Chapter 3
#No guy would write a love letter to another guy!#
Xu Jingyou had that dream again.
In the dream, it was a familiar narrow alleyway. Every day after school, he had to pass through it. For a long time, he feared it, deliberately taking detours time and again, only to be shoved back into it by others time and again.
“Damn fatty, you’re the one who tatted to the teacher, right?”
“Copying your homework is doing you a favor. Don’t be ungrateful!”
“We just asked you to pass a note during the exam, it’s not like it was a big deal.”
“So what if your grades are good? So what if the teacher likes you? If you offend us, let’s see who in the whole school will dare to talk to you.”
His schoolbag was yanked off, the test papers and textbooks inside dumped out, smeared with mud and shoe prints.
The owner of the schoolbag remained expressionless, forced to passively endure everything.
His stunted height and excessive weight made him the laughingstock of all the boys; and once he became a laughingstock, anything he did became a target for their amusement and attacks. Even if he was just walking, eating, or studying normally, he could be harassed by them anytime, anywhere.
In the alley, he was mercilessly pushed to the ground. He had thought about fighting back, but how could one person stand against seven or eight fists? He had thought about telling his parents, but he couldn’t bear to make his elderly grandparents worry.
It doesn’t matter. Just endure a little longer. Just one more year.
Wait until middle school graduation, and I can leave this environment, fly to another country, and reunite with my parents…
“—Hey! Move if you don’t want to get hit by the ball!”
Suddenly, a voice cut through the alley, like lightning tearing through dark clouds.
Simultaneously, a football sped toward the gathering crowd. The bullies surrounding the fat boy scattered in fright. The ball slammed into the wall with a loud bang and ricocheted back—proof enough of the power behind that kick. A boy deftly hooked his foot, and the ball obediently came to rest beneath the sole of his sneaker.
Everyone’s gaze converged on the football, then traveled up the leg of the person stepping on it, until they saw the boy’s face.
He stood in the sunlight. The golden rays plated him with a fuzzy, glowing halo, making him look like the sunlight itself.
The uninvited guest was wearing the uniform of another school. He was vibrant and spirited. He clearly had likable features, but right now his brows were tightly knit as he glared at the group of bullies.
“Looking at your uniforms, you’re from the No. 1 Middle School Junior Division, right? Why are you bullying a classmate? Hmm? Cat got your tongue? Speak up!”
“You’re asking who I am? Is my name something you’re worthy of asking?!”
“Have you heard of [Name] from the High School Division? That’s my sworn brother!”
“Since you’re bullying a classmate like this today, I’ll have my bro come have a nice little ‘heart-to-heart’ with you tomorrow!”
Under the intimidation of this strange boy, the bullies tucked their tails and ran.
The bullied fat boy sat dazed on the ground, clutching his soiled schoolbag.
The boy kicked the soccer ball aside and strode quickly into the alley. He helped the bullied boy pick up his books and papers, organizing them neatly before stuffing them back into the bag.
“Alright, that bunch of jerks has scrambled. Next time you run into this situation, remember to tell your teachers and parents. There’s no shame in asking adults for help.” The boy crouched down, looking at the pitiful boy in front of him, feeling both angry and annoyed. “How did they hit your face? You’re so swollen I can’t even see your features clearly!!”
The boy’s lips trembled, his face instantly flushing from pale to red. “They didn’t hit my face. I… I’m just fat.”
The boy: “Uh.”
He tried desperately to hold back his laughter, but he failed, bursting out with a pfft.
The boy had been keeping a stern face and a serious expression earlier, but now that he laughed, the dimple on his left cheek appeared, brimming with mirth.
While laughing, the boy reached out and pinched the boy’s soft, doughy cheeks, kneading them with both hands like he was kneading a ball of white glutinous rice cake. I finally understand why the girls in class like buying those ‘squishy’ toys, the boy thought. The texture is so good; it’s really addictive.
The chubby boy was swayed left and right by the kneading until the older boy finally showed mercy and stopped. Cupping the other’s face in his hands, he looked seriously into his eyes.
At the moment their eyes met, the fat boy was certain he was seeing a hero that only appeared in storybooks.
“Don’t be so silly and get bullied again in the future. If you run into trouble again, you can come to the High School Division of Normal U Attached High to find me.”
“Little brother, remember my name.”
“My name is—”
…
Half-asleep and half-awake, Xu Jingyou felt a gaze land on his shoulder.
He roused from his dream, only to realize he had fallen asleep face-down on the long library table. A cup of pearl milk tea suddenly appeared in front of him. He followed the hand holding it upwards, and unsurprisingly, met a jubilant, sunny face.
“I was just about to call you, didn’t expect you to wake up.” Yuan Man shook the milk tea in his hand and winked at him. “Have some milk tea. I went through a lot of trouble to smuggle this in from outside school; I almost got caught by security.”
Xu Jingyou didn’t immediately accept this “goodwill.” He stared at the milk tea for three seconds, using a strictly business-like tone: “The teacher said no drinks allowed in the library.”
Yuan Man: “Aiya, aiya, why are you so rigid? The teacher isn’t here. You don’t say anything, I don’t say anything, who’s going to know?”
