Special Fondness – Extra: A few snippets

~Sleep Talking~

Fang Su has had many dreams lately, sleep talking sometimes, his voice light and low, extremely gentle, but people could easily hear it clearly.

Tang QiaoYuan seemed to have found a new interest, and has never reminded him, observing him on one side in an ill-behaved way and “having a conversation” with him. No matter what Fang Su dreamt about, or said, he always took delight in getting involved, shamelessly disturbing people’s dreams.

That afternoon, Fang Su was taking a small nap, and started again to speak in bits and pieces, saying that the end of the year was approaching, can hang on red lanterns, this time they can hang more of them, very bright, very pretty. 

Tang QiaoYuan was sitting at the bedside, lowly chuckling twice then answered by coaxing him: “You call me husband, then we’ll hang up one more time.” 

“Husband…” Fang Su who was dreaming was naive, going along with his words and replying, mumbling a few words then called again, “husband… called twice… have to hang up two more…”

Tang QiaoYuan laughed out loud.

Fang Su was accidentally startled awake, and opened his eyes in a daze, only slowly waking up after a long while, looking with confusion at the person who was full of smiles.

Tang QiaoYuan lowered his head and pecked at him, not willing to let it go, said: “Su Su called me ‘husband’ in his sleep, often dreaming of me lately, could it be that he hasn’t seen enough of me while he is awake?” 

Fang Su’s face became red.

“What did you dream of?” Tang QiaoYuan asked him on purpose.

Fang Su did not reply, from the moment he woke up from his dream, his temperament was revered to not being good at speaking. After a moment, only then he stretched out a hand from below the quilt, and said softly while pulling on Tang QiaoYuan’s sleeve: “The end of the year is close.”

“En,” Tang QiaoYuan finally did not tease him anymore, covering his palm that was languid from the sleep, said while smiling, “The end of the year is close, let’s hang a few more lanterns this year.” 

Fang Su was distracted, it was as if that person went into his dream.

A moment later, he curved his eyes, and nodded, in return, Tang QiaoYuan got the most valuable gentle smile of his life.

 

Read it on milkteatranslations.wrdpres.cm

~ Meeting friends ~

Tang Qiaoyuan brought Fang Su along for meeting friends.

In the room, a friend looked at the dark blue brocade bag at his waist and asked half-jokingly and half-seriously: “I said Tang QiaoYuan, every time I see you carry this purse with you, never changing it, what kind of treasure is that exactly, can you lend it to me so I can take a look?” 

Tang Qiaoyuan heard that but laughed, embraced Fang Su next to him, and asked: “Let them take a look or not?” 

The few friends were highly interested, repeatedly poking fun at him for fearing his wife.

The sky was clear, Fang Su tilted his head to look outside the pavilion, he simply couldn’t hear what they were discussing, he was suddenly called, and turned his head in confusion: “What?”

“Since they are laughing at me for “fearing my wife”, then I have to wait for your ok or not.”

Fang Su didn’t know the cause of the accident, after hearing this his face suddenly turned red, and could only reply softly: “You decide.”

“Then I’m not giving,” Tang QiaoYuan replied straightforwardly, teasing back those people, “The treasure my Su Su handmade, how can it easily be seen by you?”

This time Fang Su heard it clearly, sighed in his heart, and was thinking that in the future it would be better if he doesn’t come along with this person to his meeting friends.” 

~One’s fate~

On the Chinese New Year day, Fang Su went out of the city to sweep the tomb. 

A secluded path led to the depths of the forest, between the trees on the two sides were looming graves. The horse’s hooves slowly stepped, and after a while, it stopped in front of a simple and lonely grave.

Tang QiaoYuan helped Fang Su to get off the horse, helping him to take care of the fallen leaves and the weeds in front of the grave, looking at the rough lettering that hadn’t even been traced in cinnabar, his heart felt a bit uncomfortable. 

But the person beside has been used for many years, persistently carefully wiping the dust off the tombstone with a cotton cloth, extremely similar to the quiet look that was reflected in Tang QiaoYuan’s eye when he first saw him. 

Tang QiaoYuan let out the trace of a smile, asking: “How about looking for an auspicious day to relocate the tomb to somewhere else?”

Fang Su was quite surprised by that, he considered it for a while then shook his head at him: “This place is quite good.”

Tang QiaoYuan really couldn’t understand what was good about this place — — a desolate place in nowhere, overgrown with weeds, and also quite far from the city. But since Fang Su said it, he didn’t need to speak anymore, placing out the incense, candles, and tribute wine from the basket, sincerely worshiping along with Fang Su. 

Until when they were about to leave, Fang Su only sat on the horse’s back and looking around, in a docile manner whispered: “QiaoYuan, you met me here, this place is very good…….mom is blessing me from there.” 

Tang QiaoYuan’s gaze warmed, in an instant, waste weeds and desolate trees became the best landscape. 

