FLME Ch4: Cool Guy

Although Yu Wen claimed to have garbage acting skills, his two-hour crash course in crying was quite effective. Coupled with the bonus from his appearance, the final result was quite good. Director Gao’s brows, which had been furrowed all day, finally relaxed.

In front of the monitor, Yu Wen watched from the first second to the last. After finishing, he felt he shouldn’t have dragged them down and let out a small sigh of relief.

Director Gao’s sharp-tongued nature remained unchanged. He dragged the progress bar back and sneered, “What the hell are you acting here? Your lines are mushy, you don’t even open your mouth! With you like this, you still dream of being a big star? Next lifetime!”

When Yu Wen came last time, Director Gao only found him familiar. Later, he accidentally heard the crew members discussing him. Moreover, the assistant director, in order to give Yu Wen a chance, had been nagging in his ear every day; it was hard not to remember.

Not only did he remember this exceptionally good-looking PA, but he also heard about his grand ideals from the makeup team.

A heavy stone in Yu Wen’s heart fell to the ground. His expression relaxed, completely not taking the director’s mockery to heart.

“Not necessarily, you shouldn’t speak too absolutely—”

Director Gao: “?”

Yu Wen: “What if I can’t become one in my next life either?”

Director Gao: “…”

The nearby cameramen struggled to hold back their laughter.

Yu Wen just said it casually. Actually, in his heart, he felt he still had some natural talent. The emotions he couldn’t get right no matter how much he practiced in the washroom naturally poured out once he was under the camera. After Director Gao yelled cut, he even felt like he hadn’t had enough.

Maybe I was born to eat this bowl of rice, Yu Wen thought shamelessly.

A ringtone sounded. Director Gao took out his phone and glanced at it, his expression suddenly changing, looking complicated. He seemed to hesitate whether to answer or not. Yu Wen inadvertently glanced over and saw the caller ID name:

Xie Jiamao.

Yu Wen: “…”

In a flash, the recent rumors in the crew, the “old friend” from his boss’s mouth, the new company needing someone to hold down the fort… connected in Yu Wen’s brainstorm, stringing together into a logically harmonious single event.

Two minutes later, Yu Wen looked away with a natural expression, pretending not to hear Director Gao’s suppressed and irritable voice by his ear.

What did the boss’s sins have to do with his employee?

“Eat… I’m not eating, cut the crap. You cooking personally my ass, when has it not been Xiao Xie cooking and you bringing it out… Does carrying plates count as cooking? If I get nominated for a Magnolia Award, does that mean I dominate the film and television industry?”

“You have the nerve to mention the PPT! Blowing your own horn like that, making Xiao Xie write such unconscionable things… Without Xiao Xie, your trash company is bound to fall apart sooner or later!”

“Xie Jiamao, jokes are jokes, but signing with a company is no small matter. I can’t just happily sell myself to you just because of one word from you. Everyone knows you like to blindly meddle in things, what if this time is also just a three-minute passion… Anyway, if you want me to sign, you have to produce some results first…”

Hanging up the phone, Director Gao noticed that Yu Wen hadn’t left yet, resting his chin on his hand and listening to him scold someone.

“Nice to listen to?”

Director Gao’s expression was displeased, his brows knotting together in a precursor to an outburst of anger.

Yu Wen: “The way you say that, it sounds like I intentionally eavesdropped.”

Yu Wen: “You had it on speaker.”

Director Gao licked his back molars, intentionally glaring at Yu Wen with his sharp, lantern-like bell eyes, trying to scare him. Not only was Yu Wen not scared, he even blinked his own bigger, rounder cat eyes.

Director Gao: Provoking me!

Director Gao bit his inner cheek, then suddenly let out an exasperated laugh.

The kid didn’t know the immensity of heaven and earth, talking back twice for every sentence he said, but surprisingly, he fit his tastes.

Gao Kaiyu was impatient by nature, but that didn’t mean he liked others being overly reverent to him. Yu Wen grasped the degree of being a thorn perfectly; it neither provoked disgust nor failed to pull their interaction into a comfortable range.

He didn’t know if it was accidental or if the kid was truly perceptive. If it was the latter—he was very sharp, and his EQ was quite good.

