious. "Mad as you are, you shouldn't waste food. Do you have any idea how much this bag costs?" The rabbit turned its head away, refusing to look at him. Setting the food bowl back down, Jing Shu thought for a second and went to swap in fresh water. It was one of those ball-point water bottles mounted to the side of the cage. He unscrewed the cap, filled it to the brim, fastened it back on, and gave it a gentle shake until water droplets clung to the metal spout. Gathering the rabbit into his arms, he brought it close to the spout. "Come on, have some water." The rabbit licked the ball once, then jerked its head violently—knocking the bottle so hard it swayed out, smacking the cage bars with a sharp clatter. The ball-point spout came loose from its bracket, dousing Jing Shu's hand in water. "Hey—" Jing Shu pulled his hand back, water already dripping from between his fingers onto the floor. The rabbit wriggled free from his grasp, bounded two meters away, and crouched down, thumping its hind feet—thump, thump, thump—making the floor vibrate with the impact. Jing Shu looked at his dripping hand, then at the rabbit crouching in the distance, glaring daggers at him. At last, he let out a sigh, wiped his hand twice on his relatively dry sleeve, and walked over to scoop it back up. This time he had learned his lesson. Holding the rabbit, he sat on the sofa, no longer rushing to offer food or drink, simply setting it on his lap and stroking it slowly. From the crown of its head down to the base of its ears, then along its back to the tip of its tail. At first, the rabbit kept its neck stiff, but by the third pass, its body went soft, flattening out across his thighs as its ears gradually drooped. "Things came up at the university today, so I got held up," Jing Shu spoke to it softly, his tone level and calm, as if explaining things to a person. "It's not that I intentionally skipped coming home to feed you. Didn't I start getting your food ready the second I walked in?" The rabbit's ear gave a slight twitch, but it ignored him. Jing Shu kept stroking, his fingers tracing down the rabbit's dark ears and back up again. Growing comfortable, the rabbit began grinding its teeth, a quiet, gentle crunching sound. Thinking the storm had passed, he leaned over to grab the remote on the coffee table to turn on the TV. He had barely stretched halfway out when— The rabbit snapped its head up and took a bite right at the web between his thumb and index finger. It wasn't hard, really wasn't. A rabbit's front teeth were flat, so the bite felt more like a firm pinch; it didn't even break the skin, just left two faint white indents. Once done biting, the rabbit was the first to let go, crouching on his lap with its head tilted, watching him. Jing Shu looked down at the marks on his hand, then back at the rabbit. Man and rabbit stared at each other for two seconds. "Aren't you something," he said, without a trace of anger in his voice, sounding almost complimentary. "Quite a set of teeth." Then he shifted the rabbit to the side, got up, and began clearing away the mess—picking up the bowl to wash it clean, sweeping up the scattered pellets, rehanging the water bottle, and refilling the hay rack. The rabbit followed right at his heels, running circles around him, no longer throwing a fit. It merely tilted its head up to watch him bend down, stand up, bend down, and stand up, its little black-and-white face tracking his every move. Once everything was taken care of, Jing Shu washed his hands, crouched down to eye level with the rabbit, and said, "Go ahead and eat. Don't go flipping it this time, alright?" The rabbit hopped closer, bumped the palm of his hand with its head, and then dutifully bowed down to eat its pellets. Jing Shu crouched there watching it for a while and chuckled. "Alright. Tantrum over, then?" He didn't go to bed very late that night. After tidying up, reading for a bit, and taking a shower, he was in bed by eleven. At night, the rabbit was allowed to run free around the apartment; the study door was left open, a small living room lamp left on, free to go wherever it pleased. Jing Shu usually slept on his side, curling toward the right, sometimes hugging a pillow in the empty space against his chest. That night, holding the pillow, drifting off in a haze, he could still hear the rabbit parkouring around the living room—paws pattering from one end to the other, a muffled thump as it rammed a sofa leg, a pause of two seconds, and then the pattering scampering back again. Half-asleep, he thought to himself that he'd have to sweep under the sofa tomorrow; the rabbit was always burrowing under there. He didn't know how much time had passed before he sank into a deep sleep. Later, his senses woke before his mind did—there was a sudden weight in his arms. Not the soft, plush sink of a pillow, but a substantial, warm weight, pressed entirely against his chest and stomach. Like someone had folded a thick blanket and laid it over him, yet far more solid than any blanket. Before his brain could catch up, his hand moved on instinct, trailing along the shape until he touched something sleek—no, not just sleek, it had texture, like hair. Jing Shu's eyes snapped open. The bedroom was dark. The curtains weren't drawn shut, letting a sliver of lamplight spill through the gap, angling across the duvet. There was, without a doubt, a person in his arms. Curled up, head tucked right beneath his chin, long soft hair spilling across his pillow and over their shoulders. His hand was still resting on their waist, the palm registering warmth radiating right through the fabric. Jing Shu froze completely. His thoughts raced frantically—had he locked the front door? Yes. Were the windows shut? Yes. Auntie Zhou hadn't come today. His older brother hadn't said he was visiting. Then who—slowly, he looked down at the person in his arms. The streetlamp's beam caught the crown of their head, where a pair of rabbit ears rested. Jing Shu's breath caught for a second. Then he slowly lifted his head, looking toward the foot of the bed. Usually, the rabbit would sleep curled at his feet, or hop onto the nightstand to nestle. Right now, the foot of the bed was completely empty, without even a single strand of rabbit fur on the duvet. He turned toward the door; the bedroom door was cracked open an inch, light from the small living room lamp squeezing through, revealing nothing on the floor by the doorway. He pulled his gaze back, letting it settle on the person in his arms once more. "...It's you," he murmured softly, voice little more than a breath, unsure who he was even talking to. Once the words left him, he paused, as if realizing how absurd the whole thing was, yet somehow feeling it wasn't all that out of character after all. He gently moved the hand that was being clutched; rather than pulling it away, he curled his fingers and held the other's hand in return. It was a size smaller than his, slender-boned, with fingertips cold to the touch. "Why are your hands so cold?" he muttered under his breath, drawing the person closer into his chest, tugging the blanket up to properly cover the exposed shoulder. "I'll ask you tomorrow," he whispered, as if making an appointment, or perhaps giving himself a graceful out—it was far too late tonight; no questions, just sleep.