DSYOM Chapter 62

Wen Di recently felt like a balloon inflated to the extreme. The combination of grant applications, paper publications, and teaching plans squeezed together, leaving him anxious, irritable, and unable to sleep or eat well. If anyone so much as poked him lightly, he would immediately explode.

Even if that ‘anyone’ was his spouse doing household chores.

“Why are you doing laundry now?” Wen Di stared at Bian Cheng with empty eyes. “Is it necessary to wash clothes after wearing them just once?”

Bian Cheng’s hand, holding the laundry detergent, froze mid-air.

“Why are you running the robot vacuum cleaner?” Wen Di questioned again. “Isn’t the floor already perfectly clean?”

The cylindrical creature knocked against Bian Cheng’s foot. He bent down and switched it off.

Thinking that was the end of it, Bian Cheng was caught off guard when Wen Di turned around again after a while, glaring at him.

“What now?”

“Your breathing is too loud.”

Bian Cheng remained silent for a moment, walked over, and pressed Wen Di’s stress-induced, acne-ridden forehead against his chest. At that moment, Wen Di no longer minded the sound of his heartbeat; he trembled and reached out, holding onto the human-shaped pillow tightly.

“The first few years are always tougher,” Bian Cheng murmured, rubbing the back of Wen Di’s head.

Wen Di let out a long sigh, as if his entire being had deflated. Last year, he joined the University of Languages, proudly becoming one of the countless ‘young lecturers.’ Although the University of Languages wasn’t a double first-class university, it ranked high in its field and was located in Beijing. The hiring process had been fiercely competitive, and he had gone through many hardships to secure the position. The school used a 3+3+3 assessment model: if requirements were met, it was possible to be promoted from lecturer to associate professor in as little as three years. However, failing to meet the standards after nine years made further advancement nearly impossible. Wen Di had high aspirations and believed he should set his goals with a sense of urgency, which led to his current state—glaring at his partner’s breathing.

“Let’s take a break,” Bian Cheng said.

“I can’t,” Wen Di glanced at the screen. “I haven’t finished the application for the Ministry of Education’s Youth Fund, I still have one chapter of my paper to write, and I still have lesson plans for two courses…”

He let out another groan and collapsed onto Bian Cheng’s chest. “T University is still better,” he muttered, “T University doesn’t even care about teaching evaluations.”

Different universities had different assessment criteria. Some placed great emphasis on teaching, and course evaluations were included as part of the assessment metrics. But T University did not care about these at all. The quality of teaching had no impact on professional title evaluations. Whether or not a teacher put effort into preparing lessons was entirely up to their conscience.

Unlike Wen Di, if his course evaluations didn’t rank in the top 60% for three consecutive years, the school had the right to dismiss him.

“Our research pressure is even greater,” Bian Cheng reminded him. “The requirements for projects are much higher.”

Wen Di thought about the fund application materials on his computer and shut his eyes in despair. Applying for projects was mentally exhausting enough, but the real issue was that after finishing the paperwork, he still had to go to various offices to get stamps and signatures. This process was also incredibly time and energy consuming.

Then he remembered the pile of invoices he hadn’t reimbursed yet, and his headache worsened.

He needed to quickly secure positions as a master’s and doctoral supervisor, recruit people to run errands for him, and free himself from these trivial tasks.

Thinking of this, he suddenly shivered. This must be what people meant by the young man who slayed dragons eventually becoming the dragon himself.[footnote]屠龙少年终成恶龙 (tú lóng shàonián zhōng chéng è lóng): A saying that refers to someone who sets out with noble ideals but eventually becomes what they initially opposed.[/footnote]

“Sigh, is there really no such thing as a mentor who doesn’t exploit others?” He rubbed his chest and asked Bian Cheng, “How do you handle all the miscellaneous tasks?”

“I have an assistant.”

