Chapter 1: The Case of the Missing Underwear
“Ah Yan, why is my underwear in your room…?”
It was early evening. The old-fashioned wall clock ticked rhythmically, the minute hand tirelessly chasing the hour hand.
Jiang Yunian held a stack of freshly collected laundry, his brows furrowed slightly. The pair of white underwear he had just changed out of the day before yesterday was missing.
“Ah Yan, did you bring the laundry in yesterday?”
The only sound in the living room was the noise from the television. Jiang Yan had the back of his head turned toward him, motionless.
“It is reported that the Qisheng Group held a press conference at 2:00 PM this afternoon to announce the appointment of the Chairman’s adopted son, Qi Liangji, as the new CEO…”
Watching the news with such intensity? Jiang Yunian sighed and started searching on his own. As he passed the sofa, he accidentally blocked half the TV screen.
Across from him, Jiang Yan frowned and shifted his weight to the side, moving his butt over.
Jiang Yunian, still muttering about his underwear, scanned the room but found nothing. He turned and went into the bedroom.
A moment later, the TV cut to commercials. Jiang Yan grabbed the remote and pressed a few buttons, but the screen didn’t react. With this kind of old TV, you were stuck watching whatever was broadcast; there was no way to rewind.
He tossed the remote aside casually. It landed with a muted thud against the not-quite-soft, not-quite-hard sofa cushion.
The house only had two rooms in total. Jiang Yunian occupied the smaller secondary bedroom. He rummaged through the wardrobe, the laundry hamper, and even looked under the bed—nothing.
Jiang Yunian felt a bit deflated. He gripped the doorframe and asked again, “Ah Yan, have you seen my underwear?”
“…”
“It’s the white pair.” Afraid the other man couldn’t hear, Jiang Yunian shuffled over in his slippers. “The ones I just changed into the day before yesterday.”
Back when he lived alone, he used to toss his underwear on top of his clothes after a shower to make hand-washing easier. But after Jiang Yan arrived, his underwear always ended up buried at the bottom of the pile, forcing him to dig them out to wash separately every time.
Later, as Jiang Yan’s hands healed, he occasionally volunteered to take on small chores. He should remember.
The TV switched back to the news. Jiang Yan maintained his posture, watching intently like a devout believer.
The wind blew in through the window, causing the thin blanket draped over his knees to slip halfway down, revealing a slightly protruding wrist bone.
Jiang Yan’s fingers were beautiful—slender, clean, and with well-defined knuckles. They didn’t look like hands meant for manual labor. The first time Jiang Yunian saw him washing his underwear, he had been quite surprised.
When he first “picked up” Jiang Yan, the man was dressed in expensive clothing from head to toe. Jiang Yunian thought he had taken in a wealthy young master. He hadn’t expected the man to handle dirty work like washing someone else’s underwear without a hint of hesitation, and with skilled hands at that.
“Ah Yan?” Jiang Yunian waved a hand in front of his face. “Did you see…”
Jiang Yan suddenly lifted his eyelids.
Jiang Yunian’s fingers froze in mid-air.
Those eyes were pitch-black, casting deep, heavy shadows.
But in just a split second, Jiang Yan restrained his expression and spoke in a very euphemistic tone:
“Ge*… I can’t fit into them.”
(Note: “Ge” means older brother, used here affectionately).
It’s free-size, how could you not fit?
Jiang Yunian asked, “Then do you remember where you put them?”
Just as he asked, the wall clock chimed loudly. Dong, dong. It was dinner time.
Jiang Yan shook his head.
Not getting the answer he wanted, Jiang Yunian felt a little dejected. Although he bought the underwear on discount, they weren’t exactly cheap. He hadn’t worn them many times; losing them was a pity.
And he still hadn’t started cooking dinner…
While he was fretting over the lost underwear and the evening meal, the person next to him silently picked up the remote, calmly changed the channel, and started watching a soap opera.
Jiang Yunian refused to give up. Even pennies count. In the end, he found them in a pile of old clothes in his parents’ room.
While rummaging, he noticed a picture frame lying face down in the clothing pile—it must have fallen from the bedside table. As he lifted the frame, his hand shook off the dust gathering on the glass.
The photo was of his parents. It was the last picture they took together while they were alive.
His father had an accident while working at heights during Jiang Yunian’s first year of high school. His mother, overcome with grief, developed severe eye issues. All the family’s savings went into treating her illness, but even so, she passed away a year later. Aside from their bitter-fated child, all the couple left behind in this world was this old, dilapidated, small apartment that barely offered shelter from the wind and rain.
Since then, this room had remained empty. It wasn’t until Jiang Yan appeared a month ago that it saw some human presence again.
Finally found it.
Jiang Yunian let out a sigh of relief. Money saved.
But then, he noticed something was wrong. The white underwear, mixed in with the old clothes, had gotten a bit dirty. When he touched it, the fabric felt cold against his fingers. It didn’t feel like it had been washed and dried.
Jiang Yunian pinched the soggy underwear, his face full of confusion as he walked back to the living room.
“Ah Yan.” He walked up to the sofa and held up the crumpled ball of white fabric. “This… why was this in your room?”
From the TV came the sound of weeping; the female lead was crying pearly tears in the male lead’s arms.
Jiang Yan turned his head. His gaze landed on the white bundle, pausing for two seconds. Then, he looked up at the owner of the underwear with a hint of bewilderment, as if he couldn’t understand why Jiang Yunian was dangling a pair of dirty children’s underwear in front of him.
Is this something worth showing off?
