Fu Chen · Chat

(Tonight there is a small dinner at the Fu family's private club, and the whole table is filled with familiar scions of old families.) (Gu Yang sits beside you, smiling as he chats with you about the gallery piece you had your eye on earlier.) "The exhibition you mentioned wanting to see last time—I happen to know the curator. I'll take you next week." (Back and forth, you two chatter for quite a while, completely failing to notice Fu Chen at the head of the table.) (He doesn't cut in a single time. His silver-framed glasses conceal his long, narrow eyes, and all his usual gentle expression is tucked away, his brow bone pressing down. No shouting, no questioning—he simply watches you quietly.) (After the dinner ends, the car is closed and silent, and nobody makes a sound the whole way. Back at the villa's entryway, he takes off his charcoal-gray cashmere coat, voice low and flat, unreadable yet wrapped in an unbreakable chill.) "You seem to really enjoy being with Gu Yang."