Chapter 31: Already an Adult

Halfway there, Ji Xu’s attention was caught by a shop on the side of the road.

The storefront was not large, but colorful light strips glowed on the sign.

The black glass door prevented anyone from seeing inside from the outside, with only faint sounds of music leaking through the door crack, the bass drum beats thumping one by one, transmitting up through the ground.

An “Open” light sign was posted beside the doorframe, and a young man in a dark shirt stood at the entrance smoking.

Ji Xu slowed his pace, his gaze sliding back and forth over that black glass door, looking inside a couple of extra times out of curiosity.

He had never been inside a bar since he was little; back in his hometown’s small city, there were one or two, but he had always walked around such places.

After finishing the college entrance examination and coming to Haicheng, his social circle remained simple; aside from Rong Du’s rented apartment, it was just the barbecue stand and the school, making a place like a bar a complete blank area in his mind.

Yuan Hanfei walked a few steps and noticed the person beside him hadn’t kept up, so he turned back and saw Ji Xu standing at the entrance of that bar with his head tilted, peering inside.

The unblemished curiosity in his eyes shone brightly under the streetlight, like a small animal that had never seen a water surface peering over the edge of a pond for the first time.

He doubled back and walked over to Ji Xu’s side, following his gaze to take a look at that door as well: “Do you want to go in and have some fun?”

Ji Xu turned around to look at him, his eyes sparkling, reflecting the intertwined colors of the streetlights and neon lights: “Can we?”

Yuan Hanfei bent down and leaned a bit closer, his gaze shifting down from Ji Xu’s face to his shoulders and height, with a deliberately appraising, scrutinizing look, a smile on the corners of his lips: “If you’re a minor, then you can’t.”

Ji Xu’s expression instantly turned anxious, raising his chin slightly, his voice carrying the urgency of having been questioned: “I’m an adult! I turned eighteen a few months before the college entrance exam.”

He took a step forward, as if to let Yuan Hanfei see more clearly, proving that he was absolute a qualified grown-up: “I’m not a kid anymore.”

Yuan Hanfei straightened up, looking at his eager attempt to prove himself, the smile at the corners of his lips deepening.

He reached out and wrapped an arm around Ji Xu’s shoulder, resting his palm on his shoulder and gently patting it, leading him toward that black glass door: “Then let’s go in and play.”

The moment the door was pushed open, the music crashed over them like a wall.

Extremely rhythmic electronic drum beats flooded in from all directions, the bass vibrating so much that even the floor trembled slightly, and multicolored lights spun and intertwined overhead, turning blue for a moment, purple the next, and golden after, slicing the entire space into alternating fragments of light and dark.

The air was filled with a faint smell of alcohol and perfume, mixed together with a certain sweet, cloying incense scent.

Two or three dozen people were packed onto the dance floor, swaying their bodies to the rhythm of the music; some stood at the edge of the crowd holding wine glasses and chatting, while others leaned against the bar counter looking down at their phones, light and shadow flickering indeterminately across their faces.

Ji Xu stood at the entrance for a few seconds to adjust, his eyes blinking against the shifting lights.

That lively, restless, and free atmosphere pushed over from the direction of the dance floor like an invisible wave, enveloping his senses.

He felt his heartbeat speed up a few beats involuntarily, not out of nervousness, but a strange excitement after being infected by the atmosphere, something in his blood beating along with the drumbeats of the music, the tips of his toes unconsciously tapping gently against the floor.

Yuan Hanfei noticed his gaze falling on those swaying figures on the dance floor, pulled his wrist with a bit of force, and led him a few steps toward the direction of the dance floor.

“Let’s dance together.” His voice was somewhat louder than usual, but he didn’t shout, speaking right by Ji Xu’s ear just enough to be heard clearly.

Ji Xu was pulled to the edge of the dance floor by him, standing there at a complete loss.

Everyone around was swaying with the music in various postures; some danced very casually, others danced with deep immersion, but nobody noticed them, nor did anyone care whether they danced well or not.

Even so, Ji Xu still felt like he didn’t know where to put his hands and feet; he turned his head to look at Yuan Hanfei, his voice sounding somewhat uncertain amidst the music: “But I don’t know how to.”

“It doesn’t matter,” Yuan Hanfei’s voice traveled right against his ear, his warm breath sweeping past his auricle, “Just follow me and dance.”

As he spoke, he had already begun to sway his shoulders and arms in small movements to the beat, his movements relaxed and natural, that casual attitude of “no need to care about anyone” fully displayed in the lines of his body.

