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Tang Ruoyao could feel her heartbeat in her throat: "!!!"
She stood there, not quite sure what she should do. She should probably wash off the shower gel on her body before Qin Yinong walked in. Or grab the robe… or just didn’t do anything at all and see what Qin Yinong would do.
The touch of their bodies, the pleasure of lovemaking.
Tang Ruoyao swallowed drily and exhaled quickly.
It didn’t matter what she wanted to do; she just needed to obey.
There was a bit of shame in this thought, but there was also an inexplicable rush of desire. Tang Ruoyao wrung the excess water from her long wet hair, unconsciously pursed her lips, and began to feel heat at the tips of her ears.
Qin Yinong's footsteps were very soft, but because she was concentrating, Tang Ruoyao could hear them clearly, one by one, like they had synced with her own heartbeat. Tang Ruoyao didn't dare to make a loud noise, staring intently in the direction of the door.
Qin Yinong's figure was reflected on the door!
Tang Ruoyao's whole body was tense, and one hand was clenched into a fist on her side. She could hardly keep her hands from trembling.
After Qin Yinong came in, what would she say? Hello? Not say anything?
Would it be better to be cold and not acknowledge her, or to forgo any semblance of dignity and try to please her?
She looked down at herself. Half of her body was covered with the white foam of shower gel. As if she were waking up from a dream, she hurried over to turn on the shower, and the hot water came down again. Her noisy heartbeat had been covered by the sound of falling water.
Thanks to the previous designer, all that separated the bathroom and the bedroom was a thin glass door, so there was hardly any sound insulation.
The sudden sound of the shower calmed Qin Yinong's hot head, and her eyes became clear.
She closed her eyes and took a gentle breath. Having to force herself to withdraw the hand on the door, she turned and walked away all in one stride.
...
Tang Ruoyao put on a bathrobe and came out of the bathroom. Preoccupied with tying the bathrobe around her waist, she was startled once she looked up.
Qin Yinong sat leaning on the bedroom’s bay window with one leg bent and the other hanging in the air, swaying lightly. Her eyes were ethereal. It was not her actions that startled Tang Ruoyao, but the cigarette between her thin white fingers.
"Since when do you smoke?" Tang Ruoyao came forward and took the unlit cigarette from her hand with ease.
This brand of women's cigarettes had a long and slender body, a pale white color, and a slight scent. On the end of the cigarette butt were black painted thorns.
Qin Yinong smiled, not annoyed at her for taking the cigarette. Two fingers pinched another cigarette from the case on the side, and she rolled the tip of her tongue slightly. She held it in her mouth effortlessly.
She naturally tilted her head when she was smoking. Her breath sank slightly while the corners of her mouth raised. Her eyes were chasing the smoke, clear and blurry, clear and blurry, and she behaved just like an experienced smoker.
Why did she suddenly get such an addiction to cigarettes?
Tang Ruoyao was slightly stunned, but did not dare to show it in front of her.
Qin Yinong didn't answer nor explain. She raised her hand hanging by her side, holding the same black metal lighter in her palm.
click… clack...
click… clack...
The lid of the lighter opened and closed rhythmically, reacting nimbly to Qin Yinong's slender, white fingertips.
Tang Ruoyao made an imperceptible movement to adjust her breathing.
"It was for filming." Qin Yinong spoke unhurriedly, playing with the lighter in her hand. She looked up at Tang Ruoyao teasingly.
Tang Ruoyao’s scalp felt like it was burning. She had to force herself not to question further.
Tang Ruoyao was pierced by her thoughts, and the lobes of her ears were stained with crimson. After a second of silence, she whispered, "Well, smoking is bad for your health."
Qin Yinong nodded and chuckled.
"I know, I'm already quitting."
"Then you still..." Tang Ruoyao was puzzled.
Shouldn't you throw away your cigarettes when you quit?
Qin Yinong pressed the switch of the lighter, and a tongue-shaped yellow and red flame shot up.
Tang Ruoyao watched the flame slowly approaching the cigarette in Qin Yinong's mouth, and her fingertips curled up. But when she wanted to reach out, the flame stopped a few centimeters away from the cigarette butt.