Wen Di froze in place. He had heard of senior professors having personal assistants, but that was usually because they had collaborative projects with enterprises. With numerous administrative, financial, foreign affairs, and industry-academia tasks, assistants became necessary for the projects, and their salaries could be covered by public funds. However, the proportion of labor expenses in project funding was regulated and couldn’t exceed a certain percentage. Wen Di’s project budget was certainly not enough to cover a assistant’s salary, and he doubted that Bian Cheng’s was either.

“I hired one with my own money,” Bian Cheng said.

Wen Di had a thousand words in his heart, but they eventually condensed into one sentence: “My salary isn’t even as high as a assistant’s!”

“Then I’ll hire one for you.”

“Ah…” Wen Di hesitated. “I’m just a newly hired lecturer. Having my own assistant—doesn’t that seem a bit too flashy? Won’t other colleagues have opinions about it?”

“Why care about them? It’s not their money.”

Wen Di continued gnawing his nails anxiously. His mind buzzed, and not a single word for his paper’s conclusion came to him. He decided to take a break. He collapsed onto the bed, holding the human-shaped pillow with one hand while using his phone with the other. On the screen, he saw an old friend pestering him again.

Jiang Nanze’s fanbase grew rapidly, and so did his pressure. His anxiety over choosing topics was no less intense than Wen Di’s breakout-inducing stress. Recently, he had been inviting PhDs from various fields for interview programs to share insights about career prospects and professional experiences. Wen Di, citing his busy schedule, coldly refused him, but Jiang Nanze persisted, visiting the thatched cottage three times.[footnote]三顾茅庐 (sān gù máo lú): From a famous episode in the fictional Romance of Three Kingdoms (三国演义) in which Liu Bei recruits Zhuge Liang to his cause by visiting him three times. This sentence basically refers to someone making persistent efforts to invite another person of talent.[/footnote]

Jiang Nanze: [Think about it. We’ve known each other for so many years.]

Wen Di: [If you’re looking for someone, find a big shot. Didn’t I already give you Yu Jingyi’s WeChat contact?]

Jiang Nanze: [She’s in the UK. Our program is for in-person interviews.]

Wen Di: [So many requirements. Can’t you do it online?]

Jiang Nanze: [She’s busy with a very important academic conference right now. We’re not that close, so I feel bad bothering her. Hey, wasn’t it us who looked after Jiang Yu while you two were on your honeymoon?]

Wen Di: [Alright ba, I’ll talk to you after I’m done with this busy period.]

Jiang Nanze: [I’ll take that as a yes! I’ll treat you to dinner later!]

Jiang Nanze: [And while we’re at it, bring your husband along too.]

Wen Di let out a cold laugh. This guy really knew how to calculate, already eyeing a ‘buy one, get one free’ deal.

Wen Di: [Be careful with him. If he says something out of line and you lose followers, don’t blame me.]

Jiang Nanze: [That’s exactly the kind of dramatic effect I want! (fly rubbing their hands.jpg)]

After replying, Wen Di immediately regretted it. Why had he added more to his plate and now taken on the task of convincing Bian Cheng? He glanced at the person beside him. After some thought, he realized that Bian Cheng never agreed to anything without knowing the details. So he opened Jiang Nanze’s video account and showed it to him: “They want to invite you for an interview.”

Bian Cheng took the phone, opened one, and watched it at double speed for two minutes.

“Just say whatever you want.” Wen Di said.

To Wen Di’s surprise, Bian Cheng agreed easily.

“Maybe it can encourage more students to enter the field of mathematics,” Bian Cheng said.

Wen Di was deeply suspicious of this, but he kept silent. Bian Cheng closed the interview video, his gaze sliding down from a row of striking yellow text about biochemical materials to a few videos labeled ‘vlog’. “What’s this?” he asked Wen Di.

“Something for recording one’s life,” Wen Di said. “His vlogs usually feature the couple moments. For example, when the two of them go somewhere for fun, they film it. During holidays or birthdays, they film it too—it counts as a treat for fans. Sometimes, he can put together a video just by taking a video of himself at work for a day.”