“Tomorrow I will ask someone to replace the tombstone with a new one.” 

“Alright.” Fang Su hugged him tightly, and closed his eyes bearing the summer breeze. 

The smile on Tang QiaoYuan’s lips deepened,  protected well the person in his arms, and gripped the rope to drive the horse, horse hooves gradually quickened. 

Along with the disorderly sound of hooves, he remembered that at that time when he got a love poison attack, feeling furious and restless galloped all the way, not knowing why he was led there.   

It was probably as Fang Su said, in the unseen world, having his own shield. 

Thence seeing Fang Su, his life was set. 

~Idle dream~

A square and upright desk was set in the courtyard, an incense burner on top of it, with two wine glasses. 

Fang Su stood silently beside it, and was puzzled for a while, only seeing the person at his side toasting to the sky saying: “With the sky above, thick soil as evidence, I, Tang QiaoYuan with Fang Su are to become brothers with a different surname, not begging to be born on the same year, same month and the same day, only begging to die on the same year, same month and same day. 

Fang Su’s eyelid twitches, only feeling that these words weren’t right, it seemed that this person once told him: Only wished that you would leave before I do, not leaving you lonely and desolate. 

He looked sideways in confusion, only to see Tang QiaoYuan’s appearance unchanged, but seemed to be another person, lifted his cup and looked at him sincerely. 

Fang Su struggled back and forth, after a while, he still couldn’t bear to see him disappointed, silently taking the other cup in his hand. 

The eyes of the person before him were instantly full of joy, drinking up the wine, and made an earth-shattering promise:

“Brotherly friend Fang, in the future as long as older brother has a mouthful to eat, then brotherly friend certainly won’t have one less mouthful of meat. 

Fang Su heard this ear-bursting form of address, in the end, his hand couldn’t help but shake, the liquor spilled all over the floor. 

Through the window, the warm sun was brushing lightly on his face. 

Fang Su woke up from his dream, looking at the still life of the room, and didn’t return to his senses for a long time, it seemed that the three incense sticks from his dream were still burning in front of him. 

Someone called him from outside near the window sill: “Su Su, do you remember where I put my Lishan warm jade chess? Brother Chen came to the mansion to pay a visit, I am looking for it to relieve boredom with him.” 

“… How did you call me?”

Tang QiaoYuan didn’t understand: “Su Su?”

Fang Su enjoyed the aftertaste for a long while, and sighed in relief, fortunately, it wasn’t “Brotherly friend Fang” anymore.

He turned over to get off the bed, and went to the cabinet to get the jade chess for Tang QiaoYuan. 

Tang QiaoYuan thought he was confused by the sleep, smiled and kissed him over the railing, and turned around to meet the guest. 

Fang Su stayed alone in the room, and carefully thought about that absurd odd dream.

A little bit later, Tang QiaoYuan who returned after sending the guest back noticed that Fang Su sent out a post in the friend circle¹, but forgot to block him:

Is there any expert in the thousand friends circle² who knows how to interpret dreams? May I ask what phenomenon is about to appear if I dreamt about my husband turning silly? Urgent, waiting online. 

(Sugar³ master: ?……The phenomenon is, that you probably don’t want to sleep tonight.)

~Years~

Over the years, Fang Su learned to write a notable amount of elegant characters, and paint delicately. Every stroke dipped in ink on the rice paper contains a subtle style that came from Tang QiaoYuan’s brushwork. 

The characters looked like him, the painting style looked like him, only the temperament was not like him. 

Fang Su from many years later, his unchanged temperament was still as soft and gentle as water, day after day, warmly enveloping all of Tang QiaoYuan’s deep feelings. 

　　

[ Bonus nonsense theater]

Fang Su went to see Qin MeiWan with the note.

Qin cousin: He he he I knew you would come.

Su Su: I have something to ask you…

Qin cousin: You ask, I would let you go clearly.

Fang Su took out the note, and pointed at the word after “poison”.

Su Su: How do you read this character?

 Qin cousin vomited blood, and died.

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Notes:

1. Friend circle on WeChat, just like when you post on Facebook. (The author just added a bit of modernity in their historical work lol.)
2. I don’t know if it’s a mistake, because ‘ 网友’ (Wǎngyǒu) means ‘netizens’ but the author used ‘万友’ (Wàn yǒu) which means ‘thousand friends’, the pinyin for both is very similar so it could’ve been a typo that hasn’t been corrected, which happens.
3. Same, 糖 ‘sugar’ and 唐 Tang QiaoYuan’s family name. Typo? Play on words? Idk.

We’ve done for good with Special Fondness! I haven’t even had time to work on my other project… It’s rush period for our sector, before that, I used to take a small coffee break every two hours, and we’re so busy that I barely get the time to go to the toilets… Although our chief or boss doesn’t prohibit us from doing that, we’re just so swamped with work that we’re just trying to do as much as possible… x_x

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Milktea

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