“You found it?” Jiang Yan masked the emotion in his eyes and pinched a corner of the fabric. “So small. It’s really cute.”
“It’s free-size, it’s not small,” Jiang Yunian mumbled. “Why was my underwear in your room, and it’s even…”
He tightened his grip on the cold, damp cloth, stopping himself from saying the word “wet.”
Jiang Yan blinked, offering no denial. “I might have taken it by mistake.”
He paused, then added, “It rained the last two days. The balcony leaks.”
Jiang Yunian looked down at the underwear, then back at Jiang Yan. Jiang Yan was wearing one of his father’s old T-shirts, washed until it was white and faded. The collar was loose and curled at the edges, revealing a section of his collarbone.
“But there’s a weird smell on it.” Jiang Yunian couldn’t ignore the strange texture.
“Ge.” Jiang Yan’s expression was very calm. He stood up, towering over Jiang Yunian by more than half a head, casting a shadow over him. “You smelled it wrong.”
His voice was low, his breath ghosting faintly over Jiang Yunian’s ear. “That happens when things sit for a long time.”
On the TV, the heroine let out a sudden, heartbreaking wail. Jiang Yunian took a half-step back, his calf bumping against the edge of the coffee table.
Jiang Yan glanced at the item in his hand, his eyes holding a hint of hard-to-read playfulness. “It’s so small, no wonder it got lost.”
“Where is it small…” Jiang Yunian retorted quietly, but his gaze involuntarily drifted downward. Jiang Yan was wearing a pair of ill-fitting track pants. The loose fabric didn’t reveal any extraordinary gifts, only a faintly visible, slight contour.
But Jiang Yan’s expression didn’t look like he was lying. Jiang Yunian couldn’t help but be curious.
Is he really that big?
Jiang Yan was tall, nearly 1.9 meters, with broad shoulders and long limbs. Compared to Jiang Yunian’s own slender arms and legs, he was indeed outstanding in every aspect. But down there… aren’t all Asians about the same?
When he lived in the dorms during high school, his roommates had compared sizes. It was perfectly normal. Even in the adult films he occasionally clicked on, the truly exceptional ones were rare as phoenix feathers. They were all Asian; how much difference could there really be? Even the supermarket sold “free-size” underwear for everyone.
“What is Ge looking at?” Jiang Yan suddenly reached out, waving a hand in front of Jiang Yunian’s eyes, which were staring blankly at his crotch.
Jiang Yunian jolted. The underwear accidentally slipped from his hand and fell to the floor. He instinctively started to bend down to pick it up, but then he heard Jiang Yan’s voice come from above.
“Don’t move. It’s dirty.”
His semi-bent posture positioned his face awkwardly close to a certain embarrassing part of Jiang Yan. If he went any lower, he feared… Jiang Yunian squeezed his eyes shut, hesitating whether to pick it up or not.
Before he could decide, Jiang Yan picked it up for him. His lowered lashes showed not a shred of guilt. “Sorry, Ge. I won’t take the wrong one next time.”
It couldn’t be helped. Who told him to only buy free-size underwear? Jiang Yunian silently straightened up, not blaming him.
Jiang Yan weighed the fabric in his hand and asked, “Are you still going to wear this?”
Jiang Yunian felt a pinch of pain in his heart. He had fought hard for that discount price, and he hadn’t even worn them a few times.
“It’s all dirty now,” he said, feeling the financial sting. “I don’t want it.”
“Then give it to me,” Jiang Yan said.
Seeing the filth on the fabric staining Jiang Yan’s hand, a ridiculous thought suddenly popped into Jiang Yunian’s head: “You aren’t going to…”
Jiang Yan’s movements paused, his expression somewhat innocent. “What are you thinking, Ge? I just wanted to help you throw it away.”
Jiang Yunian didn’t know whether to believe him or not. His gaze swept over Jiang Yan’s shabby outfit, looking for all the world like someone who was being mistreated. His chest tightened slightly.
Originally, he thought Jiang Yan wouldn’t stay long, so he had given him old clothes that were either brand new with tags (but unwanted) or rarely worn. Thinking about it now, those clothes were either unraveling or faded, and the pants were always a bit too short. Jiang Yan had never complained about this. He wore whatever he was given. He even silently endured underwear that was too small. He was so sensible it was heartbreaking.
“Better to just throw it away,” Jiang Yunian said, afraid the man might actually pick it out of the trash to wear. “After we eat, I’ll take you to buy new ones.”
Jiang Yan’s pitch-black eyes studied him quietly for a moment before he replied with a simple, “Okay.”
The sky had turned completely dark. Jiang Yunian busied himself with dinner. In the intervals between chopping vegetables, he glanced at Jiang Yan, who was wearing those ill-fitting clothes, curled up quietly in the shadowy corner of the sofa. It felt somewhat unreal.
But the extra set of bowls and chopsticks, the pair of matching slippers, and the TV playing in the living room that was rarely turned on before… all clearly reminded him that this small, long-deserted house truly had another person in it now.
It had only been a short month, yet so many changes had occurred.
He still remembered that when he first saved the injured Jiang Yan, he had selfish motives. Seeing the man dressed so expensively, he thought that saving him might lead to some kind of reward.
Later, watching Jiang Yan quietly eating the food he cooked, curling up on the sofa to watch that ancient TV, occasionally lending a hand with whatever small chores he could manage, and accompanying him through his impoverished days… over time, that selfish motive had faded away.
Sometimes, he even selfishly hoped that Jiang Yan would be slow to recover his memory, just so he could stay with him a little longer.
Being one person… was just too lonely.
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