Bian Cheng stayed silent for a long time before sincerely asking, “Why would anyone watch this kind of thing?”

“Isn’t it fun to watch two handsome guys showing affection?”

“What’s so interesting about other people’s lives?” Bian Cheng pointed to one of the videos. “What’s this? Picking up a partner from work? Is this even worth filming?”

“You don’t want to watch, but there are tens of thousands of others who do. Stop talking nonsense.”

Wen Di snatched the phone back, stretched lazily, and reluctantly climbed off the bed to sit in his ergonomic chair, gloomily resuming work on his fund application. With no laundry to wash or floors to sweep, Bian Cheng could only pick up a book on birational geometry to read.

In mathematics, theoretical study was a lifelong endeavor. By the time he finished the third chapter, it was already bedtime.

While thinking about the unwashed laundry, he picked up his phone and saw several messages from his father. After the dismissal notice was issued, Bian Huaiyuan had suffered another heart attack, which had also triggered mesenteric artery embolism. Although he was resuscitated, his health had remained poor. He simply wrapped up his affairs in Beijing and went to live in a sanatorium abroad. It allowed him to both recover and avoid running into old acquaintances.

The next week, Bian Cheng would be attending the International Congress of Mathematicians and planned to visit his father while he was there. After Bian Cheng replied to his father’s question about the timing, his father asked about his recent health and academic progress but not about his relationship. Having his career path cut short and plagued by illness, Bian Huaiyuan had lost interest in life itself. Whether or not his son came out mattered little to him anymore. Over the past two years, he hadn’t asked about Bian Cheng’s personal life, and Bian Cheng hadn’t told him anything either.

Thinking of this, Bian Cheng suddenly asked Wen Di, “Do your parents know about us?”

Wen Di jolted, typed a few garbled characters, and immediately said, “Of course not.”

“They don’t urge you to get married?”

“I told them that the first few years are crucial. If I don’t perform well, the school might fire me,” Wen Di said. “I need to secure my job first before even thinking about relationships.”

“And what about after those years?”

Wen Di rubbed his nose and glanced toward the wall, looking at the room next door through it. “Then I’ll just tell them that I’ve actually been in a relationship for a long time, with someone older than me, married, and has a child. I’ll say I was afraid they’d be angry, so I didn’t dare bring them home to meet them. But don’t worry, now I have both a partner and a child, so there’s no need to pressure me anymore. Look, isn’t every word of that true?”

Bian Cheng was silent for a moment before saying, “I feel like that’s almost the same as directly coming out.”

Wen Di waved his hand dismissively. “We’ll cross that bridge when we get there. My mom doesn’t pressure me, my dad rarely says much, and my grandparents only nag a little during the New Year. That’s the good thing about being in Beijing—the mountains are high and the emperor is far away, they can’t control me.”

Bian Cheng naturally resisted the idea of ‘the boat will straighten when it reaches the bridge’[footnote]船到桥头自然直 (lit. The boat will straighten when it reaches the bridge): An idiom meaning things will resolve themselves naturally in the end.[/footnote] and began considering various contingency plans. Wen Di turned around, tilted his head, looked at him for a while, shut off the computer, walked over, took the book beside him, and straddled the lap of his married-with-kids partner, cupping his face with both hands.

“What should I do,” he sighed, “I won’t be able to see you next week.”

“I’ll video call you.”

“I might not be able to answer,” Wen Di said, “I might be bedridden with lovesickness.”*

“That won’t do,” Bian Cheng said, “You still have a paper to write. Isn’t the funding application deadline next week?”

Wen Di stared at him coldly for a while, patting his cheek lightly. Though the force was gentle, Bian Cheng felt it was a kind of threat.

“Are you eligible for the Fields Medal this year?” Wen Di asked, “You’re not far from forty now, you only have two chances left. Aren’t you going to seize the opportunity?”

