Let Me Meet You chapter 5
I’ll Buy Everything for You
“Are you out of your mind?!”
Li Xuan sprinting forward, grabbed Sheng Min tightly around the waist and forcefully tossed him back onto the living room sofa before finally shouting.
Sheng Min felt dizzy after being thrown onto the sofa. It took him a moment to regain his senses as he looked at Li Xuan’s furious face. He tried to sit up, “I…”
“What do you mean? Don’t move!” Li Xuan suddenly jolted, bracing himself on the couch beside him, one leg kneeling on the sofa, pressing half of his body against him, “If you move again, I’ll punch you!”
Sheng Min looked at him. Li Xuan glared back, unwilling to back down. Water droplets still clinging to his hair dripped onto Sheng Min’s face as his heart raced, taking a long time to calm down.
“You really are crazy,” Li Xuan couldn’t help but say again.
“Get up first.” Sheng Min avoided his gaze and said softly, “My hand is numb. We can’t talk like this.”
“What else is there to say? If I had come out a second later, I would have had to learn to perform shaman rituals just to talk to you.” Li Xuan stood up and stepped back to sit on the coffee table, “Your hand is numb? Let’s get this straight, that’s my hand.”
Sheng Min straightened up and adjusted the hair at his temples, speaking softly, “You can use mine.”
“Why should I? Did you ask me?”
Sheng Min hesitated, “You just said…”
“What did I say? That you look good?” Li Xuan almost laughed out of anger, “That doesn’t count as asking. Which telecom fraud gang did you come from? You don’t use that kind of trick to get information.”
He looked at Sheng Min, emphasizing each word, “I don’t want to use yours; I’m saying I can only use yours right now. It doesn’t mean I want to. I’m still thinking about how to switch back. Did you not understand me?”
“You don’t know how to switch back, do you?” Sheng Min knew he wasn’t in the right, his voice getting softer.
Li Xuan sneered, “I don’t know right now, but I know if you jump down, I’ll have no way to switch back. Jumping off a building? Have you watched too many dramas? If you jump down, the police will come knocking on the door. The surveillance won’t miss us going in together; how am I supposed to explain that? I have no grudge against you; not only do you plan to smash my body to pieces, but you also intend to leave me with this heap of trouble?”
Sheng Min lowered his eyes and took a long time to say, “I didn’t think that much. I just thought I wanted to die at home. You would be scared if you saw it later.”
“Thanks for your consideration,” Li Xuan said sarcastically with a smile, “Should I get you a banner for that?”
Sheng Min was silent for a moment, “I’m sorry.”
He lowered his head slightly, the cold white light from above casting a stark contrast on his neck and the tips of his hair. Li Xuan pressed his lips together; Sheng Min must have smeared something on his lips, as he could taste a faint sweetness. He exhaled, barely calming down, but his voice was still cold: “You cut your wrists, right? Why do you want to die?”
“I don’t know,” Sheng Min said, hugging a cushion in front of him, “I just want to.”
“Then can’t you think of something good?” Li Xuan frowned, “Are you sick?” He paused and added, “I’m not scolding you right now.”
“I don’t know,” Sheng Min repeated, “Maybe I do have something, like depression… Sometimes I take online quizzes and find they fit me quite well.”
“You rely on searches to see if you’re sick?” Li Xuan didn’t even know what expression to make, “You’re really a textbook example of a patient from a dubious clinic. Can’t you just go to the hospital for a check-up?”
Sheng Min shook his head.
“I can’t go,” he said softly, “If I really find out I have depression, a lot of opportunities won’t come to me anymore. And the image the company gave me is a cheerful type, if…”
“You care about your image when your life is on the line?” Li Xuan’s temples throbbed, “You might as well check now; after all, you’re in my body.”
“ I don’t want to.”
“Why not?” Li Xuan wanted to go over and open his head to see what kind of mush was inside.
“No reason. I just don’t want to.” Sheng Min spoke in a flat tone, glanced at him, and then looked down again.
Li Xuan sighed as he stared at the ceiling, feeling that he had sighed more that night than in the previous twenty years combined: “I don’t care. Regardless, it’s dawn, and we need to go to the hospital… Don’t look at me. You can check your mental health if you want, but your physical health must be checked. I was in a car accident; who knows if I sustained any internal injuries.”
“It should be fine; I don’t feel uncomfortable anywhere right now.”
