Author: 反舌鸟 / Mockingbird

Translator: Kinky || https://kinkytranslations.com/

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Chapter 8

“Anything else?” Long Xingyu asked him.

Yu Ruoyun was listening but didn’t speak. It seemed like he was driving. The background was filled with faint songs from the car stereo with the volume slightly amplified.

“Have you heard it?” Yu Ruoyun asked. “Jiang Yu’s song.”

Long Xingyu’s heart suddenly tightened.

The music industry had once flourished. Back then, it was popular for actors to transition to singing, releasing albums, and providing tracks for commercial performances to increase their appearance fees. Jiang Yu had also sung, but even he had almost forgotten about it.

“No,” Long Xingyu said. “What an old song.”

As he spoke, he suddenly felt uncomfortable, squatting down against the wall and pressing on his lower back. It turned out Lu Zheming wasn’t lying. Long Xingyu really did have a back injury.

He was so unlucky. He would rather have been reborn as any random extra in Hengdian, doing a job he was more familiar with. Instead, he was a small idol, trapped by a contract, without freedom. Even among idols, his company was particularly unreliable. Its parent company was in the gaming industry, initially recruiting pretty girls as streamers. Later, they had the bright idea of entering the idol industry, recruiting male trainees. Even Long Xingyu’s agent had only just received their performance agent qualification certificate a few days ago and had celebrated by treating them to a meal.

He didn’t understand. By his standards, neither Long Xingyu nor his group had the qualifications to become popular. Yet, they had unexpectedly risen to fame, with the company’s unreliability becoming a selling point. Fans lamented that such good-looking idols had fallen into a den of thieves, believing that only they could save them. The young girls did their best to help him, but his fate was still in someone else’s hands.

Long Xingyu wondered if Jiang Yu’s bank card had been canceled. If not, Jiang Yu’s savings would be enough to pay the breach of contract fees.

“There’s something I want to ask you,” Yu Ruoyun said. “For a friend. If a company wants to separately sign your film and management contracts, would you consider it?”

Long Xingyu, pressing on his lower back, stopped moving.

“Which company is so clueless?” Long Xingyu said.

Yu Ruoyun’s voice carried a hint of amusement. “I recommended you.”

He didn’t seem at all bothered by Long Xingyu’s indirect insult.

“Maybe,” Long Xingyu said. “I’ll quietly wait for a pie to fall from the sky.”

“Not quite,” Yu Ruoyun said. “They’re selective. They might wait to see how your first project performs. So, before that, you should put in more effort to make yourself visible.”

Long Xingyu’s sensitivity suddenly pricked like a thorn, piercing his skin. Despite Yu Ruoyun’s kindness, he could sense the condescension in his words because Yu Ruoyun said, “Make yourself visible.”

“So, you think singing and dancing on stage, winking at the audience, doesn’t count as being seen, isn’t real work,” Long Xingyu said. “Of course, an actor like you wouldn’t appreciate it.”

He didn’t know what he was trying to mock. Was this even mockery? He was just stating facts. Yu Ruoyun was indeed an award-winning actor who never thought highly of him, no matter who he was.

If Yu Ruoyun hung up, Long Xingyu might have felt better, but Yu Ruoyun said, “If I have to reflect, I might indeed have a bias. China doesn’t have the soil for idols. The model is copied from abroad, but the audience is limited. Maybe it will be accepted by mainstream culture in the future, but that takes time, consuming the youth of these young people.”

“I just think this company might not be suitable for you,” Yu Ruoyun said.

Long Xingyu was silent for a long time before saying, “Forget about signing with another company. Can I discuss something else with you?”

“Go ahead.”

“Damn it, can you just scold me? Am I holding a knife to your throat for you to just accept all this?”

After yelling, Long Xingyu realized how perverse his request was.

“For instance, right now. You should call me crazy,” Long Xingyu added.

Yu Ruoyun actually laughed.