Bian Cheng didn’t respond to his partner’s overly high expectations. He had already learned that in the face of such sudden cold gazes, there was only one thing to do.

He pressed down on the back of the person above him, letting their soft lips fall. They maintained this posture, feeling the sensation of their bodies embracing and pressing against each other. Wen Di was slightly thinner, so he could hold him and let him sink into his arms.

Wen Di was evidently dissatisfied today; Bian Cheng got bitten by him twice.

After showering, Wen Di returned to the bedroom while drying his hair and saw that Bian Cheng was still shirtless, exposing the bite marks on his shoulder, staring intently at the screen. Wen Di sat beside him, glanced over, and said sarcastically, “Why would anyone watch something like a vlog?”

Bian Cheng frowned as he watched comments like ‘Ahhh, so sweet!’ floating on the barrage and remarked, “Are state-owned enterprises so idle? Making videos every day?”

Last year, Song Yuchi had finally graduated successfully and joined a second-level institution under the National Energy Group.

“They have a good relationship.”

“Why bring flowers to the office?” Bian Cheng said. “Won’t that attract a crowd?”

“They have a good relationship.”

Wen Di lay down to sleep, and then heard Bian Cheng start a new video, this time it was a travel Vlog.

“Qinghai is very beautiful,” Bian Cheng said. “I haven’t been there yet.”

Wen Di rolled his eyes. This guy was obviously envious!

A few seconds later, the sound of the video changed again, and the background played Jiang Nanze’s off-key rendition of ‘Happy birthday to you.’

“What does celebrating a birthday have to do with cross-dressing?” Bian Cheng frowned, paused for a moment, and added, “He doesn’t look as good in women’s clothes as you do.”

Wen Di finally couldn’t stand it anymore, turned his back, snatched the phone from Bian Cheng’s hand, and placed it on the bedside table. “Sleep.”

Bian Cheng, whose right to watch the video was taken away, lay down, pinched the corner of the quilt, making sure it was in the right position and the cotton wool was smooth, and closed his eyes with satisfaction.

Over the next week, both of their schedules were packed. Bian Cheng went to a nursing home and then attended the ICM. The ICM, a grand event for exchanging the latest research results, theoretical advancements, and applications in mathematics, left his back sore after several days of academic lectures. Bian Cheng made a video call to his partner during the break of the lecture, but no one answered even though it was afternoon in China.

The thought of lovesickness flashed through his mind but was quickly dismissed by reason.

After a while, Wen Di replied that he was too busy. Bian Cheng thought about it for a moment and drafted a recruitment notice, posting it across various university forums and platforms.

When the ICM ended and Bian Cheng finished interviewing several candidates, he still hadn’t managed to have a long conversation.

He began to wonder whether it was because they were too busy or if he had said something again to upset the person.

As mathematicians shook hands and said their goodbyes, he walked out of the venue, passing by a dazzling array of academic posters. The afternoon sun was bright and dazzling.

Shining on the person standing at the bottom of the steps, holding flowers.

Probably from working overnight, Wen Di’s face showed signs of exhaustion, but the moment he saw Bian Cheng step out, the usual smile lit up his eyes.

God, he thought, I’m so lucky.

He walked down the steps to his partner, who had traveled across the ocean. “Why are you here?”

Wen Di smiled and handed him the flowers. “I came to pick you up from work.”

He accepted the bouquet, and for the first time in his life, he found these plants so beautiful. Looking at the person in front of him, he suddenly felt the love in his chest swell to an overwhelming degree.

“I missed you so much,” he said.

This time, the other person didn’t wait five seconds.

“Me too,” Wen Di took his hand. “I’ve finished my paper and lesson plans. Let’s go.”

“Where to?”

“To shoot a travel vlog,” Wen Di said. “So you’ll have something to look at and think of me in the future.”

 

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T/N: There’ll be 8 chapters left, 7 chapters on Jiang Yu and then another extra for this CP!