Qin Yinong's hands were steady; she didn't struggle with cigarette addiction.
"Ah-li." Qin Yinong suddenly raised her eyes to look at her with a cold, desolate gaze.
Tang Ruoyao replied, “Mn.” Looking at Qin Yinong’s eyes, she felt her heart sink down a bit.
The saddened indifference in Qin Yinong's eyes suddenly disappeared, as if it were never there.
She took the cigarette in her mouth and said quietly: "People have so many desires. Do we have to satisfy every desire?"
"If it doesn't violate laws or morality, it's okay," Tang Ruoyao answered after some consideration.
"But people's desires are endless. Can you guarantee that once a desire is fulfilled, there won't be another to take its place? Once you taste the sweetness, it is difficult to stop." Qin Yinong sneered, "Otherwise, why would the word ‘boundless avarice’ exist? (T/N "boundless avarice" 欲壑难填 is literally the two words “desire” and “difficult to fill'' next to each other) Desire is a hungry beast locked in an iron cage with its mouth wide open. It sits and salivates as it waits, and it will be swallowed by itself when it is released. So the more you want, the more restraint it will take. It could go from something as small as a cigarette, or candy, to…”
Qin Yinong glanced at her deeply.
The more things you have access to, the deeper it could get. One wrong step, and you could fall into the abyss and be broken into pieces.
Tang Ruoyao looked startled.
"So the best way is to restrain it from the beginning."
Qin Yinong lit the cigarette, silently lowered her eyelids, and watched it quietly burn in her finger. White mist curled up, and the smell of smoke filled the air. For smokers who quit smoking, their senses will instinctively react and stimulate the salivary glands to make their mouths water.
Tang Ruoyao clearly saw Qin Yinong's swallow by the movements of her neck, and her expression looked vaguely uncomfortable.
Tang Ruoyao still didn't understand why she had to torture herself so much.
Qin Yinong smiled at Tang Ruoyao's dumbfounded appearance.
She really drank too much today, and she actually said these things to Tang Ruoyao. Or, she had an unrealistic fantasy in her heart, hoping that Tang Ruoyao could understand her. But so what if she did understand it? She couldn't even save herself. But could she really expect a kid just 22 years old to be able to help her?
"Acting is also a kind of desire. We usually call it the desire to perform. It also requires restraint. Going beyond one’s limit is as bad as falling short." Qin Yinong raised her voice slightly, pulling back her distraction.
Tang Ruoyao uttered blankly, “Ah.” Although she wondered if Qin Yinong had skipped a transition in her thought process, she straightened her posture quickly and listened to Qin Yinong's teachings.
Three years ago, not long after Tang Ruoyao entered film school, she still did not have a complete vision of what “performance” was. It was not the school teachers who gave her enlightenment, but Qin Yinong. Qin Yinong's teachings were the sole reason for her passing the director's audition for her first film. Even though Tang Ruoyao still did not dare to compliment Qin Yinong's character at that time, she had to admit that Qin Yinong was an actress born to act. While acting, no matter how many actors were around, she was the only one, a sun bright enough to eclipse anything in its path.
Qin Yinong was her sponsor, her teacher, and after the two had met, she became the person she admired most of all actors; her idol.
"That ‘Astral Variation’ that you released last year is a negative example of uncontrollable desire for performance." Qin Yidong raised her eyelids and glanced at her calmly, and the iconic sloppy smile that she often hung on her face was reduced. There was a faint coldness and majesty in the voice.
"What do you mean?"
Tang Ruoyao looked at her directly, and didn't blindly bow her head to admit her mistakes just because Qin Yinong was an authority on acting. She didn’t take popular roles just to stroke her ego. The people who worked alongside her liked her, so what could she mean by this, saying she couldn't hold her desire to perform?
A small smile flashed across Qin Yinong's eyes, and her chin lifted, motioning her to sit down by her side.
The opening of the bathrobe was low. When Tang Ruoyao bent over to sit next to her, her neckline was wide open, revealing a sheet of thin, snowy skin. Qin Yinong accidentally saw two cherry blossoms atop snow-capped mountains, and looked away uncomfortably, watching her movements from the corner of her eyes. She waited for her to sit down, and then turned back nonchalantly.
