The White Olive Tree

Chapter 48

Song Ran hesitated for a moment before asking, "You're free now?"

Li Zan replied, "The team is resting for a few days."

She glanced back at her car, thinking he might prefer it, but Li Zan, interpreting her look as hesitation, confidently walked to his motorcycle and looked back at her and said, "Come on."

Song Ran, slightly puzzled, pointed towards her car, "Not going in my car?"

"It's too slow," Li Zan responded.

"I thought it was pretty fast..." Song Ran mumbled, but Li Zan had already handed her a helmet.

Approaching, she took the helmet and put it on.

It occurred to her belatedly, how did he know she was heading to the western suburbs? Li Zan, having already put on his helmet, turned to check on her and noticed she hadn't fastened the strap.

He reached out, almost touching it before retracting his fingers and simply pointing, "The strap."

"Hmm?"

"You didn't fasten it."

"Oh." Song Ran secured the strap and stepped onto the footrest. The motorcycle slightly tilted; Li Zan steadied it with one foot, supporting her.

Once she was seated and gripped the back of the seat, adjusting her position to maintain a careful distance from him, he asked, "All set?"

"All set," she confirmed.

Li Zan started the motorcycle, and they sped off towards the west.

The city's roads were rough, and Song Ran found herself bouncing against him. Each bump pushed her forward, making her shift awkwardly back, only to be jolted forward again.

After several uncomfortable bumps, at one point she even ended up pressing against his back, blushing furiously before hastily moving back.

Eventually, Li Zan stopped the motorcycle, turned slightly, and suggested, "If you sit closer to me, you won't sway as much."

"Oh. Okay."

Before she could adjust, another bump sent her lurching forward again, her body pressing against his rigid back, her heart nearly leaping out of her throat, and her legs splayed behind him.

This time, she didn't move back but leaned slightly forward, resting against him. As he had said, joining as a single unit seemed to stabilize them, reducing the jolting and bumping to just a soft rustling of clothes against each other.

Her hands remained tightly gripped to the seat, her face burning silently.

Neither of them spoke, remaining in silence for a long time. The only sound along the way was the distant gunfire from the combat zone.

After a while, Li Zan asked her casually, "What about that journalist, Saxin?"

"Huh?" She looked up from watching the ground swiftly receding beneath them, meeting his shoulder as she replied, "I don't know. I can't reach him."

"What do you mean you can't reach him?"

"I only have his social media. We used to communicate through messages. Now he doesn't reply."

Li Zan fell silent for a while before saying, "He seems quite young."

"Yes, 20 years old. He's almost 21 now."

After a long pause, he said, "I hope he's okay."

"He should be fine..." Before Song Ran could finish her sentence, a nearby house in the alley was shaken by the nearby artillery fire. A piece of the outer wall fell off, hitting both of them on the shoulder, spraying dust and choking Song Ran.