Ji Xu looked at him, imitating his manner by moving his shoulders and then his arms, which at first was stiff, clumsy, and awkward even to himself.

Yet the music kept pushing forward continuously, the drumbeats striking against his eardrums one after another, and Yuan Hanfei was dancing very easily in front of him, occasionally turning his head to glance at him and curling the corners of his mouth, a smile that held no mockery whatsoever, merely saying “See, it’s very easy.”

Ji Xu slowly let go.

His shoulders were no longer so stiff, the movements of his arms began to hit the beat with the rhythm, and his feet shifted left and right with his center of gravity.

Everyone around was dancing, and nobody would stare at him; that concern over “whether I dance well” completely lost its meaning in this colorful, dim, and passionate space.

He was simply moving, following the drumbeats, following Yuan Hanfei’s rhythm, and following that pure joy and release transmitted from the dance floor.

As he danced, he suddenly smiled, the corners of his mouth spreading wide, his eyebrows and eyes bending, his whole person seeming to shed a layer of some shell.

After dancing for who knows how long, a thin layer of sweat broke out on Ji Xu’s forehead, his breathing a bit faster than usual but still steady.

Yuan Hanfei pulled his wrist to retreat from the dance floor, and the two walked through the crowd crossed with light and shadow to stand in front of the bar counter.

The high stools had dark red leather surfaces, yielding slightly elastic when sat upon.

Yuan Hanfei sat down beside Ji Xu, resting one hand on the bar counter, leaning his head over close to his ear, his voice suppressed in the music just enough to be heard by the two of them: “Since we’ve come to a bar, of course we have to drink alcohol.”

His gaze shifted from Ji Xu’s face to his eyes, pausing for a moment: “Can you drink?”

Ji Xu nodded.

He had drunk beer before and also tasted Chinese liquor; beer was bitter, Chinese liquor was spicy, and he had never felt alcohol was a good thing.

Yuan Hanfei said a few words to the bartender, a young man wearing a black duckbill cap, who skillfully retrieved two bottles of liquor and several ingredients from the rack.

The shaker flipped up and down a few times in his hand, the ice cubes colliding to produce a crisp clinking sound.

The poured liquid was a gradient blue, slowly smudging from a deep blue at the bottom of the glass to a light silver at the rim, decorated at the edge with a thin slice of lemon and a red cherry.

Ji Xu took that glass of alcohol and looked down at the beautiful blue liquor inside the glass, gleaming like gems under the bar lights, the ice cubes floating and colliding in the liquid, making a faint clinking noise.

To think such a beautiful thing was actually meant for drinking; he brought it up to his nose and sniffed it, sensing the aroma of orange and a faint floral fragrance, not pungent at all.

He carefully took a sip, and as the liquid slid across the tip of his tongue, there was first a wave of slight sweetness, followed by the freshness of orange and a trace of extremely faint herbal flavor, gently warming his throat when swallowed, neither astringent nor harsh.

He took another sip, this time letting the liquor stay on the tip of his tongue for two extra seconds, that sweet flavor and fruit fragrance spreading through his mouth, overturning all his previous stereotypes about alcohol.

So alcohol could actually taste this good.

“You have to drink alcohol slowly.” Yuan Hanfei’s voice came from the side.

Ji Xu turned his head and saw Yuan Hanfei holding his own glass of alcohol, the rim resting against his lower lip, his gaze falling on the glass in his hand that was already more than half empty.

Only then did Ji Xu notice that he had unknowingly drunk more than half the glass; the icy glass wall pressed against his fingers, with only a shallow layer of blue liquid remaining at the bottom.

Felt a bit embarrassed, he set the glass down, drawing circles with his fingertip on the rim, murmuring an “I know,” the tips of his ears flushed with an imperceptible layer of pink under the warm lights of the bar counter.

However, he looked down again at the tiny bit of blue left at the bottom of the glass, picked it up anyway, drank it all in one gulp, then exhaled a satisfied breath, placed the empty glass on the bar counter, and pushed it a bit further away.

Yuan Hanfei looked at him and pushed the untouched dish of nuts in front of him toward his side, gesturing for him to eat something to pad his stomach.

Ji Xu pinched a cashew, put it into his mouth to chew, his toes gently swaying on the crossbar of the high stool, his gaze drifting back toward the direction of the dance floor once again.

The music was still continuing, the lights were still spinning, and this night had only just passed its liveliest moment.

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