Maybe he really was born to eat this bowl of rice.

After returning from the Fenghua set, Yu Wen temporarily had no work, becoming a happy salted fish squatting at home and collecting a base salary.

However, he still had to attend acting and vocal classes; after all, he spent money on them. Hearing that he wanted to grasp both acting and singing-dancing, Xie Jiamao immediately wanted to hire a dance teacher for him, but Yu Wen refused. He had a few years of ballet background, and it was hard to change his focal points of exertion in the short term. It was better to put all his energy into acting and vocals; it was more cost-effective.

Unless necessary, he didn’t even want to learn street dance. Changing habits was a very painful thing.

Xie Jiamao felt it was quite a pity, but could only follow his wishes. However, he still discussed with him finding a teacher to guide him first, just to get a feel for the atmosphere.

Yu Wen gladly agreed.

This afternoon, he rode his beloved little electric scooter and rushed to the company. Although Starlight Media was just starting out, it had all the necessary facilities. On the newly renovated tenth floor, there was a dance studio. When Yu Wen arrived, the door was already cracked open a bit, and faint, upbeat music could be heard from inside.

The large floor-to-ceiling windows of the dance studio faced the windows of the building opposite and didn’t have privacy film attached, prioritizing a “holding nothing back” vibe. The person warming up inside had no choice but to pull the thick black curtains closed on both sides, tightly blocking out the bright daylight. The yellow lights above the dance studio were on, enveloping the massive space and the moving person in a dim, ambiguous atmosphere.

Yu Wen pushed the door open a bit more. In the hazy lighting, he saw that person’s superior side profile and the faint glimmer of light flashing past his ear.

Xie Jiamao had said that the teacher coming over temporarily today to give him private lessons was surnamed Xie.

At this moment, Yu Wen should politely call the other party “Teacher Xie”, but the moment he opened his mouth, it was: “It’s you? Cool guy.”

The cool guy turned around, his gaze lingering on his face for two seconds. His raven-black eyelashes lowered thoughtfully, and after a moment he said, “It’s you.”

The cool guy walked over, casually lifting the hem of his shirt to wipe his sweat. Six-pack abs and a lean waistline were on full display, making Yu Wen greedy with envy—he had lied to the assistant director. In fact, his childhood dream wasn’t to be a big star, but to be a tall, lean, and muscular cool guy.

For various reasons, this dream was still just a dream today, with no signs of coming true.

“Yu Wen?” the cool guy inquired.

Yu Wen nodded. “So you’re the dance teacher Boss Xie hired for me. We really have an affinity.”

“…No.” The cool guy bent down, picked up his water bottle, and threw his head back for a gulp. His Adam’s apple bobbed sexily up and down.

“Ah?”

The cool guy lowered his eyelashes, pursed his lips to consider for a moment, “I only danced for a year, I’m not a professional dancer. I don’t deserve the title of teacher.”

Yu Wen blew smoke: “You’re too modest. I know, you must be the company’s specially appointed choreography teacher, right…”

The cool guy still shook his head, too lazy to answer these questions anymore. After a few more casual sentences, Yu Wen finally learned his name—Xie Heyu, derived from the poem line “Crane calls under the moon above the pine, flowers brighten the spring in the clouds.” It sounded very cultured.

Xie Jiamao had said that today’s class was just to feel the atmosphere; sitting on the side and watching was fine. Yu Wen gladly complied, finding a small corner for himself. Over there, Xie Heyu played music to find his rhythm; over here, Yu Wen pulled half a watermelon out of his large backpack.

He also brought two spoons, worried that the dance teacher wouldn’t have tools if he wanted to eat watermelon.

Teacher Xie declined his enthusiastic invitation.

Xie Heyu picked apart the movements while watching a video. He seemed not to have danced for a long time; his movements were rusty, and occasionally details weren’t executed properly, giving off a careless, lazy feel. Yu Wen could see his foundation, but could also tell that he hadn’t danced again for at least two years.

However, some people have talent blended into their flesh and blood, and their muscle memory is deeper than their hippocampus. In just a short moment, Xie Heyu presented an energetic dance with an eighty percent completion rate.

