Chapter 249: Chapter 159: In Commemoration of Li Zhi’s Outstanding Contribution to Encouraging Shen Yuan’s Progress
Time slipped by.
By 11 o’clock, Shen Yuan still hadn’t finished his homework.
It was time for a break.
His gaze slowly drifted from the half-finished test paper before him and settled on Li Zhi, who was still diligently working on her own beside him.
He hesitated for a moment before finally asking, "When are your parents coming back?"
Hearing his question, Li Zhi stopped writing. She glanced up at him and shook her head gently. "I don’t know," she replied. "They went to see my grandfather."
"Your grandfather?" Shen Yuan frowned. "What’s wrong?"
Li Zhi pursed her lips but still answered in a low voice, "He’s getting old. His health isn’t great."
Seeing this, Shen Yuan knew better than to press the issue and changed the subject.
After a moment’s thought, he said to Li Zhi, "Why don’t you come to my place for lunch? I’ll call my mom now and let her know."
Li Zhi nodded. "Okay."
Shen Yuan immediately pulled out his phone and called his mom. Zhang Yuyan’s voice came from the other end almost instantly.
"Hello? What’s up?"
"Mom, Li Zhi is coming over for lunch."
"What?" Zhang Yuyan’s voice jumped an octave, clearly displeased. "You little brat, why didn’t you tell me sooner? Do you have any idea what time it is?"
Shen Yuan quickly held the phone away from his ear to save himself from his mom’s shouting.
He explained helplessly, "I was doing my homework! I just remembered to tell you now. It’s no big deal, just make one extra vegetable dish."
"I’ve already started cooking the rice!"
Zhang Yuyan grumbled, "Forget it. You can just eat less."
With that, Zhang Yuyan hung up.
Shen Yuan: ?
’Zhang Yuyan, am I not your son anymore?’
Shen Yuan shook his head helplessly, then turned to Li Zhi. "Alright, we’re all set. We can just head over for lunch later."
After speaking, Shen Yuan put down his phone and stretched. "So tired. Li Bao, are you tired?"
Li Zhi subconsciously rubbed the back of her neck. "I’m okay. My shoulders and neck are just a little sore."
The words had barely left her mouth when a shadow suddenly fell over her.
Shen Yuan leaned over her, his hands on the back of her chair. His Adam’s apple was so close it nearly brushed the crown of her head. "I can give you a massage," he murmured. "I’m great at it."
An ink dot bled from her pen onto the paper. Li Zhi leaned forward, away from his body heat, and shot him a sidelong look. "Don’t think I don’t know what you’re up to!"
"Hey! I try to be nice, and this is the thanks I get," Shen Yuan said, still leaning nonchalantly on her chair. "If you won’t let me give you a massage, how about you give me one?"
"In your dreams, ugly! You want *me* to massage *you*?"
Stroking his chin, Shen Yuan leaned close to her ear. "I’m not *that* ugly, am I? When I was a kid, Uncle Wang from the village said I looked like Jin Chengwu."
"In that case, you must be the great Mr. Fen Wu of Jiyang, deigning to bury yourself in a pile of test papers."
Her gaze became a measuring tape, tracing a path from the stubborn cowlick on his head, down the tan skin of his neck, and finally settling on his lazy smile.
She reached out, grabbed his sloppy collar, and straightened it. "A complimentary service for Mr. Fen Wu. Your collar’s more crooked than the old bent tree at the village entrance."
Shen Yuan immediately straightened up, his fingers toying nonchalantly with the rumpled fabric at his throat. "Stunned by my good looks?"
As he finished speaking, Li Zhi’s pen tapped the back of his hand. "You want the truth?"
The way she raised an eyebrow and glanced at him made her lashes cast a shadow like a butterfly’s wing on her porcelain cheeks.
Shen Yuan nodded.
"No." The fingertips Li Zhi used to prop up her cheek pressed a small dimple into her skin.
"Then you might as well have lied."
As Shen Yuan spoke, Li Zhi turned back to her desk. The plastic cap of her pen tapped sharply against the wooden surface.
"Massage my shoulders."
In the backlight, the fine, downy hairs on the nape of her neck glowed with a fuzzy golden halo, like the new feathers of a hatchling.
Shen Yuan’s fingers, which were resting on the back of the chair, suddenly clenched.
He distinctly heard the faint sound of his own gulp.
Gazing at her slender neck, Shen Yuan subconsciously held his breath.
"Don’t make me regret this."
Li Zhi’s voice snapped Shen Yuan back to reality.
"I was just getting ready."
Li Zhi let out a dry laugh, her eyes fixed on his reflection in the computer monitor before her.
But she didn’t call him out on it.
Shen Yuan’s warm palm hovered three inches above her tense shoulders. Right before letting it down, he took a slow breath in and let it out.
"First style of the Shen Clan Massage," he announced. "I haven’t thought of a name for it yet."
His voice trailed off with a mischievous laugh, but his four fingers were restrained, using only their pads to apply pressure. He began gently kneading in a spiral motion outward from her shoulders.
He felt the slight tremor of her shoulder blades under his palm and asked softly, "Is the pressure okay? Let me know if it’s too much."
"Mm," came the noncommittal sound from her throat.
Her shoulder blades trembled slightly with the pressure from his fingertips. His warmth penetrated the thin cotton of her autumn shirt. The spiral kneading precisely targeted the sore points on her shoulders, and the process of the ache being replaced by a tingling sensation felt like fizzy bubbles popping between her bones.
Her brow furrowed slightly, and under the desk, her toes curled.
Li Zhi had to force herself to focus on something else, anything to suppress the sigh that was about to escape her lips.
But Shen Yuan’s touch was too precise; every time, he found the exact spot that brought her relief, and a small sigh would escape her lips now and then.
"Feel good?"
Li Zhi nodded.
Under the precise kneading of his fingers, the tension in Li Zhi’s shoulders and neck began to melt away, like ice on a lake in early spring.
Comments