Everyday Life of a Dom Boyfriend

Part Eleven: Inner Circle (End)

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Xia Zhi was startled by fright, yet Ai Zhemei looked rather calm, supporting the man who was at least 1.8m tall on her thin shoulder as she entered. She tossed the man onto the couch and shouted, “Teacher!”

Ye Qia didn’t emerge from the room until after a long time in his underwear and slippers. He murkily swept the living room with a glance and said coldly, “You pay for the couch cleaning, Zhemei.”

Xia Zhi: “…”

Zhemei was quick to react, promptly replying, “Yes, Teacher. But what about him?”

The man on the couch seemed to understand he was the one being referred to. He groaned and slightly opened his half-closed eyes as if wanting to speak, but when he opened his mouth, all he could squeeze out was a few incoherent syllables. Xia Zhi looked at the blood coming from between the man’s legs, dripping from the leather couch and gradually pooling on the marble floors. Scared witless, he glanced towards Ye Qia and Ai Zhemei only to see the two still looking calm and collected.

Ye Qia even went to wash up before walking out unhurriedly and saying to Ai Zhemei, “You did this?”

“No.” Ai Zhemei pursed her lips, looking wronged. “This is one of my friends…”

“I told you not to make friends with questionable people,” Ye Qia interrupted his student’s explanation. He said sternly, “Do you know how troublesome they are?”

“The uh…”

Ai Zhemei was even more aggrieved. “Teacher, I didn’t want to either, but friendships are unavoidable.”

“You guys…”

Ye Qia revealed a look of disdain. “If something serious were to happen, I certainly won’t help you. See what you’ll do then!”

“I…”

“Teacher, I don’t want that either.” Ai Zhemei pouted, her capable and experienced persona flipping into that of a spoiled one as she said, “But I don’t have any other choice right now. It won’t happen again, I swear. Besides, aren’t you my protector?”

“Are you guys done?” The man on the couch finally erupted, spending all of his remaining energy to roar, “Save me first!”

Xia Zhi jumped in fright. Turning to look, he discovered the man was probably at his limit for blood loss. After the man finished his roar, he spasmed before his eyes rolled back.

“Fuck, hurry up and save him!” Xia Zhi felt the urgency as well, rushing Ye Qia with a shriek, “I, for one, don’t want someone dying in our home!”

Ye Qia and Ai Zhemei simultaneously rolled their eyes at him and began to “sort out” the man, carrying him into the bathroom. Xia Zhi wanted to follow and help but was mercilessly shut out. He waited fretfully for nearly half an hour before the door opened. As he got close, a strong stench of blood nearly made him vomit.

He pinched his nose and hid farther away, asking in alarm, “Is he dead?”

“No,” Ye Qia said, in a bad mood. “We stopped the blood loss. Get ready to bring him to Magician for a look.”

Startled, Xia Zhi asked, “Isn’t Magician an anesthesiologist? Gourmand’s the surgeon.”

“It’s more convenient to find him, Gourmand isn’t easy to call out.”

Xia Zhi furrowed his brows, feeling as if he had faintly caught on to something, but this feeling flashed for a moment before it was gone from his mind, not giving him the opportunity to catch it. As he was contemplating it, Ai Zhemei had already carried out the man. Xia Zhi glanced at him and although his complexion still looked quite awful, at least his eyes weren’t rolled to the back of his head. After Ye Qia gave a few words of instruction, he and his student took the man for medical treatment.

When they were gone, Xia Zhi took stock of the place. His gaze finally fixed on the couch and after two seconds of being lost in thought, he suddenly let out a howl.

“Ye Qia, who’s cleaning the sofa?!”

Xia Zhi ended up cleaning the couch. He wasn’t particularly hygienic but allowing his own couch to be covered in a strange man’s blood that had bled out from who-knew-where wasn’t something he could stand for. Most importantly, this couch belonged to the landlord. If the blood stained it, they would have to pay for it, and by the time they called the cleaning company, the bloodstain would’ve dried.

After he finished cleaning and had worked up a sweat, the director’s call came in. It wasn’t the weekend today and although he had skipped out on work in the morning under some pretense of “I’m going to visit a client,” the unfortunate thing was that it happened to be his turn to organize paperwork so he still had to go in in the afternoon.

“Come, come.”

With one hand clutching his phone, he hastily pulled on a shirt before heading towards the door. As he opened the door, he happened to meet Ye Qia right outside. Ignoring the sound of the director’s voice, he hurriedly hung up after giving his greetings, then asked, “How is he?”

“It’s not serious, just that his chrysanthemum tore.” Ye Qia looked unperturbed. “Left him with Magician for observation.”

Xia Zhi’s brows furrowed again upon hearing this name. “Do you call him up every time you have an injured person?”

“He’s more idle.” Ye Qia undressed, stretching as he sighed. “It’s easier to find him than it is to find Gourmand. Gourmand usually needs to accompany Wang Ke, he’s on call 24 hours a day and can’t randomly come out.”

“Didn’t he come the last time I had the ring on me?”

Ye Qia turned and gave him a look, then said as if downplaying it, “That’s because I specifically requested him to come.”

Xia Zhi was stunned. Making sure he understood the implicit meaning, he immediately revealed a smile that was asking for a beating. He edged closer and leaned his head on Ye Qia’s shoulder. “You’ve liked me since then?”

“I was afraid your dick would become useless.” Ye Qia pried Xia Zhi’s head off of him with a finger.

Xia Zhi’s lips curled and said nothing else. He felt as if he was forgetting something, but nevermind, he wasn’t going to probe into it either.

Presently what he cared more about was: “Is this a normal occurrence within your circle?”

“It’s normal.” Ye Qia entered the kitchen, searching for food as he replied, “But it’s uncommon for me.”

Xia Zhi frowned. “It’s happened several times after I met you.”

“What do you mean several times?”

“Today was once, and what happened to me counts as once too, right?”

“That was your own stupidity!”

“It had nothing to do with it! Clearly you didn’t explain things well enough!”

The two argued over “whether it counted” for a while. Xia Zhi suddenly grew quiet, gazing at Ye Qia’s phoenix eyes. “When will you retire?”

Ye Qia knew what Xia Zhi meant by it. He sighed. “Do you want me to retire that badly?”

“I’m afraid of something happening to you!”

Ye Qia didn’t utter a word. He walked over to the living room table and flipped through the stack of newspapers. After selecting a few, he spread them out on the table and tapped them. Puzzled, Xia Zhi came over to look. They were articles on criminal cases that resulted from debt disputes. Of course he would normally see these at the office, but seeing them all gathered in one place gave him a tinge of dread.

When he finished flipping through each one and noticed the earliest newspaper was from the end of last year, his heart instantly softened. He looked up at Ye Qia with a gaze full of smiles. “You fell in love with me that early, huh?”

“…”

Ye Qia walked over, suddenly pulling and trapping Xia Zhi’s head in his armpit, and rubbed him. When Xia Zhi struggled out of his hold, Ye Qia was already unhurriedly heading into the bedroom to catch up on sleep, leaving him alone and at a loss.

A moment later, Xia Zhi went over, opening the bedroom room and asking quietly, “Then when exactly did you fall in love with me?”

Ye Qia’s head was in the blankets. In a muffled voice, he answered, “I’ll find an opportunity to retire as soon as possible.”

Xia Zhi laughed secretly and said, “I’ll also find a way to transfer to the logistics department.”

After a few seconds, a quiet voice came from the blankets. “I love you.”

“I love you, too.”

[Summer]