Shifting weight, twisting hips, hitting the beat, waving… It’s often said that tall, thin people have a hard time learning jazz dance well, but the truth was, people with long arms and long legs looked great dancing. It was a highly pleasurable visual enjoyment.

After a dance, Xie Heyu stopped to drink water. Yu Wen gave a seal-like round of applause. He didn’t offer any more flattery, but his eyes were wide and bright, brimming with words of praise.

Xie Heyu glanced at him, put down his water cup, raised it again, repeating this twice, and finally turned his back to him.

Yu Wen: “?”

After dancing for two hours, right as Yu Wen hit the bottom of his watermelon, Xie Heyu turned off the speakers and leaned against the mirror to rest.

The two sat a distance apart. The air held a stuffy, humid heat. Xie Heyu’s bangs were soaked with sweat, his whole person looking like he’d been fished out of the water, even his eyelashes glistening with dampness.

Yu Wen hugged the watermelon rind and chatted with him, asking when he learned jazz.

“Graduation from high school.” Xie Heyu lowered his head, his chopped black hair covering his ear cartilage. A black cartilage stud, different from the previous one, looked restrained and exquisite.

“My family wanted to arrange for someone to enter the entertainment industry and urged me to join a draft show. I practiced singing and dancing for a while, didn’t really like it, so I shelved it.”

This is a humblebrag, isn’t it? Isn’t it? Yu Wen thought sourly.

Under his mother’s influence, he had practiced ballet for a few years, but he was the untalented type. His mother had pulled his hand and said earnestly, “All roads lead to Rome, why hang yourself on a crooked tree? When living, people still need a certain material foundation, don’t you think?”

The underlying meaning was that if he continued dancing ballet, he would starve to death sooner or later.

Yu Wen had to regretfully give up the idea of inheriting his mother’s mantle. He knew he lacked a bit of aura in dance, so he had never held much hope for singing and dancing that revolved around dance.

Xie Heyu was a quiet, reserved handsome guy. Unless necessary, his answers were so concise they were just “Mm,” “Oh,” or “Okay.”

Yu Wen guessed he probably didn’t like others being too enthusiastic towards him. But staying together, it wasn’t good to not say a word. They weren’t familiar with each other; facing each other in silence would only be more awkward.

Yu Wen looked for things to say.

“What does Teacher Xie do?”

“…Studying.”

“Wow, Teacher Xie is so young.”

A moment later.

Yu Wen: “Is Teacher Xie in high school or college?”

“…”

“Should be college.” Yu Wen got the answer from Xie Heyu’s expression and nodded to himself.

He glanced at Xie Heyu, and suddenly said out of the blue, “Teacher Xie’s earring is really nice.”

Unlike the boring small talk from before, this sentence carried a degree of genuine sincerity.

Xie Heyu looked sideways, casting him a glance.

Two minutes later, the solid black ear cuff from Xie Heyu’s cartilage was worn on Yu Wen’s ear. The latter looked in the mirror, slightly dazed. “Wasn’t it an earring stud…?”

“It’s an ear cuff today.” Xie Heyu adjusted the position for him and said in a low voice, “It suits you.”

“Does it?” Yu Wen carefully examined himself in the mirror. After a moment of surprise, a feeling of handsomeness belatedly washed over him. He admired himself like a peacock spreading its tail feathers, then turned to ask Xie Heyu, “I feel like I have a bit of an American street-style trendy boy vibe, what do you think?”

Under his weird comparison, Xie Heyu fell silent for two seconds, before nodding resignedly, “Mm, you do.”

Yu Wen felt beautiful.

He suddenly felt that Xie Heyu was extremely friendly and lovable. He eagerly exchanged contact information and asked for all the ear cuffs in Teacher Xie’s shopping history. Finally, he solemnly declared, “From now on, I leave the matter of ear cuffs in your hands.”

Xie Heyu was currently a sophomore in college. He had classes in the afternoon and couldn’t stay long. After packing up his things, the two said a brief goodbye.

Xie Heyu picked up his backpack. On his way out, he inexplicably paused. Holding the door handle with one hand, he looked back at Yu Wen.

“Have we… met before?” he asked.