The laughter made Long Xingyu so embarrassed that he hung up. Looking at Yu Ruoyun’s name on his phone screen, he thought the name had always sounded effeminate, like a woman’s name. It indeed felt like a cloud—gentle, distant, and unreachable*.

*Clarity: The [Yun] (云) in his name is cloud.

Yu Ruoyun was no longer laughing.

He was indeed driving, parked by the roadside. There was a lighter in the storage box next to the driver’s seat, probably left behind by someone who had taken a ride because Yu Ruoyun didn’t smoke and had even appeared in anti-smoking ads.

Someone once blew smoke rings into Yu Ruoyun’s face and said, “Hey, anti-smoking ambassador, come catch me.”

Yu Ruoyun would reply, “I don’t have the authority to enforce the law.”

That person loved such childish provocations, like a cat climbing up his trouser leg, claws out, scratching people without realizing it, just wanting to sit on his shoulder and declare ownership while rubbing against his chin. He didn’t mean to hurt anyone.

So Yu Ruoyun would take the cigarette from his lips and compensate with a kiss.

What happened next?

His head started to ache, and he couldn’t remember.

Yu Ruoyun had returned temporarily for an event scheduled before joining the crew. That day had been cleared for him to walk the red carpet and exchange pleasantries with people he hadn’t seen in a while. Someone asked about his amnesia, and Yu Ruoyun smiled, saying it was temporary and he would recover soon. “Look, I remember you, don’t I?”

He had remembered most of what was important. It didn’t affect his daily life. The people he couldn’t remember probably weren’t that important. He could continue living like this—working, acting, dining at expensive restaurants with friends, signing autographs for fans, asking their names, and writing them down carefully.

But Long Xingyu was a shadow of someone else, carrying fragments of Jiang Yu. Each time he tried to get close to Yu Ruoyun, those fragments would pierce Yu Ruoyun, drawing blood and awakening memories of Jiang Yu.

Perhaps because of this, Yu Ruoyun felt he owed Long Xingyu something and wanted to help him more. He used Long Xingyu’s strangely familiar behavior to recall memories of Jiang Yu. It sounded a bit underhanded, and Yu Ruoyun wasn’t good at such things.

The most rebellious thing he had done was to film a movie at sixteen against his family’s wishes. His parents were intellectuals who expected him to teach at a university, not become an actor. Winning Best Actor for his first movie made everyone see him as a prodigy. His parents said he should return to his studies once he had enough of acting. The director even visited his home to persuade his parents, promising he would complete his education, which allowed him to continue acting. He did finish school, attended a film academy, and had a higher attendance rate than many classmates.

There might be another thing, but Yu Ruoyun would have to ask his family about it.

He made a call home, and his mother was surprised. “Why are you calling at this hour?”

They talked about his accident and recovery, then Yu Ruoyun suddenly asked, “Mom, did I ever tell you I like men?”

“…” His mother didn’t seem to register the question, uncertainly asking, “What did you say?”

Apparently not.

“Nothing,” Yu Ruoyun said softly. “Just wanted to tell you. Goodnight.”

Yu Ruoyun thought it must have been a very secret affair. The public didn’t know, colleagues didn’t know, his manager didn’t know, and even his family didn’t know.

Now he no longer had the chance to announce it. Jiang Yu was dead.

Yu Ruoyun looked at the message on his phone. A director he had worked with before sent a WeChat: [Ruoyun, the movie is finally being released. We might need you to shoot some promotional material.]

Yu Ruoyun agreed. Promoting a movie was part of an actor’s job, although this movie had been made years ago. It had been promoted once before, but suddenly couldn’t pass the review. No one knew what sensitive content had caused it, but it couldn’t be shown.

Being an actor for a long time, one would encounter such unexpected situations. Back then, Yu Ruoyun had wondered if a movie that no one could see after all the effort put into making it really existed.

Now it was finally being released, but it would likely be heavily edited. It was no longer the original story but a patchwork of old scenes. Would it still be the original movie?

Yu Ruoyun didn’t know.

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