Like a rascal, he punched the seal open with the straw and held it to Xu Jingyou’s lips.
Xu Jingyou didn’t know what was wrong with himself, but he actually lowered his head and dazedly took a sip.
The tea flavor was rich, the milk smooth, and even the pearls were chewy and bouncy. It was unexpectedly delicious.
Yuan Man: “Good, right?”
Xu Jingyou nodded slowly.
“As long as it’s good~” Yuan Man said triumphantly. “Stick with Big Brother here, and I guarantee you’ll live the good life. I’ll bring you coffee next time.”
Xu Jingyou stared at the milk tea in front of him, carefully hiding the flutter of joy in his heart.
So there is a next time.
He took another sip of milk tea, finally made up his mind, and stood up to head toward the service desk. “Let’s go.”
“?” Yuan Man didn’t react immediately, staring at his back blankly. “Go where?”
Xu Jingyou: “You’ve been coming here to harass me every day lately, didn’t you want to know the borrower list?” He glanced at him, then looked away. “I can only help you this one time.”
“!!!” Yuan Man’s almond eyes were almost filled to the brim with surprise. He immediately jumped up from the table. “Xu Jingyou, I love you to death!!”
This shout practically echoed through the entire library. In an instant, every student reading nearby glared at him furiously.
“Shh! No loud noises in the library!”
Knowing he was in the wrong, Yuan Man quickly pressed his palms together and whispered apologies. “Sorry, hehe, sorry to disturb everyone, I got too excited.”
He grinningly mimed zipping his lips, walked quickly to Xu Jingyou’s side, and stood on tiptoe trying to sling his arm around his shoulder, but the boy kept a straight face and dodged it.
Yuan Man tilted his head and looked closely, seeing a flush of red creeping up from Xu Jingyou’s neck to his earlobe. It looked almost cooked through.
Yuan Man asked, knowing the answer perfectly well, “Eh? Why is your face so red?”
Xu Jingyou didn’t look at him, coldly tossing out two words: “I’m hot.”
“Oh…” Yuan Man dragged out the syllable. “I thought you got shy because I said ‘I love you to death’ just now.”
Xu Jingyou: “I said, I, am, hot.”
Yuan Man shrugged. “Fine, fine, you’re hot, you’re practically dying of heat… Hey, don’t grip the milk tea so tight, it’s going to explode in a second.”
They walked one after the other back to the service desk. The teacher wasn’t there, and Xu Jingyou was the only one with query access.
He skillfully logged into the system, entered the password, and typed in the book title The Little Prince.
Soon, two whole pages of The Little Prince popped up on the screen. Every version imaginable was collected by the library.
Xu Jingyou: “…That’s a lot.”
Yuan Man: “…That really is a lot.”
Impatient, Yuan Man simply stood directly behind Xu Jingyou, craning his neck to look at the screen. To see more clearly, he leaned half his body weight onto Xu Jingyou’s back, his right hand resting on the boy’s shoulder.
Xu Jingyou’s shoulder instantly turned rock hard.
Yuan Man was focused entirely on finding the person. He carefully identified the titles on the computer and pointed at the screen. “It should be the eighth one, the Illustrated Edition of The Little Prince!”
After pointing, his hand rested back on Xu Jingyou, only this time it landed on Xu Jingyou’s arm.
Now, Xu Jingyou’s arm turned rock hard too.
Yuan Man didn’t think much of it, assuming Xu Jingyou was just carved from ice—naturally stiff and rigid like this.
Xu Jingyou’s right hand, holding the mouse, clicked the eighth link. The list of all students who had borrowed the illustrated edition appeared on the screen.
Among them, the number of people whose borrowing time “coincided” with Yuan Man’s sixteenth birthday was one, two, three, four, five… there were a full ten people!
Yuan Man was a bit surprised. “Why so many?”
As he spoke, the warm breath he exhaled landed on Xu Jingyou’s ear. Xu Jingyou’s fingers tightened around the mouse, the veins on the back of his hand throbbing.
Xu Jingyou just wanted to get this over with quickly. The eyes behind the lenses seemed to be staring at the computer screen, but in reality, his body was just a shell; his soul had long since flown off to who knows where.
He asked, “Xuezhang, are you going to copy down all these names and investigate them one by one?”
“Why go through all that trouble?” Yuan Man shook his head. “Among these people, I can eliminate half of them right now.”
Xu Jingyou: “?”
Yuan Man: “Look at the first one, the third, the fourth, the eighth… the names. At a glance, they’re all boys’ names. We can delete these from the ‘suspect’ list.”
“Why?”
“Where in the world would a boy write a love letter to another boy—” Yuan Man’s expression looked as if he had been struck by lightning as he blurted out, “—That would be so weird!”
Xu Jingyou: “…”
“Well? Are you also impressed by my rigorous deductive skills?”
The thin boy didn’t respond. The light in the eyes behind the lenses simply dimmed a little further.
He picked up the cup of milk tea that was still more than half full. The straw had been bitten flat by him. Using that flattened straw, he forced himself to take another sip.
Who on earth said milk tea was delicious?
It’s full of artificial flavoring, falsely sweet, and choking.
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