Li Xuan thought he was probably fine too. Sheng Min had lost so much blood, and he only felt a little dizzy, mostly from anger. The accident probably only left some superficial wounds. Even though rationally it didn’t seem very realistic, having his soul swapped had made anything else feel less bizarre by comparison.
“No, we should go to be safe.” He pointed at Sheng Min. “It doesn’t matter if you’re not happy about it. This is my body, my call.”
“Okay,” Sheng Min replied softly. Li Xuan scrutinized him, thinking this person might be deceiving him, looking for an opportunity to end his life before tomorrow came…
“Why aren’t you saying anything?” Sheng Min asked, feeling uncomfortable under his prolonged gaze.
Li Xuan watched him for a few seconds and suddenly leaned closer. Sheng Min instinctively leaned back, but Li Xuan grabbed his wrist, trying to make his tone sound gentler: “Why do you want to die so bad? Did something happen? Are you unhappy most of the time?”
Sheng Min struggled a little, frowning: “Let go of me first.”
“No, I’m saying this because I’m afraid you’ll run away and go do something rush.” Li Xuan firmly refused and asked again, “Are you unhappy?”
“I…” Sheng Min didn’t know how to answer that and blinked.
“Don’t worry, I have no interest in anyone else’s privacy.” Li Xuan curled the corner of his mouth, “I mean, your unhappiness is as Sheng Min. But now that you’ve switched into my body, aside from the two of us, no one else knows about this. So whatever happened to you before, it doesn’t concern you for now. Right?”
Sheng Min didn’t really understand what he meant. Li Xuan was too close, almost touching noses. The pressure was overwhelming, and he felt like he couldn’t say no, so he just nodded.
Li Xuan seemed somewhat satisfied with that expression: “So, for the time we’ve swapped, you just live well for me. When we switch back, you can die however you want; I absolutely won’t stop you. As a gesture of our brief acquaintance, I’ll even bring you a bouquet on Qingming Festival, okay?”
He ended every sentence with a question, but his tone clearly indicated that it wasn’t a negotiation.
Sheng Min stared at the familiar yet unfamiliar face in front of him. He himself would never have such a strong expression on his face. He felt a bit dazed and finally asked after a long time, “What kind of flowers?”
“Huh?” Li Xuan didn’t expect that question: “What flowers do you want?”
“Gerbera daisies and sunflowers, and I want the gerbera daisies to be red.” Sheng Min replied, “And the osmanthus candy from the dessert shop by the riverside in the south of the city.”
Li Xuan hadn’t expected him to have specific requests, thinking it was quite strange. Who uses red flowers for tomb sweeping? And even if he brought candy, would Sheng Min crawl out of the grave to eat it…
Seeing him not saying anything, Sheng Min pondered: “Is that too much? I can do without the candy…”
“It’s fine, I’ll buy it all for you.” Li Xuan thought he might be a bit crazy, but Sheng Min looked at him with bright eyes. For some reason, he had an unexpectedly innocent look using his eyes, which was much more pleasant than the earlier suicidal expression. He readily agreed.
“Okay,” Sheng Min said quickly, seemingly afraid he might change his mind.
Li Xuan nodded, “So have we reached an agreement?”
Sheng Min hesitated: “I guess so.”
“Don’t say ‘I guess,’ be definite.” Li Xuan obviously wasn’t satisfied with that answer. “We agreed that until we switch back, you’re going to live for me.”
After saying that, he pressed down with his thumb. The gesture didn’t match his impatient temperament at all. Sheng Min looked down at his own hand and honestly said, “I’ll try my best.”
Li Xuan clearly wasn’t satisfied with that answer too, his face showing a mix of wanting to explode and forcing himself to calm down. But Sheng Min didn’t say anything else, and for a moment, the only sounds in the living room were the ticking of the clock and the faint sound of rain falling from the eaves.
“How about you finish your shower first?” After sitting quietly for a while, Sheng Min cautiously suggested, “You still have foam on your head.”
“Is it my fault?” As soon as he mentioned it, Li Xuan immediately remembered seeing him about to jump off the building and got angry again.
“It’s my fault,” Sheng Min bit his lip.
“As long as you’re aware of that .” With that attitude, Li Xuan felt like he was punching into cotton and ultimately didn’t say anything more, standing up to head back to the bathroom.