Tang Ruoyao didn't notice anything, tilted her head down, and adjusted the hem of the bathrobe.
"The reason why an actor is an actor is that as soon as the director says ‘go,’ a completely different person will immediately appear. They will be fully immersed in the performance, right?"
Tang Ruoyao nodded.
Almost all actors are like this, she thought it represents concentration and accomplishment, doesn't it?
She expressed doubt with her eyes.
Qin Yinong didn't answer for the time being, tapping her index finger on her knee, raising her eyebrows and asking her: "Do you remember where ‘Astral Variation’ was filmed?"
"It was in a special needs program." Tang Ruoyao responded.
"Astral Variation" is a film aimed at special needs education. Tang Ruoyao played a teacher, and she studied sign language for several months for the role.
"Are all the students in it real?"
"Yes, the crew chose a special needs program to shoot in."
"How long did it take to shoot?"
"Three months."
"What about those students, how many of them do you remember?"
Tang Ruoyao couldn’t say anything. She was silent.
Qin Yinong's eyes were cold, and she asked in a deep voice, "You were committed to it for three months, and it didn't even have any impression on you?" Tang Ruoyao immediately concluded: "I..." She raised her eyes slowly. She said weakly, "Jiejie..."
Qin Yinong's expression was more relaxed, as she had just taught her pupil a new lesson.
Because the special needs school was a real environment with real students, a teacher working in a special school should be like a teacher who really worked there. She should get along with the students, instead of just superficially acting out her own role in the drama. Actually becoming the role one performs demanded control over desire.
Tang Ruoyao was talented in acting: she was naturally gifted and she made rapid progress. When Qin Yinong and the directors went out for lunch together, they chatted about the new generation of actors. Tang Ruoyao was the first to be mentioned every time.
She was also fascinated by her talent and ability to blindly pursue her improvement. If this went on, she would sooner or later become a performance machine without emotion and humanity. That was not what Qin Yinong wanted to see for anyone, and she didn’t want that for Tang Ruoyao’s future in particular. Development can be harmful.
During the conversation, the cigarette between her fingers had burnt to the end. Qin Yinong got up, didn’t hesitate to extinguish the cigarette, and threw it into the trash can. She looked back at Tang Ruoyao, whose eyebrows were furrowed, giving away that she was lost in thought. Qin Yinong went to the living room to pour a glass of water, and afterwards sat next to her, sipped it, and waited patiently.
After a while, Tang Ruoyao moved suddenly. She quickly got up, bent over to give a proper bow, straightened up again with eyes gleaming, and solemnly said: "Jiejie, thank you for teaching me."
This was for the teacher. A bow.
This kid.
Qin Yinong looked at her directly for two seconds, then suddenly chuckled.
Tang Ruoyao was puzzled by her smile.
Qin Yinong cleared her throat and lazily glanced at her with narrowed eyes. Holding a smile on the corners of her lips, she said leisurely: "Of course Jiejie teaches you; it is in exchange for tuition."
The atmosphere around her body suddenly tightened. When the two looked at each other, invisible sparks shot out in the air.
Tang Ruoyao's throat tightened, resisting the urge to swallow, looked into those dark eyes, and whispered: "What tuition?" The next moment, Tang Ruoyao was suddenly lost in an embrace. Along the way, she fell into the arms of a woman's gentle fragrance.
The sweet, cold fragrance filled the tip of her nose, and Tang Ruoyao's mind was spinning.
The waist tie of her bathrobe loosened.
Tang Ruoyao lowered her eyes and saw Qin Yinong's white jade-like hand, holding her bathrobe tie, slowly pulling out little by little.
Qin Yinong tilted her head, and once again her breath was on the other’s ears, tormenting them, breathing out cool air.
"Your body. Will you give it to me?"
The author has something to say:
Sister think about it, this is a development article (*/ω＼*)
ps: The "restraint" of performance desire, the theory of actor's control, use a program "The Performer's Word", Zhou Xun And Qin Hailu's period
next chapter Translated by mooie, edited by mooie and noba.